Nile Basin Countries Draft New Law

By Kikonyogo Ngatya TEN countries sharing the River Nile have drafted new laws on the utilisation of waters and other resources from the river. The Executive Secretary of the Nile Basin Initiative (NBI), Meraji Msuya, said this yesterday in Entebbe at the meeting of donors and the countries that share the river. He said the draft had been handed over to the council of ministers of the ten countries. “Colonial governments entered most of the legal governing instruments on the river. “The new laws are being drafted by sovereign states. We hope it will further strengthen our cooperation in different sectors,” Msuya said. Msuya said the laws would involve protection of the river from silting and environmental degradation, introduction of foreign plants and animal species and limiting some more developed member states from draining the river for irrigation purposes. Donor representatives from 16 countries and institutions are meeting in Entebbe for three days to find ways of implementing a US$140m (about sh245b) project in the Nile riparian countries. The countries in the Nile Basin are Burundi, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Egypt. Ends