Guillaume Muhoza
- The MV AMANI boat, recognized as the property of Zoé Kabila, Joseph Kabila’s brother, with a capacity of 4000 to 5000 tons of freight, able to transport 4000 to 5000 passengers and having 16 VIP rooms, will soon be relocated from Kalemie to the port of Bujumbura
- Its docking is planned in 3 months, the time to finalize the dredging work of the port of Bujumbura.
- This initiative is believed to be revolutionary in Burundi’s lake trade. The port of Bujumbura remains under-exploited, even though it is a hub for serving the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo
The port of Bujumbura, which has an annual capacity of around 500,000 tonnes serving Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), would be revitalized by the arrival of this vessel from the DRC. This ship was built in the DRC and has been operational for nearly three years. It already serves between the ports along the east coast of the DRC ( Kalemie, Moba, Baraka, Uvira and Kigoma in Tanzania ).
An agreement in principle has been signed last month between the commercial management of Global Port Services, the company that operates the port of Bujumbura, and MV Amani. The two parties have announced a joint visit to the Bujumbura port basin as soon as possible to decide together on the arrival of MV AMANI in Bujumbura.
This will drastically reduce transport costs and travel expenses at a time when Burundian opinion, particularly in the period of fuel shortage, has been calling for the use of lake transport instead of expensive road transport.
You will know that another boat with a capacity of about 1600 tons, 68 meters long with a width of 12 meters and a height of 4.5 meters, belonging to a Burundian operator is being built on Lake Tanganyika in the locality of Kabezi (Bujumbura province) since June 2021.
