EDITOR’S NOTE: You are crossing into the Twilight Zone.
(KBC) – Prime Minister Raila Odinga on Monday said Kenya may import power from Ethiopia [where the capital Addis Ababa goes dark several times a week] following the current national shortage of hydro-electric supply.
Mr. Odinga said plans to transmit power from South Africa fell through this year after the country began experiencing a power shortage.
The PM who was holding talks with the IGAD Secretary-General Mr Mahaboub Mohammed in his office said the body had been central in promoting peace in East African region and Horn of Africa but must now meet its regional mandates of economic growth, food security and infrastructural development.
The PM said with over 14 million people in danger of perennial famine and food insecurity in the region, IGAD must urgently share information on weather patterns.
“IGAD should work in close co-operation with farmers and give meteorological expertise to stop crop failure and the rising costs of food”, said the PM.
The PM said the development agency must revitalize its regional integration plans and hasten the upgrading of infrastructure to expand the economy. “Regional road networks and communication must now be opened on the Northern Corridor through Mombasa, Uganda, Rwanda, DRC and Burundi”.
He said Ethiopia had already constructed their part of the Great North Road from Addis to Khartoum and that the route through Juba, Isiolo, Merille, Marsabit, Kitale-Lodwar, Loki and Juba must now be completed.
He said plans for the construction of the Garissa-Wajir-Mandera route that links Kenya with Ethiopia and Somalia and -major networks and the railway plan from Lamu, Addis-Juba-Uganda and Rwanda were underway.
Mr Mohammed who earlier briefed the PM on IGAD’s status and the regional political dynamics said Eritrea which had suspended its membership to the body had now agreed to rejoin.
He appealed for Kenya’s support to mobilize resources and to undertake staff rationalization in conjunction with UNECA.
Mr. Mahaboub said he would seek for the support of the Council of Minister meeting in Addis later in the month.
“The blue print on regional integration is ready and we’ve asked EU to partner with us for cross-cutting infrastructure”.
IGAD has managed conflict management and largely controlled raids on livestock in the last two years.
It has also intervened in volatile areas in Sudan, Eritrea, Djibouti and made a political transformation in the region.
Somalia however, remains a serious challenge with the unrest there affecting the entire sub-region, especially Kenya.
2 thoughts on “Kenya considering importing power from Ethiopia”
First remove Meles and his associates in crime. Then and only then start talking of regional development otherwise it is going to be another opportunity of enriching the thugs in Addis Abeba who already pillaged the country more than enough.
The cancer in the Horn and East African region is none other Meles and his TPLF savages.
I couldn’t contain myself after reading such a fantasy, this Raila Odinga guy must be smoking something to say what he said, none of these African countries can accomplish any infrastructure project without their masters doing it for them, he must have been hallucinating otherwise any puppet leader in his right mind wouldn’t say what he said. There is only one country in the horn of Africa that is building real infrastructure with indeginous construction companies and that is Eritrea, no other country in the rest of Africa would build the kinds of roads, railroad, bridges and all kinds of small and medium dams by itself. What amazed me was the Raila Odinga didn’t even mention who was going to build the so called roads that he talked about, by the way Eritrea will not come back to IGAD as long as IGAD is a tool of neo colonialists and openly condoned the invasion of Somalia by Woyanne.