SGR is a Win-Win Cooperation, not a Friendship with Kenya, says China

By David Indeje / Published August 15, 2016 | 8:45 am

The Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) has been described as the epitome of China-Kenya relations and not just friendship between the two.

China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi quoted in the China Daily said the multi-billion project is a symbol of improved prosperity.

“If the Tanzania-Zambia Railway, constructed in the 1970s by China, is a railway of friendship, the Mombasa-Nairobi Standard Gauge Railway is more than that,” Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi said of the 472-kilometer railway costing $3.8 billion.

“It is a railway of win-win cooperation, prosperity, ecological protection and common development,” Wang said in Nairobi, Kenya, during his visit to the country.

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Wang Yi in a briefing with the Foreign Affairs CS Amina Mohamed, he noted that China-Kenya cooperation has taken the lead in China-Africa mutually beneficial cooperation.

Kenya and China have decided to strengthen cooperation frameworks in five areas: industrialization and infrastructure construction, agricultural and green development, people-to-people and cultural exchanges, peace and security as well as justice and police affairs, and international and regional affairs.

President Uhuru Kenyatta during the State House infrastructure summit on August 8, he defended the project that his government’s resolve was to see the SGR through to the end of the line arguing that it would transform Kenya’s economic fortunes.

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“We are no longer going to be the dumping ground for products while our people have no jobs, while our people suffer in poverty. We are going to move to the next level irregardless (sic) of what The Economist says, irregardless of what anybody says,” he said as quoted by Capital FM.

The Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) will be completed in June next year.

Construction of the 609km long stretch of railroad begun in October 2013 and was scheduled to be completed by December 2017.

About David Indeje

David Indeje is a writer and editor, with interests on how technology is changing journalism, government, Health, and Gender Development stories are his passion. Follow on Twitter @David_IndejeDavid can be reached on: (020) 528 0222 / Email: info@sokodirectory.com

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