Where bad road means nights deep in the wild

Passengers push a stuck commuter taxi near Pian Upe National Game Reserve. photo BY NELSON WESONGA

What you need to know:

HELPLESS. While on a journey from Mbale to Nakapiripirit, Nelson Wesonga has an ordeal to tell about the state of the road.

This is not fiction. During the wet season (Between April and June), the road between Muyembe in Bulambuli and Nakapiripirit is impassable for those driving two–wheel–drive vehicles.
Many travellers who have been on the 93.3 kilometre stretch during the rainy season have spent nights in the wild after the vehicles they were in got stuck in the rut.
On Sunday, April 3, 17 passengers and I left Mbale District in eastern Uganda for Nakapiripirit in the northeast, 93.3 kilometres away. The commuter minibus we boarded set off just after midday. According to the driver, who identified himself as ‘Mzee Peter’, we would arrive at 6pm.
Arriving at one’s destination early allows a traveller time to look for accommodation before dusk.

Helplessness
Three years since my earlier visit to the region, the stretch between Mbale and Muyembe is still the same uneven tarmac. From there onwards to Nakapiripirit it is, not murram, but, a dirt road.
Only motorists driving four–wheel–drive vehicles (sports utility vans) can manoeuvre between the two towns within six hours. After one of our van’s springs broke, William Isabirye, a mechanic, suggested Peter stops and we look for wood to fix in the spring’s place.
We found a piece of wood that would work. And we continued with the journey. We covered about four kilometres. When the vehicle’s fan broke and water pump failed, Peter said he had to ‘ground’ the vehicle.
He said he would also need Shs250, 000 to fix the vehicle but he would use the money we had given him. Someone would have to travel from Mbale, where many mechanics can be found, to where our vehicle was stuck to fix it. In the meantime, he rang someone he addressed as “Afande” to send a tractor to tow our vehicle to firmer ground. Afande, who might not have known he was on speakerphone, answered that he could not since he was not at the station’.
“We will spend the night here,” Peter said, resignedly. “Tell the passengers outside the car to enter and close the door.”
We got in. Some of the passengers who are either from or have lived in Karamoja for decades then started telling the rest of us stories. Many were chilling.
“I have seen Karimojong warriors rob passengers stranded on this route. I have also seen some women being raped. I have seen many other scarier things,” Paul Osuna, the conductor said.
Our vehicle had broken down about 12km from Pian Upe National Game Reserve. Osuna said some leopards’ were wont to wander into the road at night. That aside, those who might not have carried some snacks and water would have to wait for motorcycle taxis (bodaboda) that might ride by to send them for something to eat.
When Jason Wekesa, an elderly man who said he had lived in the area for 50 years, said the area used to be unsafe in the past, I relaxed – since in my understanding, he meant the place was not as unsafe anymore.

Effects on passengers
Because of the risk and the difficulty of driving through the mud during the rainy season, Patrick Opolot, who travels on the route monthly, said the commuter minibus operators increase the fare.
“During the dry season, the fare from Mbale to Nakapiripirit is Shs20, 000. Now, because of the rain, it is Shs25, 000,” Opolot said.
The conductor said they increase the fare because sometimes they have to hire tractors from Namalu Government Prison or even the district local government earthmovers to tow them.
And in case some vehicle parts get spoilt, they have to buy them.
When asked whether he would reduce the fare at the onset of the dry season, Osuna said yes.
I had to wait for the sun to ‘dry the road’ to continue with the journey the next day.
And it was not in the van I had travelled in all the way from Mbale but in a lorry travelling to Amudat District to pick up marble, which it would then transport to Tororo for processing.

Quick facts
• For some reason, the government in 2013 chose to tarmac the 93.3–kilometre long road from Moroto to Nakapiripirit. The road was completed 2015. It cost Shs184 billion.
• But even before it was tarmacked, it was real murram. Vehicles would never get stuck on that stretch – however heavy the rain would be.
• A lot of artisan mining goes on in Moroto and Nakapiripirit.
• Some travellers speculated that if it weren’t for the artisan gold mining going on especially in the areas between Moroto and Nakapiripirit, the road would not have been tarmacked first, fast.
• Parliament in 2015 cleared the central government to borrow $110 million from the Islamic Development Bank to upgrade the Muyembe-Nakapiripirit road.
• The Uganda National Roads Authority (UNRA) has put up a notice at Muyembe, indicating the road would soon be upgraded from earthen to asphaltic road. Just as the state of the road, UNRA’s notice is real.