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| Africa Horn | |
| Uganda picks Tanzania for oil pipeline, drops Kenya plan | |
| 2016-04-25 | |
| Landlocked Uganda has announced it will build a major pipeline to export its oil through Tanzania. Uganda had planned to send the pipeline through Kenya, which wanted a joint facility for oil from its own fields that are under development. The pipeline will now be routed further south, with concerns about possible attacks by Somalia’s al-Shabab Islamists said to be a factor. The group has attacked targets close to where the pipeline would have passed.
The discovered oil reserves in Uganda are estimated at some 6.5bn barrels, and the country expects to start production in 2018. France’s Total, China’s CNOOC and Britain’s Tullow hold most of the licences. Kenya, which has also struck oil, had wanted the pipeline to pass through its territory. Uganda had initially signed such a deal, but Total later questioned the plan over security concerns, the BBC’s Catherine Byaruhanga in Kampala reports. Ugandan Foreign Minister Sam Kutesa said on Saturday that the cost was also a factor in choosing the project. Reports also suggest that Uganda backed the Tanzanian route because the country’s port of Tanga is already fully operational, while Kenya’s Lamu port is still being built. Meanwhile, Kenya said it would build its own pipeline from Lokichar, in the north-east, to Lamu. | |
| Posted by:Steve White |
| #1 Meanwhile, what the hell happened to the pipeline to connect South Sudan oil (which is already available) with Kenya? The Somali refugees have not only screwed up Minnesota, but Kenya as well. |
| Posted by: Phairt Barnsmell9169 2016-04-25 09:57 |