Kenya must guard her lead role in region

American designer Virgil Abloh once said: “The whole point of collaboration is that you give and take from each other, and that’s how you create things that are totally new.” Now, he was not thinking about the relationship between Kenya and her neighbours. But his saying accurately describes some of the recent bilateral agreements made by Kenya, Uganda and South Sudan, regarding port space on Kenyan soil.

During his recent state visit, South Sudanese President Salva Kiir accepted the offer of a 10-acre piece of land in Naivasha to build a dry port to ease the movement of goods and boost trade between the two countries. The dry port will be built at the Inland Container Depot at the Naivasha Special Economic Zones, and will serve as a logistics hub for the Sh2.5 trillion Lamu Port South Sudan-Ethiopia Transport Corridor Project.