The Government of Uganda represented by the Uganda National Roads Authority (UNRA) is seeking to partner with a private sector to design, build, operate, maintain and transfer a limited access tolled expressway between the cities of Kampala and Jinja in Uganda.
The process of choosing a fit company is underway with the government having four bids to choose from. The companies that have already submitted their bids include Strabag of Germany, China’s Communications Construction Company among others.
The Ugandan government and the contractor will each contribute US $400m and US $600m respectively and an additional US $500m will be needed to fund acquisition of land, debt financing and operating costs.
This project will be the first built in the country using a public-private partnership (PPP) model. This implies that the contractor awarded the contract will design, build and operate the route for 30 years, earning profits by charging tolls before transferring the ownership to the state.
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Kampala—Jinja Expressway (KJE) Project
The billion dollar project forms part of the Northern trade corridor from Mombasa in Kenya through Kigali in Rwanda. This is a strategic corridor which serves as a trade link to the sea for land locked countries of Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, South Sudan as well as the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.
The 95 kilometer (59-mile) Project comprises of:77km of the Kampala—Jinja mainline (KJE) Expressway of 4+4 lanes for the first 32km, and then 2+2 lanes for the remaining 42km with a design speed of up to 120kph and
Kampala Southern Bypass (KSB) – an 18km Urban Expressway of 2+2 Lanes with design speed up to 100kph which will start at Butabika, on the Eastern outskirts of Kampala, and link with the new Kampala- Jinja mainline Expressway then connect in Munyonyo.
Road transport is by far the most dominant mode of transport in Uganda, carrying over 95% of passenger and freight traffic.
