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Uganda: Regional Trade Arbitration Necessary
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New Vision (Kampala)
EDITORIAL
27 March 2008
Posted to the web 28 March 2008
Kampala
THE Kampala City Traders Association (KACITA) is demanding sh20b in compensation from the Kenya government for losses its member incurred in the post-election chaos in that country. KACITA is threatening to boycott the Mombasa route if Kenya does not respond to their grievances within two weeks.
The Kenyan High Commission in Kampala says they are aware of the issue and they are taking the necessary steps.
KACITA are within their rights to demand compensation. The free movement of goods and services more than documents is what will cement the community.
The fact that KACITA is now threatening action suggests that the formal channels are working at a less than business-like pace or have failed altogether.
The community needs to urgently activate an arbitration mechanism to resolve such commercial disputes, which cannot be resolved in courts of law, so as to increase the confidence in the business community.
KACITA too can help in this process. It is debatable how they will enforce a boycott of the Kenyan route if push comes to shove, but their threat will get more attention because they are talking as a group.
Aggregating their influence is the first step. KACITA now needs to strengthen itself as an institution by empowering its members through training, negotiating access to finance and facilitating a consolidation of their individual members into more viable commercial enterprises.
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By empowering its members and building up its own institutional capacity, KACITA can then not only be taken more seriously, but play a more active role in negotiating trade pacts.
But in the immediate term the regional governments need to activate an arbitration mechanism to keep progress on regional integration on track.
The East African Community (EAC) will remain a pipe dream if the adhesive meant to hold it together, the interaction between the region's business communities, is not nurtured and solidified.
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