During the one-day return ride, one of our senior reporters who was in the entourage, chanced to have a word or two with both top government officials responsible for the transportation sector and top TAZARA management.
Fast forward: TAZARA also called the Uhuru Railway links the port of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania with the town of Kapiri Mposhi in Zambia’s central province.
The single track railway which was built under a $500m soft loan from the People’s Republic of China is 1,860 kilometres long.
The governments of Tanzania, Zambia and China built the railway to eliminate landlocked Zambia's economic dependence on the then Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and South Africa, both of which were ruled by white-minority governments.
The railway provided the only route for bulk trade from Zambia's Copperbelt to reach the sea without having to transit white-ruled territories.
The spirit of Pan-African socialism among the leaders of Tanzania and Zambia and the symbolism of China's support for newly independent African countries gave rise to TAZARA's designation as the "Great Uhuru Railway", Uhuru a Kiswahili word for freedom.
The project was built from 1970 to 1975 as a turnkey project financed and supported by China. At the time of its completion, two years ahead of schedule, TAZARA was the single longest railway in sub-Saharan Africa.
TAZARA was the largest single foreign-aid project undertaken by China at the time, at an initial construction cost of $500m.
But TAZARA has faced operational difficulties from the start and is in a state of near-collapse as of 2015.
Today, 40 years down the road TAZARA, which started as a shining example of African cooperation, has gone through thick and thin. At one point, the railway line was almost relegated to an intensive care unit, surviving on life support machine.
During the ride to commemorate TAZARA’s 40th anniversary something happened that does not augur well to the revitalization of the Uhuru Railway—and that was the exchange of barbs between the top government officials and TAZARA officials.
It was really sad reading in the press on how government officials blamed TAZARA management for doing nothing to save the firm from further deterioration and at the same time TAZARA officials blaming both governments—Tanzanian and Zambian—for not caring about the railway line.
Now that the commemoration ride has gone, and the 40 years of TAZARA have been earmarked—the way forward should be to support the authority towards its restoration.
And this support should come from all stakeholders of the railway line. That is from TAZARA management, the governments of Tanzania and Zambia, our friends from China, traders who use the line and passengers.
With African the growing economies TAZARA still stands a great change of playing its part in propelling the economic prosperity of southern and central African countries to full height.
Instead of putting much concentration on counting the loss, the focus now should be how to forge ahead. TAZARA is still viable 40 years after its inception.
The two governments, TAZARA and our Chinese friends need to work very closely towards bringing back the railway line on track.
_0.jpg?itok=QU87XW8D){kind=tracking}
.jpeg?itok=vCj6bCRe)
