EAC selling unity facade while buying dependency
By Dennis Mogare, June 18, 2025On May 15, 2025, the East African Community (EAC) launched the process of formulating its Seventh Development Strategy, an opportunity to transform integration from lofty rhetoric into real, measurable progress for its citizens.
When the EAC was revived in 2000, it rekindled hopes for a united region built on economic cooperation and political solidarity. With the inclusion of Rwanda, Burundi, South Sudan, DR Congo, and Somalia, the bloc has grown into a strategic community of over 300 million people bounded by the Indian and Atlantic oceans.
Without bold recalibration, the EAC risks becoming a facade of unity where foreign interests drive the agenda while citizens are left behind.
On paper, the vision was clear: a customs union, a common market, a monetary union, and ultimately, a political federation. But over two decades later, this vision remains frustratingly elusive.
While structures exist and summits are held, the everyday East African continues to ask: What is the EAC doing for us?
The unfortunate truth is that EAC integration has largely favoured foreign investors over local enterprises.
While attracting external capital is vital, it must not come at the cost of local growth. Regionalism must empower East Africans first, so as not to entrench the very dependency it seeks to escape.
For instance, in retail, once-vibrant local giants like Nakumatt and Uchumi have been pushed out by multinationals such as Carrefour (France) whose deep capital and streamlined logistics now dominate urban markets from Nairobi to Kigali.
Infrastructure paints a similar picture. Projects like Kenya’s Standard Gauge Railway and regional highways are largely financed and executed by Chinese state-backed firms, with most profits, labour, and technical capacity flowing outward.
In telecommunications and banking, global players such as Vodafone, Airtel, and MTN hold sway, often repatriating earnings while local innovators struggle for capital.
Export Processing Zones (EPZs) in Kenya and Rwanda, linked to US markets through AGOA, have become enclaves of foreign-led production with minimal local linkages and poor labour conditions.
In agribusiness, foreign firms control extensive farmland under long-term leases, displacing communities and prioritising exports over regional food security. Across the board, sectors meant to drive development are skewed toward external interests.
This integration model, rather than empowering East Africans, has too often reduced them to consumers and labourers in a system that works best for interests external to EAC.
Why has this happened? Because despite strong rhetoric, the EAC has faltered in implementation. Non-tariff barriers ranging from arbitrary checkpoints to complex customs procedures continue to stifle local trade, especially for small-scale traders lacking the means to navigate them.
Meanwhile, well-resourced multinationals easily bypass these obstacles through legal and political leverage. The EAC secretariat’s chronic underfunding and reliance on donor support, particularly from the EU and, hitherto, USAID, further undermines autonomy.
Consequently, the region’s integration agenda often reflects external priorities. Indeed, what emerges is a project that appears Pan-African, but functions largely under foreign influence.
The upcoming Seventh EAC Development Strategy is a rare chance to reset course. It must confront non-tariff barriers decisively, build regional value chains, and put East African citizens at the centre of integration.
The writer is a Foreign Policy Analyst.
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