By Hayal Alemayehu

ELiE, a Sudan-based company which invested some USD 160 million in pharmaceutical, edible oil and soap plants in the northern Ethiopia town of Gondar, is contemplating pulling out from the business it has yet to kick-start due to customs bureaucracy, Ahmed Elbadawi Ahmed, general manager of the company, told The Report.

“We have a duty-free privilege because of the type of the business we are investing in,” Ahmed said. “Initially, it took only one day for Ethiopian customs office to reconcile documents and provide us with the pertinent waiver to take our imported goods duty free. But now, it takes the office more than three weeks to do the same and at times that may not even be successful,” the manager added.

“This is frustrating the owners of the company who have already ordered me to sell the company and go back to Sudan,” Ahmed said.

According to the manager, the company, which currently employs 152 people, would have started producing soaps had it not been for a power problem. “If we were provided with power, we would have started the soap production,” Ahmed said. “And this is causing another problem after the company invested a huge sum of money and is ready for production.”

The delays which the Sudanese company complained of were only temporary, according to a representative of the Kality customs office, which is responsible for providing service to investors who have duty-free privileges.

The problem occurred when the pertinent office transferred from the head office of the Ethiopian Revenue and Customs Authority around Beklo Bet to Kality.

The manager of the Sudanese company however says that the problem is persisting even now.