One popular saying in the interlacustrine region of East Africa (also known as the Great Lakes), goes thus in one of my Grandmas’ tongues: ow’omutwe muhango, n’obu otariisize, noyonesa, meaning once you are notoriously known for being careless with your flock, and it often destroys neighbours’ crops, even the day your flock is securely tethered at home, you are the automatic culprit in a case of crops destroyed by an unknown flock.
This nugget
of wisdom can’t be more apt to our checkered EAC integration agenda than in the
last three months as the body got a new leadership. First, it was the new
Secretary General of the EAC, Dr Peter Mathuki from Kenya, who took the relay
from Burundian economist Liberat Mfumukeko (we argue that this latter performed
to stakeholder expectations). Dr Mathuki, who moved to the EAC Secretariat from
the helm of the EABC (East African Business Council), had NTBs( non-tariff barriers)
as his automatic culprit, in his very first reported words regarding his new
office and its exigencies. ‘It must be
NTBs…this is obvious’, is the latest accusation we have from the new CEO at the
East African Business Council, Rwandan economist, Mr John Bosco Kalisa. Yes,
NTBs must be eliminated, was the news tagline featuring his maiden tour of
manufacturing industries in Uganda.
Yet
truth be told, the Culprit is elsewhere, though occasionally NTB lets his
animals loose into neighbours’ crop fields. It is these real culprits that the
new leadership and EAC Secretariat and EABC Secretariat need to smoke out and
parade them to pay for their negligence, with appropriate compensation to the
families whose crops have been devoured. The Real Culprits are legion but can
be tamed once the gang leaders are netted. And both men have what it takes to
refocus the direction of our integration if it is to live to our hopes, dreams
and aspirations.
Real Culprit
Number One is the delusional
‘private-sector, citizen-led’ integration, which deviated from the
strong pillars and anchors of the pioneer EAC: East African Airways, East
African Ports and Harbours, East African Posts and Telecommunications, East
African Common Services Organisation, East African Literature Bureau, East
African Railways, East African Examinations Council, East African Currency
Board, and many more, all thriving on active,
dirigiste State involvement . The only
survivors of this era are The East African Development Bank and the
Inter-University Council of East Africa, both headquartered in Uganda. In
conformity with the ‘new paradigm’, the developmental State of the old EAC was relegated,
with government presence only replicated in the assembly, council of ministers
and the Summit, where the Heads of State and Government meet as the final
political organ.
The result of this ‘citizen-led’ integration has
been a plethora of ‘stakeholder’ organs and bodies in Arusha, with overlapping
paper missions, visions, goals, objectives. The common binding thread(and
perhaps prima faciae raison d’être) of all these organisations, is development
partner financing. More on this culprit soon.
Luckily
for us and the top honchos in Arusha, the culprit buster for this premier faux
pas of EAC integration is there for takes it is called The Kampala
Agreement. This is one valuable
inheritance from the Founding Fathers that we have chosen to ignore. It was
signed in Mbale, Uganda in early 1970s, and its core tenet is planned, evenly distributed
industrialisation across the EAC. We start from here. And the rest will fall in
line. Stay tuned.
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