Kakumiro, Mubende voters want better roads

VOTERS’ NEEDS

Despite being located in different sub-regions, Bunyoro and Buganda, respectively, Kakumiro and Mubende districts, are striving to attain all-round prosperity.

However, in their quest, the challenges identified with most local governments, have not spared them.

Mubende is Kakumiro’s neighbour to the south-east and agriculture is the mainstay of the local economy in both districts. They grow crops, such as maize, beans, matooke and coffee, among others.

Religious and cultural tourism and some degree of trade supports the local economy in the districts.

For instance, every May 25, Catholics from Hoima Diocese and Mbarara Archdiocese trek to Saint Andrew Kaahwa’s birth place at Kooki Shrine in Kakumiro. St Andrew Kaahwa is one of the Uganda Catholic Martyrs who was murdered at Munyonyo in Kampala.

Councillor speaks out 

Hajjat Hawa Nakabugo Ssemakula, the LC5 female councillor for elderly persons in Mubende district, said despite the Kampala-Fort Portal road being in a bad state, government has revamped several roads within Mubende municipality under the Uganda Support to Municipal Infrastructure Development Programme Project.

However, Ssemakula noted that within the health sector, there are some gaps. “We have four constituencies with only Kasambya having Health Centre IV. We want to see Buwekula South and Buwekula Main, getting a health centre IV each to save the congestion currently being experienced at the referral hospital. We also ask the Government to ensure more medicine is provided in the health facilities to avoid stockouts,” she said.

She also expressed concern that some elderly people, especially those without good support, take dirty water and that the Government should think about providing them with small water tanks to harvest water or extend bore holes near to their homes.

Key issues  

The outstanding issues voters and leaders in the administrative units want to be addressed, cut-across sectors of health, education, road network and transport, agriculture and food security, water and sanitation, employment, poverty, energy/power, security, land management, business and economic issues, environment, domestic conflicts and leadership gaps, among others.

The former minister of state for lands, Dr Kasirivu Atwooki, recognised the outstanding achievements of the Government in Kakumiro. However, he indicated that the outstanding request of the people of Kakumiro, is the tarmacking of the road from Nalweyo-Kisita -Nkoko-Ntwetwe-Massage in Kyankwanzi district.

He said the second road the people of Kakumiro want to be worked on, is; Ntwetwe-Bukumi-Kakumiro.

“One, Nalyweyo-Kisita?Nkoko-Ntwetwe- Massodde, is a liberation road. After Kabamba I in 1981, that is where President Museveni, who was by then a rebel passed as he retreated to establish the initial rebellion base in Kiboga. Then on Kabamba II, they used it to cross from Kyamusisi through Butorogo, Kagobwa. Even when they retreated to Birembo, they used the same route,” Kasirivu said.

The same road, according to Kasirivu, who is also the former Bugangaizi legislator, is where the East African Crude Pipeline (EACOP) is passing, which adds on its importance.

“It is also a religious tourism road. It connects to Kooki Catholic Shrine,” Kasirivu added.

Land conflicts, power gaps  

Kasirivu, despite recognising that rural electrification had scored strides, indicated that a number of villages are not yet on the national grid and should be considered.

He also noted that the problem of land ownership in Kakumiro and the entire greater Kibaale remained complex and unresolved.

The Government has implemented land reform policies, including the 1995 Constitution and the Land Act (1998), aimed at addressing land ownership and tenure issues.

The efforts have included an intervention to pay off landlords to aid the people in the area to secure land titles.

President Yoweri Museveni, the National Resistance Movement (NRM) candidate, in his re-election bid, will address voters in Kakumiro as he completes his Bunyoro campaign tour.

On the same day, he will start campaigns Buganda where he will address voters in Mubende district. Kakumiro district was operationalised in 2016 after a parliamentary legislation that split Kibaale district.

Mubende, is one of the oldest districts in the country created in 1967. Edward Muhindo, a contestant for Bugangaizi South constituency in Kakumiro, said the most pressing issue is power extension, especially in Bugangaizi.

“For over 15 years, power has not extended to other rural places, yet it’s a region that can drive development by allowing people to establish cottage industries such as maize mills and others. So, there is a need for power extension,” he said.

The second issue, he said, is extension of safe and clean water to rural water.

“People used to have local streams and local wells. But with the massive deforestation in our area, there is need for the Government to speed up rural water projects,” he said.

Citizens’ manifesto  

The voters’ concerns in Kakumiro, Mubende and in both sub-regions of Bunyoro and Buganda are also refl ected in the New Vision Citizens Manifesto conducted between March and May 2025, where prospective voters highlighted key bottlenecks undermining service delivery in the spheres of healthcare, security, roads infrastructure, water and sanitation, poverty, unemployment, power connectivity, education, agricultural services, land management, crimes, leadership among others.

For instance, only about 26.7% of the respondents in Bunyoro sub-region endorsed the state of health services, while in the education sector more than 81% believe something should be done to improve the education sector performance.

Only 8% of the respondents in the sub?region approved the state of the roads and transport as more than 92% suggested more needed to be done to achieve better roads. In Buganda sub-region 18.4% of the respondents approved the health sector, as more than 85% suggested necessary improvements.

Only 10% approved the state of roads as more than 90% called for improvements.

Expert’s view  

Prof. Samuel Kyamanywa, the vice-chancellor of Bunyoro University said the magic bullet to challenges affecting rural communities is education. He also advocated for more funding of infrastructure projects, which he described as common-user-programmes that boost economic development.

Kyamanywa added that establishment of a regional public university in Bunyoro “will bring tremendous and highly positive changes to the area.”

“We hope to increase the value of the by-products of petroleum, so that people can get jobs and. So, establishing this university in this area is going to open up new value chains, particularly in the petroleum and the gas sector. ,” Kyamanywa said.

Voter speaks out |

Didus Mweterane, veteran journalist says the road from Lusalira-Kasambya-Kabamba Barracks-Masaka road despite being put in the last five budgets, has never been worked on, but was paid for.

This road every election is promised, but when you go through it, you feel pity.