Alfred Nyongesa Wandera
11 September 2008
About 3,000 jobs are set for grabs when the construction of the East Africa oil pipeline begins in early November. The much-talked about pipeline expected to run from Eldoret in western Kenya to Kampala in Uganda is also expected to stabilize petroleum oil products supply to Uganda, DR Congo and Rwanda.
"During construction of the pipe line, we shall create 2,000-3,000 jobs for Kenyans and Ugandans but upon completion of construction, 500 people will be employed with 90 per cent of them drawn from Uganda," said Mr Gamal Buargoub, the Project Engineer of Tamoil East Africa Ltd - the company that won the bid for the job.
Speaking on Tuesday at the Kampala Serena Hotel during the 39th anniversary of the Great Alfatah Revolution and the 9th anniversary of the African Union organised by the Libyan Arab People's Bureau-Kampala, Mr Buargoub said the construction of the state-of-the-art pipeline is expected to take 18 months.
"We are in the final stages of negotiations and we think the costs of putting up the project will be a bit high because we shall use Scada system and fibre optical cables," he said.
He said both technologies are important for easy communication and detecting any mishap like oil leakage along the 354-kilometer pipeline.
Mr Buargoub said the project has so far attracted five internal contractors who are bidding and the company is at the final stages of evaluating them.
The first phase of the pipeline will come from Eldoret to Jinja where three more oil storage tanks will be constructed to add to the already existing three and then extended to Kampala where there will be 22 oil storage tanks.
The construction of the pipeline will fully be sponsored by the Libyan portfolio. Tamoil East Africa Ltd last month bought off Shell companies in Ethiopia, Sudan and Djibouti. Once completed, the pipeline will assume the East African Pipeline Company name because it will be extended to Rwanda and Burundi and will come into the management of the region after 20 years.
The announcement is good news to Ugandans as it may have a positive impact on fuel prices that have been unstable for quite sometimes now.
East African countries are net importers of petroleum products and the discovery of oil in Uganda and parts of DRC will enhance the use of the pipeline.
Be the first to Write a Comment!
Copyright © 2008 The Monitor. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
