Uhuru: EAC process still on course

By ALLY JAMAH

KENYA: President Uhuru Kenyatta has termed the East African integration as being “firmly on course” despite the recent friction with Tanzania.

The neighbouring country claimed it had been sidelined from the process.

Addressing members of the East African Legislative Assembly in Nairobi yesterday, the President said EAC has acquired an unstoppable momentum that is irreversible.

“The people of East Africa are interacting at such a rising rate and exchanging information, goods and services at such growing volumes that our borders have become mere formalities,” he said.

He added: “The growing benefits of interactions across our various borders have catalysed East Africans’ desire for integration. This popular desire makes integration inevitable in due course.”

Tanzania has recently claimed being “sidelined” from key meetings of EAC.

Tanzania President Jakaya Kikwete was not invited to an EAC meeting held last August in Mombasa and attended by Presidents Kenyatta, Yoweri Museveni (Uganda) and Paul Kagame (Rwanda), to discuss crossborder projects.

A recent meeting in Kigali also saw the Presidents of Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda and South Sudan sign a host of protocols and agreements, but Tanzania and Burundi were absent.