The project was announced yesterday by Kenya's Minister of Transport James Macharia, who after signing the agreement with colleagues from South Sudan and Ethiopia, contracted two different companies for the works and obtained funds from the World Bank for the first batch of works.
We are talking about the 4-lane motorway that will link Kenya and Ethiopia via Juba, the capital of today’s South Sudan.
The construction of the motorway is part of the great project for the entire African port of Lamu, in fact, the World Bank's financing also includes the construction of the Lamu-Garissa-Isiolo motorway section, which will in fact link the Ethiopian road haulage to the outlet on the ocean and the possibility of loading crude oil from the Kenyan refineries and shipping other products.
The Lamu-Isiolo motorway has been contracted out to the Lamu Road Consortium (LRC), which consists of a South African company, Group Five Proprietary Limited and the Development Bank of Southern Africa. They will finance the entire construction of the 530 km of road at a cost of $620 million. Roadworks to start in may 2018.
The South African Consortium will remain the owner of the motorway and collect tolls for 25 years, after which Kenya will return to possession.
The Lamu-Isiolo highway will in fact connect to the other motorway that will reach Addis Ababa.
For South Sudan and Ethiopia the highway will be crucial to reach the coast and not having to depend on the import-export from Sudan, where President-Dictator Bashir imposes ever higher taxes on Port Sudan.