Uganda is planning to upgrade the Nimule-Juba highway to ease trade between the two countries, authorities have confirmed.
The development follows a request by Ugandan traders operating in Juba who say that sections of the 191.5km road is largely unmemorable, taking more time and damaging cars increasing the cost of doing business.
Mr Twaha Othman, spokesperson Uganda -South Sudan Traders association said that the request to government also includes to rehabilitate and maintain a market in Juba operated by Uganda traders.
“The market sits on 17 acres of land leased for 29 years, the lease is ending in 2042 and its development is one of the main challenges we are facing currently,” he said.
The traders say the market sells mostly Ugandan products from cosmetics, foodstuff, clothes, electronics among other items.
Mr Ramathan Ggoobi, Uganda’s Permanent Secretary for the ministry of Finance and Secretary to the treasury said that government is set to start internal talks over the matter and later involve the South Sudanese authorities to ensure the project can be jointly executed.
Uganda is similarly executing three road projects in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Jointly funded by the two countries, the roads will run from some of Uganda’s border towns into DRC: one will run from Kasindi to Beni (80km) and another will integrate the Beni-Butebo axis (54km).
The third will stretch for 89 kilometres from the border town of Bunagana, through Rutshuru to the strategic city of Goma, the capital of the North Kivu Province in DRC.
“When we build this regional infrastructure like we are doing in Congo, we are not building them for only Congo or Sudan, they are roads for Uganda because they are taking Ugandan goods,” Ggoobi said.
It is in this spirit, he added, that Uganda was willing to rehabilitate the Nimule Juba road which runs from the common border in Nimule to the capital Juba.
The proposed project is likely to cause an uproar in the country just like the DRC projects before it when citizens questioned why the government was building road projects in other countries yet part of the country’s own road network remains in shambles.
Mr Ggoobi dismissed this notion.
“These are partly our roads. Sometime they make more economic sense than those in other areas in the country where we are not getting a return on investment,” he said.
The South Sudan embassy in Uganda declined to comment on the issue but a source there said they would welcome the idea although Kampala is yet to officially reach-out to them.
The Nimule Juba road was in the news earlier this year when Ugandan truckers protested robberies and killings by armed gangs along the way the way.
In response, both Kampala and Juba offered security to traders along the route increasing motorized patrols and roadblocks.
The killings have since then reduced. South Sudan is a major export market for Uganda which had largely been disrupted by the civil war that happened in Juba.
In 2020, Uganda exported $357M to South Sudan. There were not main exports from Uganda to South Sudan in 2020.
During the last 8 years the exports of Uganda to South Sudan have increased at an annualized rate of 46%, from $17.3M in 2012 to $357M in 2020. In 2020, South Sudan exported $86.7M to Uganda.
