Tanzania revives plan to tarmac highway through Serengeti

The Tanzanian government is seeking approval of Unesco to upgrade roads inside Serengeti National Park in the north after its earlier plan to construct a tarmac road across the park hit a snag.

The government had planned, between 2005 and 2012, to construct a 452-kilometre tarmac highway to link Arusha in northern Tanzania to Musoma on the shores of Lake Victoria but shelved the plan after a civil suit was lodged by animal welfare groups opposing the road across the Serengeti.

Government Spokesperson Mobhare Matinyi said in Dodoma on March 10 that the government had drafted a technical document for submission to Unesco, seeking approval to upgrade into tarmac and concrete pavements, the roads inside the park.

“Our experts have already drafted a proposal, and we are only awaiting approval from the Unesco,” Matinyi said.

Established in 1951 as the biggest national park in Tanzania – covering 14,763 square kilometres -- the Serengeti National Park was listed as a Unesco World Heritage Site in 1981.

Mr Matinyi said that sections of roads inside the park would be tarmacked.

Heavy rains have affected the infrastructure in most of the national parks, including the Serengeti, causing delays in transporting tourists visiting the park, he said.

After taking over the office in 2005, former President Jakaya Kikwete announced his government’s plan to construct the 452km road cutting through the Serengeti at an estimated cost of $480 million.

Campaigns to stop construction of the road were immediately launched by wildlife experts in Tanzania, East Africa and other parts of the world forcing the government to shelve the plan.

The Unesco World Heritage Committee also opposed the planned highway cutting through the park and a part of Ngorongoro Conservation Area, which is the other World Heritage Site sharing boundaries with Serengeti.

The African Network for Animal Welfare filed a civil suit at the East African Court of Justice in Arusha against the project, saying it would have environmental and ecological effects on the Serengeti ecosystem shared between Tanzania and Kenya.

In its verdict on June 25, 2014, the Court ruled that the road would infringe on a provision of a regional Treaty calling for the promotion of sustainable utilisation of the natural resources of the partner states, the wildlife migrations crossing between Tanzania and Kenya.

Activists said that the road would jeopardise the annual wildebeest migration and other wildlife species between Serengeti and Kenya’s Maasai Mara Game Reserve.

About 39,000 wildlife protection and conservation individuals across the world protested against the planned highway.

In March 2011, the German government offered funding to build an alternative road through the southern area of the park to Musoma, but the plan was shelved by the Tanzanian government.

Serengeti is known for its annual wildebeest migration, in which 1.5 million wildebeests and other animals cross the Mara River to Masai Mara National Reserve in Kenya, a phenomenon that pulls crowds of tourists to watch.

PHOTO | NMG