Key issues as DR Congo's Tshisekedi visits Tanzania

Dar/Arusha. Grand infrastructure projects such as the standard gauge railway (SGR) and highway construction took centre stage yesterday when President Samia Suluhu Hassan welcomed her Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) counterpart, Félix Tshisekedi.

The two leaders are stepping their countries’ bilateral ties, focusing primarily on joint infrastructure projects as they seek to improve trade, investment, and social cooperation to fully unlock their growth potentials.

On President Tshisekedi’s first day of his official visit yesterday, the two countries signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on areas of cooperation.

President Hassan said the two countries recently formed a committee comprising ministers from each side to look into areas of cooperation, and the team came up with 50 recommendations.

“Recently the ministers from Tanzania, Burundi and the DRC met in the United States at the World Bank and International Monetary Fund offices to request for funds to implement a major SGR project that would connect the three countries via Tanzania’s Kigoma Region,” she said.

She mentioned the development of Kibirizi port on Lake Tanganyika and a number of other projects as furthersteps towards fostering trade between Tanzania and the DRC.

“Data shows that there has been a slowdown of trade between the two countries for the past ten years and our goal is to change that. The DRC is ready to receive members of the business community from Tanzania and we already have several others who are currently doing business there, including in some big agriculture projects,” President Hassan said.

According to Mr Tshisekedi, improving trade and investment ties within the African region was key in development and a way for the region to reduce its dependency on foreign aid.

President Tshisekedi said he is looking forward to cooperating with Tanzania and other East African Community (EAC) in creating solutions to combat the climate change which is an imminent issue regionally and globally.

Why DRC matters to Tanzania

DRC, the vast country in the heart of Africa, is the largest market for Tanzania’s sea ports, accounting for close to 38 percent. This, along with Zambia’s 26 percent, accounts for the bulk of what Tanzania’s seaports need to remain increasingly relevant.

The DRC plays a key role if Tanzania is to yield lucrative returns on its massive investments in improving the Port of Dar es Salaam as well as Kigoma and Karema in Lake Tanganyika.

The recently modernized Tanga port cannot be ruled out as it had lately been considered an alternative route for cargo from the land locked states.

The Karema port in the remote corner of the country was recently upgraded at the cost of Sh47.9 billion and has been equipped with the necessary facilities.

This is the second official visit to Tanzania by President Tshisekedi since he was elected the President of the giant country in December 2018.

He made his first visit as the Head of State in June 2019 and did not waste a chance to check the efficiency of the Dar es Salaam port in cargo handling.

This comes at a time when central corridor route is seeing massive upgrading of the railway link through the Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) from the port of Dar to the hinterland.

Incidentally, Tanzanian traders have lately eyed an equally lucrative route to tap the potential of the DRC market through Lubumbashi in Katanga.

The route is favoured by the cargo transporters on the road through Zambia, the only land link between the largely land-locked DRC and Tanzania.

The sea bound cargo from there include copper and other minerals while the highly populated Katanga area is a sure market for foodstuffs from Tanzania.

The Lubumbashi route has gained popularity in recent years such that the Tanzania Ports Authority (TPA) has opened its facilitation centre there.

The trade traffic between Tanzania and Lubumbashi is a blessing to DRC and Zambia such that the latter two states are planning to construct a bigger bridge across Luapula river.

President Tshisekedi’s visit comes at a time when his mineral-rich country has gained a new status after its admission to the East African Community (EAC).

It is the largest country in surface area (2.3 million square km) in the seven member bloc and population estimated to be about 100 million.

In size it is trailed by Tanzania (947,303 km square) and a population estimated to be slightly over 60 million before the recent census.

Economists and members of the business community favoured increased links with the DRC mainly because of its consumer market.

“DR Congo has a huge population,” said Josephat Rweyemamu, the chairman of the East African Confederation of Informal Sector Organizations when he spoke on phone from Dar es Salaam.

Walter Maeda, the chairman of the Arusha business chamber said DRC has a huge market for foodstuffs and the construction materials from Tanzania

However, he wondered if the Tanzanian firms already have a presence in the DRC compared to other countries in the EAC bloc.

The two neighbours (Tanzania and DRC) whose sizes have linked the Indian Ocean and the Atlantic Ocean as one trading zone, have other attributes.

They constitute the largest concentration of the Swahili speaking community in the world.

This has come at a time Kiswahili - alongside with French - have joined English as the official languages of the EAC.

While there is no contention that Tanzania pressed for the elevation of the region’s lingua franca (Kiswahili) to the bloc’s official language, it is the entry of DRC which pushed the EAC technocrats to adopt French