As part of its strategy to improve urban mobility across the country, the DR Congo government announced it will soon put 600 new transport buses into service. The project will be implemented in partnership with the Chinese consortium C2 Stars Limited and Sumec Hong Kong Company Limited. The related MoU was signed on September 18, between the consortium’s chairman Tang Wei (picture, right) and the Congolese transport minister Cherubin Okende (picture, left).

Cherubin Okende says the government wants to rejuvenate the rolling stock used for public transport in the country and set a local bus assembly plant. Under this partnership, a first batch of buses could be put on the road by the end of December, Tang Wei said. But the commercial contract should be finalized in the meantime.

As a reminder, DR Congo has signed a similar deal with Serve Air to acquire 670 buses (440 Volvo buses and 230 Mercedes buses) for the public transport company Transco. The country had also planned to open a local assembly plant in Kinshasa in April 2021, but the plant has not yet been built.

Romuald Ngueyap