By PATRICK ILUNGA

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Nationals of the Democratic Republic of Congo will from now visit Kenya without a visa, Nairobi announced on Friday.

The new policy, Kenya says is part of continuing legal shift to accommodate the DRC’s admission into the East African Community.

A noticed issued last week to all diplomatic missions abroad as well as Kenya’s regional administrative heads had alerted officials of the imminent change in policy. It said the visa waiver will be effective from September 01.

“The government of Kenya has removed Democratic Republic of Congo from Category 2 to category 1 of the visa regulations in compliance with the East Africa Community Regulations of free movement of persons within the member states,” said the circular dated August 25.

Read: Kenya to scrap visa fees for Africa traders

“In this regard, Kenya has waived visa requirements for all nationals of the Democratic Republic of Congo effective September 1, 2023.”

The DRC became the seventh member of the EAC last year in May.

And though it has yet to ascend to some of the protocols including that on free movement and the customs union, Kinshasa had generally used bilateral agreements with current member states on visa. Kenyans, under that arrangement, do not need visas to the DRC.

The Congolese authorities have been waiting a long time for this measure. A few months ago, Christophe Lutundula spoke of the importance of facilitating the movement of people and goods in the EAC bloc.

The Congolese Foreign Minister argued that most of the goods coming from the Indian Ocean pass through the port of Mombasa in Kenya. He also added that, in addition to the port of Mombasa, goods also pass through Dar Es Salam in Tanzania.

Read: Tanzania woos Kinshasa with a dry port for DRC-bound cargo

The Congolese authorities nevertheless said that they expected the Congo and its citizens, as members of the East African community, should now benefit from the same customs facilities due to membership to the EAC.

According to the minister, who spoke weeks before this decision, the DRC has every reason to seek regional integration and to succeed in its integration into the East African bloc, since 5 of the 9 neighbouring countries (Tanzania, Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda and South Sudan) are in the East and belong to the East African Community.

This is why, as soon as he came to power in January 2019, President Félix Tshisekedi focused his diplomatic strategy on his eastern neighbours, "the most integrated bloc in Africa", as the Congolese president used to say.