Uganda’s Finance Ministry on Monday announced that the country is preparing to borrow Kes 23 billion from China's Export-Import Bank (Exim) to help expand its internet infrastructure.

This underscores the East African country's increasing reliance for credit on Chinese lenders after the World Bank halted all new lending to Uganda earlier this year in protest at a new anti-homosexuality law.

Speaking on X, the ministry said the money is "to finance the supply, installation, commissioning and support of the national data transmission backbone infrastructure."



The World Bank, traditionally Uganda's biggest development lender, halted loans to Uganda after President Yoweri Museveni signed the Anti-Homosexuality Act, which hands out tough sentences, including death for a range of homosexual activities.