Amne Sued: East Africa’s Biggest Threat Is No Longer Poverty — But Bureaucracy
By Adonis Byemelwa
At the Rusumo border crossing between Tanzania and Rwanda, cross-border trucks stretch for kilometres in a long line, with customs clearance wait times routinely spanning multiple days.
Drivers transporting cement, machinery parts, agricultural products and consumer goods sleep inside their vehicles while paperwork slowly moves between agencies.
This on-the-ground reality forms a stark contrast with the regional integration blueprints and development plans for the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) that officials from multiple East African countries promote loudly at various summits, laying bare the core paradox of East Africa’s integration process: political progress on integration far outpaces its actual on-the-ground implementation.
Tanzanian cross-border investment lawyer Amne Sued noted in an interview held after the conclusion of the Kigali CEO Forum 2026 that East Africa has never lacked the ambition, capital, or entrepreneurial capacity needed for development.
“The real bottleneck is not ambition, capital or entrepreneurial capacity,” Sued said. “East Africa has all three. The bottleneck is that our regulatory systems have not yet fully adjusted to the speed, structure and sophistication of the businesses we are now producing.”
Current shifts in the global geo-economic landscape have brought a rare development window for East Africa. Lingering disruptions to global supply chains from China-U.S. geopolitical tensions and the COVID-19 pandemic have not yet faded.
Combined with steadily rising labour costs in Asia and supply chain concentration risks that force multinational firms to relocate production capacity, East Africa’s own inherent advantages put it in a strong position to seize these opportunities.
Tanzania and Kenya control key Indian Ocean shipping routes; newly built infrastructure, including railways, ports, and energy facilities, rolled out in recent years, is gradually coming into operation. Tanzania’s reserves of natural gas, graphite, and nickel perfectly align with the supply chain needs of the global power battery industry, while Kenya leads the entire region’s fintech ecosystem.
However, the biggest threat facing East Africa today is no longer poverty, the key challenge of the past. It is a regulatory disconnect caused by bureaucratic systems.
Cross-border enterprises operating within the East African Common Market still face widely differing license application requirements, tax policy interpretations, local shareholding rules, and customs clearance procedures across national borders.
“A company may be ready to scale from Tanzania into Kenya, Uganda or Rwanda, but it is often forced to re-learn the regulatory system from scratch in each market,” Sued explained.
All these efficiency losses ultimately translate directly into additional operating costs for businesses. Regional trade experts estimate that non-tariff barriers, customs delays, and regulatory inconsistencies cost African economies billions of dollars annually, losses that manifest in reduced productivity and declining competitiveness.
Even after years of reform commitments by the East African Community, truck delays at East African border crossings remain widespread.
A deeply ironic core contradiction lies at the heart of this issue: while African governments uniformly prioritise industrialisation and vigorously promote regional trade, local entrepreneurs still spend significant time navigating paperwork, repetitive approval processes, and inconsistently enforced regulatory requirements, leaving them unable to focus on expanding their businesses.
Leading commentator Sued argues that modern capital, which is highly mobile, only flows to regions with smoothly functioning institutional systems.
Against the current backdrop of global manufacturing relocation and supply chain restructuring, competition among African countries to attract investment has grown increasingly fierce. “Capital today is highly mobile,” Sued said. “It will go where systems function.”
Rwanda has established itself as a benchmark for administrative efficiency, with investors consistently citing fast approval speeds, fully digitalised services, and strong cross-agency institutional coordination as its core advantages.
Sued adds that investors’ core decision-making dimensions extend beyond tax incentives and labour costs; they also prioritise institutional accessibility, approval efficiency, problem-solving capacity, and the tangible ability to ensure projects launch without unnecessary delays.
“Investors are not only comparing countries based on tax incentives or labour costs,” she said. “They are comparing the ease of navigating institutions, obtaining approvals, resolving problems and executing projects without unnecessary delays.”
East Africa’s industrial ambitions are increasingly colliding with a major obstacle: weak, fragmented institutions. According to Tanzanian investment lawyer Amne Sued, the region’s greatest challenge is no longer lack of capital or entrepreneurial ambition, but bureaucratic systems that cannot keep pace with modern business growth.
Speaking after the Kigali CEO Forum 2026, Sued argued that East Africa is entering a rare economic opportunity created by global supply chain restructuring, rising labour costs in Asia and geopolitical tensions that are forcing multinational companies to diversify manufacturing locations.
Tanzania and Kenya possess strong strategic advantages, including Indian Ocean shipping routes, expanding rail and port infrastructure, energy projects and growing mineral reserves tied to the global green energy transition.
Tanzania’s graphite, nickel and natural gas reserves are increasingly attracting international interest, while Kenya remains East Africa’s financial and technology hub.
However, despite these advantages, cross-border enterprises within the East African Common Market still face major regulatory barriers, including differing licensing systems, customs procedures, tax interpretations and local ownership requirements.
“A company may be ready to scale from Tanzania into Kenya, Uganda or Rwanda, but it is often forced to re-learn the regulatory system from scratch in each market,” Sued explained.
Regional trade experts estimate that customs delays, non-tariff barriers, and inconsistent regulations continue to cost African economies billions of dollars annually.
Truck congestion at border crossings remains common despite years of reform commitments under the East African Community.
Sued believes the solution is not copying one national development model but creating a regional institutional framework capable of supporting cross-border growth.
“Africa must now move from symbolic integration to operational integration,” she said.
She pointed to Rwanda as a benchmark for administrative efficiency, with investors praising fast approvals, digitised systems and strong institutional coordination.
However, she noted that Rwanda’s relatively small domestic market limits industrial expansion, while its highly centralised governance structure may not easily translate to larger economies like Tanzania and Kenya.
Kenya, meanwhile, continues to attract venture capital, multinational headquarters, and digital innovation, but businesses there still struggle with policy unpredictability, tax disputes, and changing regulations that complicate long-term investment planning.
The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), Sued believes, has already reshaped how governments and investors think about Africa’s future by encouraging continental rather than purely national economic planning.
“The AfCFTA has absolutely changed the strategic conversation,” Sued said. “Governments, investors, manufacturers and regional businesses are increasingly thinking continentally rather than purely nationally.”
Still, she cautioned that implementation remains uneven. Fragmented customs systems, payment restrictions, transport costs, and infrastructure gaps continue to slow regional trade and reduce competitiveness.
At the same time, major global powers are increasing their economic focus on Africa. Gulf states are investing heavily in East African ports and logistics infrastructure. At the same time, Chinese companies continue to finance industrial parks and transport corridors, and Western governments increasingly view Africa as strategically important for critical mineral supply chains linked to green energy technologies.
“These shifts we are witnessing in global trade routes, supply chains and manufacturing geography are not temporary disruptions,” Sued said. “They represent a structural reorganisation of the global economy.”
Sued warned that Africa must avoid remaining simply an exporter of raw materials while importing expensive finished goods.
Sued argued that Africa must shift from exporting raw materials to building regional manufacturing and value-added industries. She warned that unemployment among Africa’s growing youth population could fuel instability without aggressive industrialisation.
She also said women-led businesses remain locked out of financing because many lack legal structures, compliance systems and investment-ready documentation.
