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Kenyan Diplomat Showers Praises On President Samia

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4 years ago

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KENYAN High Commissioner to Tanzania, Dr Dan Kazungu, has poured praises to President Samia Suluhu Hassan for keeping the ball rolling in strengthening bilateral trade and investment between the two countries.

Dr Kazungu made his remarks in Dar es Salaam yesterday at a meeting that brought together members of the Confederation of Tanzania Industries (CTI) and Kenya Association of Manufacturers (KAM).

Dr Kazungu said, it was President Samia who initiated the process to get most of trade and investment bottlenecks resolved during and after her official visit to Kenya in May this year. When she visited Kenya, President Samia met President Uhuru Kenyatta to discuss a number of bilateral business issues.

“Clap hands to her Excellency for this initiative of bringing us together so that we may benefit together, not only for ourselves, but for the rest of our countries,” he told the meeting.

According to him, when Tanzania and Kenya agree to work together it always creates unforgettable magic and that is why the two heads of State met and Kenya was honoured when President Samia opted to visit the country first instead of going elsewhere.

He recalled that in 2019, there were also some challenges of doing business between the two sides, but after meeting in Arusha where they identified 25 non-tariff barriers they managed to resolve 15 issues within a span of three days.

The High Commissioner pointed out further that, after the Nairobi meeting, the two presidents directed the responsible ministers of trade to find out means for addressing the challenges and other issues that obstruct ease of doing business.

“We met in Arusha and it was surprising indeed. One minister (from Kenya) was welcomed by five ministers from Tanzania and after four days we picked up 64 non-tariff barriers. We managed to resolve 30 of them in four days,” he said.

Dr Kazungu further told the meeting that they have given a time frame for resolving the remaining 34 nontariff barriers and hopefully by end of August, 2021 all of them would be resolved.

He, therefore, called upon members of the two associations to unite and have a common understanding to increase the volume of trade to accelerate the economic growth of the two countries, considering the private sector was considered as the driving force of the industrial economy.

The CTI Chairman, Mr Paul Makanza, explained that the Confederation and KAM have enjoyed such collaboration for many years, an indication of close relationship between the two communities and, thus, cementing their brotherhood and sisterhood.