Come clean on your ‘secret’ Nile pact with Cairo, Dar tells Kampala

A row is simmering between Uganda and Tanzania over the latter’s demand that Kampala share details of secret bilateral arrangements on the use of the River Nile’s waters that were allegedly agreed with Egypt during a brief stopover in Entebbe by Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak at the end of July.

Tanzania suspects that the two leaders entered a pact to take more water out of the river for their mutual benefit.

Tensions were fanned further after Uganda Water and Environment Minister Maria Mutagamba made three unofficial visits to Cairo that Tanzania now suspects could have been intended to draw up the framework for the Mubarak-Museveni pact.

President Mubarak made a brief stopover in Uganda on his way from South Africa where he had gone to rally support for Sudanese President Omar El Bashir against his likely indictment for crimes against humanity by the International criminal Court.

According to a source who sought anonymity, among other bilateral issues, the two presidents also had specific discussions on the use of the Nile waters.

Neither of the countries, however, shared the minutes of these talks with the Nile Basin Initiative (NBI), an inter-governmental organisation that brings together the Nile Basin countries of Burundi, DR Congo, Egypt, Eritrea (still an observer), Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania Sudan and Uganda.

The EastAfrican has learnt that Tanzania requested the meeting’s minutes from NBI in vain, and consequently asked the organisation to use its mandate to follow up on the matter.

Tanzania’s interest in the matter is said to arise from concerns that Uganda is releasing water beyond the normal flow from Lake Victoria into the river for purposes of hydropower generation, which in the process ensures more water flowing towards Egypt, but hurts the ecosystem of the lake.

Kampala confirmed that the Nile was high on the agenda of the presidents’ meeting, but said that Tanzania should not intervene in the two countries’ bilateral relations, because whereas Uganda hosts the major exit to the Nile, Egypt’s lifeline depends on the river.

“Besides, whatever we discuss with Egypt that is regional is subject to approval by all the countries in the Nile Basin, so they should not be suspicious,” said Isaac Musumba State Foreign Affair Minister for Regional Integration.

Meanwhile, NBI member states are yet to agree on a new deal that will govern the use of the Nile waters, after throwing out the outdated bilateral agreements between Egypt and former colonialists Britain because not all the countries in the basin had consented to them.

Against that background, Uganda’s recent behaviour on issues regarding the Nile is being seen as potentially undermining the confidence and trust that had so far developed among the members over the past 10 years of negotiating a new agreement.

Officials close to the matter told The EastAfrican that Ms Mutagamba, the country’s political negotiator on Nile Basin issues, made three unofficial visits to Egypt over several months, without the knowledge of Uganda’s ambassador there. This made some riparian states suspicious.

Ms Mutagamba was unavailable for comment, as she was out of the country, but State Minister for Water Jenipher Namuyangu said, “When it comes to issues of the Nile with regional implications, we have a body for that, and we are working with all the other countries.”

The EastAfrican can however reveal that the quarrel over the Nile has escalated differences between Uganda and Tanzania to such an extent that Ms Mutagamba was recently snubbed in Dar es Salaam when she sought an audience with President Jakaya Kikwete.