MOZAMBIQUE’S public rail and port company, CFM, is soliciting neighbouring countries for the US$300-million it needs to upgrade the Sena Line, linking the country’s second port of Beira to Malawi. The 600km railway through Mozambique’s central Sofala province was heavily mined and sabotaged during the country’s 16-year civil war which ended in 1992. CFM board chairman, Rui Fonseca, said on Thursday that he hopes the funds will be available by September because delays will have a ‘knock-on’ effect on wider economic reconstruction. The massive Moatize Coal project in north western Tete Province, financed by Japan and Australia, as well as a series of large cotton projects in the area all rely on upgraded rail links to an export port. Fonseca confirmed that CFM was attempting to convince neighbouring states as well as Japan and Australia to contribute to the reconstruction costs for the Sena Line.