Total SA has funds to build a pipeline linking oil fields in landlocked Uganda with a port on Tanzania’s Indian Ocean coast, the Tanzanian government said, after its president met with an official from the French company. Total’s Vice President for East Africa, Javier Rielo, “assured President John Magufuli that the company will begin construction of the crude-oil pipeline project from Uganda to the Tanga port as quickly as possible because there is money for the project,” the presidency said Monday in an e-mailed statement. A Total spokesman declined to comment on today’s meeting. He referred to a December statement in which France’s oil major expressed its preference for a pipeline transporting crude through Tanzania, based on cost, reliability and safety assumptions for the infrastructure. The 1,410-kilometer (876-mile) pipeline will cost as much as $4 billion and employ 1,500 people directly, according to the statement. Magufuli announced March 2 […]