BUJUMBURA September 6th (ABP) – The Cabinet met on Wednesday August 31, 2022 under the chairmanship of the Head of State Evariste Ndayishimiye with 10 files to be analyzed including the draft decree revising June 23, 2016 declaring temporary public utility of the zone intended to accommodate the infrastructures of the services of the Presidency of the Republic and of the File relating to the request for land for the realization of a Project for the construction of an autonomous port and a shipyard on Lake Tanganyika.
According to the press release from the General Secretariat of the State, Decree No. 100/128 of June 23, 2016 on the provisional declaration of public utility of a 200-ha plot of land located in Gasenyi village, Mutimbuzi commune of Bujumbura province to accommodate of the Presidency’s infrastructure has been signed. As these lands belonged to individuals, a compensation procedure was undertaken, of which 40 ha have already been compensated while 160 others are not yet.
After analyzing the limits of the land concerned by the decree declaring the 200 ha as a public utility zone, the security services found that this land is not sufficient to ensure the security of the Presidency. They thus proposed to integrate the hill of Gishingano with an area of 334 ha 40 ares 110 ca located on the Remba and Karama sub-villages. After discussion and debate, the project was adopted with, among other recommendations, to write in the title, “declaration of public utility” and not “provisional declaration of public utility” to avoid speculation, to find another site for the relocation of the people located in that perimeter, in particular the site which had been identified at the start to house these infrastructures and where the population was compensated. To proceed with the closing of this perimeter declared of public utility to avoid any speculation and to identify at the level of the provinces sites to be declared of public utility so that the State has spaces for its projects.
Concerning the File relating to the request for land for the realization of a Project for the construction of an autonomous port and a shipyard on Lake Tanganyika on an area under the public domain of the State located in Kajaga in Mutimbuzi commune, the press release indicates that on 29/01/2022, the chairman of the board of directors of the Autonomous Port of Bujumbura made a request for land that will house the construction and operation project of the Autonomous Port and of the Shipyard. The company “Autonomous Port of Bujumbura” is a group of two companies under Burundian law, the “Canadian Total Logistic” from the Burundian diaspora in Canada, and the cooperative society “SOCIBUA-ABAHIZI”, in order to build an autonomous port meeting the international standards for deep water ports. This Project is consistent with the Lake Tanganyika Integrated Coastal Development Plan. According to the press release, this new company has brought together the adequate financial and technical means to carry out this project, which comes to meet certain challenges such as the lack of places to build and repair boats on Lake Tanganyika, the difficulties of supplying goods in Burundi in particular and many other cities in the sub-region in general and the creation of new direct permanent jobs.
At the end of the analysis of that file, the Cabinet found the Project interesting but recommended, to set up the construction project of the Shipyard and the Port within the framework of the Public-Private Partnership, to seek another land for this project because the one identified is a tourist environment and to determine the deadlines for the realization of that project as soon as the land is granted. The Ministers in charge of Transport and the Environment have been tasked with monitoring that Project.