In honour of King Oyo, the road should not become one to another funeral
With thousands expected to travel to Fort Portal for King Oyo’s burial, James Rusoke revisits the corridor’s deadly black spots and calls for caution, discipline and responsibility on the road.
James Rusoke. (Courtesy)
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OPINION
By James Rusoke
As thousands travel to Tooro’s capital for the burial of Omukama Oyo Nyimba Kabamba Iguru Rukidi IV, the Kampala-Fort Portal corridor carries a chilling history. The route is riddled with black spots, deadly bends, construction risks, speeding, mechanical failures, and lives already lost.
The greatest tribute to the king is not to arrive first. It is to arrive alive. Fort Portal will soon become the destination of one of Uganda’s most solemn journeys. It should be recalled that he championed road safety initiatives to protect school children, promote visibility and generally safer road use.
In March, Oyo led a road safety sensitisation at Buhinga Primary School and Tooro Parents School in Fort Portal, where pupils were taught about safe road use and proper conduct while travelling to and from school. And in 2024, under the flagship of King Oyo, road-safety campaigner Joe Walker completed a-more-than-300km Kampala-Fort-Portal walk, making road safety the central purpose of the journey.
King Oyo died on August 27, aged 34, and is being mourned across Tooro, Uganda, and the world at large. His burial will draw thousands of people towards the kingdom’s capital. But as mourners prepare to travel, Uganda must confront an uncomfortable reality: the road to the King’s funeral is itself a safety challenge.
Thousands of vehicles will move along the Kampala-Mityana-Mubende-Kyegegwa-Kyenjojo-Fort Portal corridor. Some will be driven by professionals. Others by family members. Some drivers know the route intimately. Others will be using it for the first time.
Some vehicles will be mechanically sound. Others may have been hurriedly brought into service because demand for transport has increased. Some drivers will be refreshed. Others may already be fatigued. And some will be under pressure to reach Fort Portal at a particular time.
That is precisely where tragedy begins. A funeral programme must never become a death clock.
When you interrogate history, you will observe that the road has already given us warnings and this is not a theoretical risk; the corridor has registered real statistical history in black spot areas such as Ngezi, Kyakatara, Mukunyu, Miranga, Rugombe, Matiri, Kihuura/Kaihura.
Rweibale, Ssebitoli, Katobile, Kagorogoro. These are not merely geographical names. They are locations associated with road-safety concerns and crashes.
In 2025, a local daily reported that more than 50 people had been killed in separate fatal crashes on the 50km Fort Portal-Kyenjojo road. Police attributed the accidents in part to reckless driving and identified Ssebitoli, Mukunyu, Katobile and Kaihura as black spots.
An earlier editorial, drawing on police records, again identified Mukunyu as a death trap and highlighted Ssebitoli, Katobire and Kaihura. One of the executive drivers in Kampala described the Rugombe-Mukunyu stretch as particularly dangerous, pointing to a long slope around Katobire followed by a sharp curve towards Mukunyu, where heavy trucks can struggle to brake or negotiate the bend. And here the message is brutally simple. The black spots are known. The question is whether we will respect them.
Contemporary reporting said the rear axle of his Land Cruiser Prado broke, causing a rear tyre to burst and the driver to lose control. The vehicle overturned several times and Bishop Kyaligonza died. His wife was seriously injured. Then, only days later, tragedy struck again. Bishops travelling to attend Kyaligonza’s burial crashed at Kyakatara.
Bishops Daniel Gimadu and Augustine Salimo were injured. Perpetua, Gimadu’s wife, died. Police reported that the driver failed to negotiate a bend. Read that again! People were travelling to bury a road-crash victim and another person died on the way to his burial.
That should be permanently engraved into Uganda’s road-safety consciousness. The danger is not confined to history.
On August 14, 2026, a fatal crash occurred at Kagavu along the Mubende-Mityana road. Police-related reporting said an Actros truck travelling from Mubende towards Mityana lost control while descending and moved into the opposite lane before falling onto an oncoming Nissan Murano. Kenneth Kaijuka, aged 45, and another adult male died, while four children in the Murano were injured.
The tragedy is a brutal reminder of what can happen when heavy vehicles, gradients, speed, road conditions and human error converge. And the timing could hardly be more significant. Uganda is now preparing for mass movement towards Fort Portal. Kaijuka’ s death must, therefore, not become another line in a police report.
It should trigger questions: Was the heavy vehicle under control? Was the speed appropriate? Were the road works adequately managed? Was the road surface safe? Were warnings sufficient? Could the crash have been prevented? Those questions must be answered before another family pays the price.
Another warning from the road is that of Father Albert. The road-safety history of western Uganda also remembers Rev. Father Albert Byaruhanga. On October 26, 2009, Father Albert died following a crash at Kyanda along the Mubende-Mityana road.
Uganda Radio Network reported that his Toyota RAV4 lost control and overturned after knocking two pedestrians. One of those pedestrians, Joseph Kigundu, also died. A memorial record also places Father Albert’s death at Kyanda on the Mubende-Mityana road. His story is important because it reminds us that the road does not suddenly become dangerous near Fort Portal. The risk begins long before the funeral destination comes into view.
Another warning from the road is that of Katama. Katama must also be treated with caution, as it appears in local and road-safety records as a dangerous point along the corridor.
The lesson for drivers is not complicated: Slow down. Do not overtake blindly. Increase following distance. Watch heavy vehicles. Expect pedestrians and motorcycles. Read the road ahead. A black spot should never become scenery. A dangerous road location does not become safe simply because you have survived it before.
These are some of the black spots where you need to slow down and the reasons why.
MIRANGA / MUKUNYU: Mechanical failure history, sharp curves and heavy traffic concerns.
KYAKATARA: Sharp-bend crash history.
ACTION: Reduce speed before entering the bend. Never overtake blindly.
RUGOMBE–MUKUNYU/KATOBIRE: Slopes, sharp curves and heavy-vehicle risk.
ACTION: Do not race trucks. Allow adequate stopping distance.
KAIHURA: Documented serious crash location.
ACTION: Avoid risky overtaking; watch pedestrians and motorcycles.
SSEBITOLI: Identified in road-safety reporting as a black spot.
ACTION: Reduce speed and anticipate unpredictable traffic movements.
NGEZI/MATIRI/RWEIBALE: Historically reported as dangerous locations on the corridor.
ACTION: Treat each approach as a high-alert zone.
KAGOROGORO: Historically associated with fatal crashes.
ACTION: Drive defensively; avoid speed and dangerous overtaking.
The rule is simple: If you know a location is dangerous, change your driving before you reach it.
The writer is a Ugandan-based thought leader in logistics and transport strategy