Residents demand food security, peace as Museveni woos Amudat voters
Amudat has a population of 203,358 people scattered across the 11 sub-counties/town councils, 44 parishes and 415 villages.
President Yoweri Museveni waving to passionate supporters at a recent campaign rally. (File/New Vision)
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President Yoweri Museveni is today, Tuesday, October 28, 2025, in Amudat district to woo voters ahead of the 2026 General Election.
His only campaign rally of the day will be held at Kalas Girls Primary School playground under the theme: Protecting the Gains, Making a Qualitative Leap into High Middle-Income Status.
Operationalised on July 1, 2010, after a parliamentary legislation approved the creation of Amudat district from Nakapiripirit, Amudat residents face challenges that are not different from those facing the rest of Karamoja, the only region dogged by insecurity in the form of cattle rustling.
However, voters and leaders in the district say the area is progressively becoming peaceful.
“The major thing we thank the Government for is pacifying the region. The local leadership has been involved in community mobilisation and community dialogue meetings on peace,” Joseph Lobot, the Amudat LC5 chairperson, said.
One issue that everyone agrees on is that poverty is rife, especially now that many animals have been lost to cattle rustlers, commonly known as karacunas and the Turkana tribesmen from neighbouring Kenya.
Amudat has a population of 203,358 people scattered across the 11 sub-counties/town councils, 44 parishes and 415 villages.
In the last general election of 2021, Amudat had 43,647 registered voters; out of these, 31,453 (72.1%) voted. This time, Amudat has 58,203 registered voters, an increase of 14,556.
The polling stations are 164, up from 120 in 2021.
Museveni, who is again standing on the National Resistance Movement party ticket, polled 30,451 (97.6%) votes in Amudat, while his main challenger, Robert Kyagulanyi of the National Unity Platform party, garnered 625 (2%).
Amudat and the entire sub-region are an agro-pastoralist area. The district is located along Uganda’s eastern border with Kenya, but it has also often been plagued by poverty, malnutrition, and famine, affecting children’s growth and education, according to the latest United Nations Children’s Fund’s Karamoja Nutrition Programme report.
The report says 84% of households in the region cannot afford a nutritious diet.