Uganda’s government has passed a bill for the Uganda National Oil Business (UNOC), a state-owned oil business, to domestically buy and supply oil, thus ending its dependence on neighboring Kenya for its oil needs, thus taking its fate into its own hands. The bill is meant to terminate the present method of importing oil through Kenyan wholesalers but it is still pending an approval by the parliament. Kenya’s Mombasa port handles over 90% of fuel imports of Uganda, a landlocked nation, while Tanzania’s Dar es Salaam port currently receives the remaining gasoline imports from Uganda, Nankabirwa noted. Meanwhile, Ugandan officials have reportedly expressed dismay over Kenya’s undisclosed government-to-government fuel deal between East African country and two Gulf nations. This falling out also threatens to seep into dollar exchange between the two countries at a time when the country desperately needs the greenback to pay for fuel imports.
