By mid-1970s, the East African Railways was the king of long-distance transportation with Mombasa, Nairobi, Nakuru, Eldoret, Kisumu, Jinja and Kampala as the key hubs.

Branches to Moshi, Magadi, Nanyuki, Nyahururu, Solai, Kitale, Lira and Kasese created a web of regional railway networks, and at each railway town, rail sidings provided connections to warehouses, factories and oil depots. Rwanda import and exports including petroleum products were handled though Kampala station.

When the East African Community collapsed in 1977 Tanzania closed borders with Kenya, resulting in loss of transit traffic from Mombasa to Moshi and the lake ports of Mwanza, Moshi and Bukoba which were fed from Mombasa by railways via Kisumu port. The railways name changed to Kenya Railways (KR) in 1977.

About the same time, difficult relationships between Presidents Jomo Kenyatta and Idi Amin of Uganda fractured links between Kenya and Uganda railways resulting in loss of rail synergy between the two countries.

This is when transporters, mainly Italians and Somalis from Mandera, emerged from Somalia where they were engaged in long-distance transportation and populated the highway between Mombasa and Uganda with old Fiat/Iveco trucks. To fill the railways void, Rwanda formed a state company (STIR Kigali) to truck cargo (including petroleum) to and from Kenya.