Taskforce to spearhead the East African Monetary Union

A taskforce to spearhead negotiations for the East African Monetary Union (Eamu) was finally launched in Arusha on Monday this week. EAC secretary-general Juma Mwapachu told delegates from the five member states to show commitment to the talks. The taskforce, made up of senior officials from the member countries, will lay ground for the methodology under which the road map to the Eamu protocol would be negotiated. Mr Mwapachu said the monetary union must fall on the lines of the one which existed in East Africa in the 1960s and 1970s before the collapse of the EA Community in 1977. “During the late 1960s and early 1970s no region in the world had a properly functional and constituted monetary union than the EAC”, he said. He noted that heads of State of the EAC member countries were “unequivocal” on their desire to have a regional monetary union in place. At a summit in 2007, the presidents of Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Burundi and Rwanda decided to fast- track the process to have a single currency by 2012. “One of the symbols of our economic integration is a common currency. The common currency will provide us with a much more solid link,” Mr Mwapachu explained. The taskforce will comprise senior officials from member countries, principally those from the ministries responsible for finance, planning, economic development and EAC affairs. Others will come from key institutions such as the central banks, capital markets authorities, insurance and pensions regulatory agencies and national statistics offices.