The East African aviation sector is taking a major step toward seamless pilot licensing as regional regulators begin a five-day workshop in Kampala to harmonise flight crew and flight dispatch skill test standards across all eight EAC partner states.
Hosted by the Uganda Civil Aviation Authority (UCAA) in partnership with the East African Civil Aviation Safety and Security Oversight Agency (CASSOA), the workshop aims to eliminate longstanding inconsistencies in how pilots and flight dispatchers—also known as flight operations officers—are tested and certified. The meeting runs from November 17–21 at Skyz Hotel Naguru.
Opening the workshop, Eng. Ronnie Barongo, UCAA Director for Safety, Security and Economic Regulation, emphasised the need for regional uniformity in practical testing.
He noted that the region has already harmonised regulations, technical guidance, and theory examinations, leaving practical skill tests as the last gap. Ugandan trainees who study in neighbouring countries currently face new examinations when they return home, a situation he described as costly and cumbersome.
Harmonisation, he said, will strengthen competence, promote cooperation, and ensure that testing quality remains consistent whether a student is examined in Uganda, Kenya or Tanzania. Barongo also revealed that Uganda’s examination system has been fully digitised and upgraded to a web-based platform, a shift expected to support the incoming skill-based reforms.
CASSOA Director Technical, Paul Lukanga, said aligning licensing requirements will remove the disparities that have long disadvantaged pilots and dispatchers trained in different EAC countries.
He explained that while ICAO provides minimum standards, East African states have been setting varying higher requirements, resulting in a pilot qualified in one state not meeting the criteria in another.
According to him, the goal is to reach a single regional standard so that a licence issued in Uganda is valid across all eight partner states.
He added that the inclusion of flight dispatchers—whose responsibilities closely interact with pilots—makes harmonisation even more essential.
Pilots themselves are strongly backing the move. Captain George Mazige, Vice President of the Uganda Professional Pilots Association, said many Ugandan pilots who train in Kenya or Tanzania return home only to face fresh examinations, which are both expensive and discouraging.
He argued that harmonised testing will allow Ugandan students who train within the region to be licensed automatically when they return. In the long term, he said, the initiative should lead to a regional licence recognised in all EAC states.
Over the next five days, participants from all partner states will be reviewing current skill-testing practices, comparing them with international standards such as ICAO Annex 1, identifying gaps in the testing of pilots and dispatchers, developing a standardised framework for examiners, integrating Competency-Based Training and Assessment (CBTA), and agreeing on a regional roadmap for harmonised test standards.
Barongo noted that the push for alignment comes at a time when Uganda’s air traffic is steadily rising. Entebbe International Airport handled 1.9 million international passengers in 2023, a figure that grew to 2.2 million in 2024, with traffic for 2025 showing promising growth. Cargo volumes are also increasing, reinforcing the need for a more efficient and coordinated regional system.
As East African states modernise their aviation infrastructure, the Kampala workshop represents a decisive step toward a unified regional system—one that removes costly re-testing, expands job mobility, and ensures that every pilot and flight dispatcher in the EAC is trained and assessed under the same high-quality standards.