Civil society calls for balanced regional integration approach

Rwandans can only benefit from regional integration if the integration process is people-centred and market-driven, the coordinator of the East African Community civil platform, Prudence Sebahizi, has said.Sebahizi, who was addressing regional integration stakeholders during a policy debate on tapping into EAC integration benefits in Kigali, on Thursday, said a balanced bottom-up approach must be emphasised for integration to benefit ordinary citizens.He said trying to focus much on how business community benefits from integration without considering the impact it may have on citizens could backfire.“The consultations we made between the business people, government and civil society indicated that there exist some differences and interests between the business community and the needs of the local citizens,” he said. “While business people are, for example, calling for an increase in external tariffs on goods coming from outside the region, this could result into high prices on some of these commodities which will eventually affect the final consumers who are in this case the local people,” he said.Sebahizi added that a 25 per cent tariff imposed on the list of sensitive commodities, including rice, maize, milk, among others, on the assumption that they are regionally produced in abundance could be a miscalculation, especially once their regional demand has surpassed their supply and importing them becomes the only option.“It’s due to such circumstances that we are calling for a balanced approach to this integration process,” Sebahizi said. Innocent Safari, the permanent secretary in the Ministry of East African Community Affairs, said there are many untapped opportunities within the bloc that a land locked members like Rwanda can tap into.Tariff eliminations on raw materials, export promotion skills, simplified trade regimes, removal of trade barriers, new duty remissions schemes, harmonised customs procedures, and harmonised domestic taxes are some of the opportunities Rwanda must embrace, Safari said. The Minister for East African Community Affairs, Jacqueline Muhongayire, said government will ensure that it provides and supports ideas that will build a more secure, competitive, people-centred and private sector-driven regional integration process.She also called on member states to respect the commitments made during several EAC meetings so as to be able to fast truck the process of integration.In a bid to deepen understanding of regional integration matters, especially the opportunities at people’s disposal, the minister called for more awareness campaigns to be conducted across the country.The ministry is today set to launch a short messaging service (SMS) Feedback project as part of the activities in line with the East African Community awareness week.The service will see traders text their complaints to the line ministry which will then analyse and then forward the message to focal persons at concerned agencies.

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Civil society calls for balanced regional integration approach