COMESA infrastructure fund gets capital injection
The Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) infrastructure fund has got a capital injection of US$21.9 million.
The capital injected includes US$15 million seed capital from the Eastern and Southern Africa Trade and Development Bank (PTA Bank) and the US$6.9 million of contributions from members state.
This initial capital of US$21.9 million is expected to leverage about US$200 million for projects, which will be co-founded by other partners. The fund will be focused on roads, railways, electricity, Information and Communication Infrastructure, ports and waterways transport.
On 27 March 2014 the Secretary General, Sindiso Ngwenya, signed an agreement to transfer the COMESA Infrastructure Fund (CIF) to PTA Bank. At that time the 2013 Chairman of the COMESA Authority, President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda, said several infrastructure projects have been identified within the past years that require US$53 billion. He commeneted:
"They include the US $28.4 billion we are raising for the railways, airports, ports, roads and border posts. Also, US $31.4 billion is required for electricity and US $630 million for ICT."
COMESA is a free trade area with 19 member states, population of over 389 million and annual import bill of around US$32 billion with an export bill of US$82 billion. COMESA forms a major market place for both internal and external trading. Its area is impressive on the map of the African Continent covering a geographical area of 12 million km².
COMESA's member States are: Burundi, Union of Comoros, Congo DRC, Djibouti, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Libya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Rwanda, Sudan, Swaziland, Seychelles, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
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