Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) has failed to honour its promise to start the Construction of 69.70km of city roads by February and September 2023 as earlier communicated. According to Kampala city political leaders, most bad roads in question categorized into Lot 1,2,3 and 4 construction works have not commenced whereas those that have already started are not even halfway done.
The under-pressure elected leaders blame the delay on contractors who have signed up for more roads beyond their capacity and also the inflation of middlemen chasing big profits.
In December 2022, the sorrowful state of city roads dominated the conversation in the digital media with pothole alerts and exhibitions, which drew, mixed reactions from the public.
A month later, KCCA issued an ambitious response pledging that in February 2023, the city was to become a construction site with a long list of roads whose construction would start in February and September of the same year.
Nine months down the road, the roaring sounds of caterpillars, and signposts indicating men at work are not seen along most of the city roads, nor have the road construction sites even been opened on most of these roads.
The state of these roads has left elected leaders under pressure from the electorates.
Central Division Mayor Salim Uhuru says the state of the roads has made people turn against him.
“I am the only elected NRM leader in Kampala, people attack me saying you lied to us,” he said.
Member of Parliament for Nakawa East, Ronald Balimwezo also claims the situation is the same with the opposition supporters.
“I feel the pressure, People think it's us to make this road.”
The 69.70km of roads KACCA promised to start by February and September has 28 roads which among them are; Wamalla Road in Lubaga, Luwafu Road – Lubaga, Sir Apollo Kagwa – Central Division, Queens Way – central, Kyebando Ring road – Kawempe, Kisasi road – Kawempe, Ssuna 2 road – Markindye, Kayemba road – Markindye and others.
The angry leaders are now blaming the delay on contractors who have signed up for more roads beyond their capacity, while others believe the middlemen position skimming for big differences is the problem.
“Some contractors are delaying because they have signed up for many roads above their capacity,” Uhuru said.
In the Central Division, only construction of Sir Apollo Kagwa Road, 6th, 7th, and 8th Street has started leaving the rest untouched. The same situation is in other divisions where construction has never commenced regardless of KCCA's promise.
“This road leads to Kasubi and off to Hoima, the Albertine region. traders along it there are several businesses but traders here feel ignored even though they pay taxes.”
“You see this pothole, when motorists try to dodge, they end up ramming into traders.”
With the slow progress of work, President Museveni directed the UPDF to help in pothole filling and sectional repairs, a view that equally drew mixed reactions.
However, officials on the committee on city roads and infrastructure are threatening to crack a whip on errant contractors.
The poor City roads have hampered businesses and seen motorists incurring huge costs on car repairs, losing a lot of productive time in garages.
