Tirinyi-Kumi road upgrading pledge pending since 1986

The promise:
President Museveni has been promising to tarmac Tirinyi-Pallisa-Kumi road since he took power in 1986.

The road starts from Tirinyi to Pallisa, a stretch of about 22 kilometers. In Pallisa it splits into two. One branch leads northeastwards to Kumi (about 52 kilometers) and later Ngora in Teso Sub region. The second branch leads southeastwards to Kamonkoli, which is about 54 kilometers away.

The upgrade to tarmac in 1996 of the Iganga-Tirinyi-Mbale road raised the hopes of the citizens. But they are still waiting.
The road, which Kumi Municipality MP Silas Aogon claims is one of the infrastructural developments that will deliver Uganda to middle incomes status, the four districts of Kibuku District, Pallisa, Budaka nd Kumi.

The road features prominently on the list of unfulfilled promises compiled by the Parliament’s Committee on Government Assurances has compiled.

President Museveni renewed the promise to tarmac the road when he campaigned for the 2001 elections, the year Dr Kizza Besigye first challenged his power.

Mr Museveni renewed the promise in the lead up to the 2006 election and leading to the 2011 elections, the 111km road was listed in the NRM 2011- 2016 manifesto as one of the 22 roads that would be dealt with during the ensuing five years.

According to former Kumi County MP Patrick Amuriat Oboi, the parliamentary Committee on Physical Planning and that on the National Economy had early during the tenure of the 9th Parliament visited the concerned districts and carried out an assessment of the number of people and amounts of property that would be affected by the project.

“It was based on our findings that Parliament approved a government request to borrow money for works on the project, but I cannot say what went on after that,” Mr Oboi told Daily Monitor on phone.

In May 2014 the Uganda National Roads Authority (UNRA) ran advertisements in the media inviting contractors to bid for improvement of the road to bitumen complete with shoulders, drainage channels and culverts. Whether the firms did submit bids remains unknown. What is known is that the work did not take off as had been expected.

On December 15, 2014, Mr Museveni, while addressing the NRM National Conference at State House Entebbe, repeated the promise to have the road tarmacked along with another long pending road, the Kapchorwa-Kween-Bukwo-Suam road.

Again on December 17, 2015, the President, while campaigning in Kibuku and Pallisa districts, when he also promised to pick up and store “all trouble causers” in Luzira prison, which he described as a good store for such errant characters, said that the road would be fixed in 2016

During one particular rally in Pallisa where he defended his government’s decision to concentrate on construction of small health units as opposed to rehabilitating and equipping the bigger existent hospitals, Mr Museveni said that the government had already secured a loan of Shs 385 m from the Islamic Development Bank to have the road tarmacked.

Status
After more than 13 months since the latest promise was repeated and at least one year after works were meant to begin, there is no indication that work will begin soon.

It is now 31 years since Mr Museveni first promised to fix the road, which usually becomes impassable in many sections, especially when it rains.

Many a resident consider the road as the single biggest impediment to development in an area where over 90 percent of the population is dependent on agriculture.

Impact
The NRM 2016 – 2021 manifesto states: “The NRM Government recognises that reliable transport infrastructure, including roads, railways, air and water transport, is very crucial for a landlocked country like Uganda. It is a prerequisite for opening up production zones to markets.
Transport is one of the key cost pushers for producers and manufacturers. The cost of transport adds 25 percent to the cost of goods while electricity at current prices adds 14 percent”.
It is largely on account of the state of this road that the cost of transport is in the area is high relative to other areas with better roads, which has impacted on the cost of goods and services in the four districts that it serves.

Investments in the sector of transport are also slow in coming as one serious businessman wants to buy and deploy a costly omnibus or bus to play this route. The route has been left to old rickety cars, which also means spending more time on the road.

Pallisa, Budaka and Kibuku are endowed with many streams and swamps, which drain into Lake Kyoga. These make it ideal for the production of rice and vegetables. Other parts of the three districts are also some of the biggest producers of cotton as can be seen in the presence of some of the country’s biggest cotton ginneries, but farmers are getting a raw deal in terms of pricing. They cannot easily access good markets on account of the poor roads.

Traders who brave the road and commit their vehicles to working in the area ensure that it is the farmers who pay for the vehicles’ wear and tear by paying them peanuts.
The same applies to farmers in Kumi where agricultural production has recently been diversified to include production of sunflower and both upland and paddy rice.

Finally the state of the road coupled with insufficient supply of electric power undermines any attempts at establishment of plants that would have otherwise helped add value to the agricultural produce, something that would have perhaps resulted into better prices for the farmers and the opening of employment opportunities.

However, while one can circumnavigate the challenges posed by lack of electricity by installing diesel power food processing plants, there are simply no two ways about the road.

Official explanation.

The director of communications at UNRA, Mr Mark Ssali, says that plans are in advanced stages to have the road fixed.
“We have already got the money. It is a loan from the Islamic Development Bank. We are now in the process of procuring a contractor,” Mr Ssali told Daily Monitor on phone last week.

Mr Ssali did not commit himself on the issue of the design, but Daily Monitor has since established that a design providing for two lanes, each 3.5 meters wide and 1.5 meter wide shoulders has been adopted, but town sections and trading centers will have a 2.5m wide parking lane and 1.5m wide footpath on either side of the carriageway.

Voices

“This road has been a chronic pain. It has been so even during past governments, but it has been a major obstacle to trade and development. This region right from Tirinyi through to Kumi is a very highly productive area. It produces a lot of cotton, rice and others. It also has capacity to produce lots of fruits and vegetables, but transporting them has been a very big problem. We think that once it is fixed the area will become even more productive” –

Mr Robert Irigie, retired Public Servant in the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries, now a farmer in Pallisa

“We recently asked the Minister for Works to present before Parliament figures detailing what has so far done. She brought in some information indicating that Shs12bn has since been put aside for compensating those who will be affected by the works. Parliament directed her to bring the complete figures so we are still waiting, but we have heard that designs are complete and that a contractor will soon be procured. Let us wait and see
– Mr Silas Aogon, MP (Independent) Kumi Municipality

Daily Monitor position

That this road is of great import to the three districts that it is meant to link and indeed Eastern Uganda as a whole, cannot be over emphasized.

At a time when the government can hardly generate any new jobs, a new road presents an opportunity for some of the unemployed youths in the region to get into gainful employment especially during the road construction phase.

After the construction, it provides yet another opportunity for the youth and many other folks to open up roadside businesses as we have seen in the case of Namawojjolo and Najjembe along the Kampala Jinja highway and in Nakalama along the way the Iganga Tirinyi Mbale highway where many deal in beverages and roasted food stuffs like chicken, beef and plantains (gonja).

Once fixed, it shall no doubt kick start a whole range of improvements in business and agriculture. An improved road will no doubt attract better vehicles and in the process lead to a reduction in time spent on travel and movement of goods in the area. A better road will also mean reduced vehicle maintenance costs.

Farmers are likely to laugh all the way to the banks as their produce, mostly rice and cotton, is likely to attract better prices, which will boost household incomes and in the process improve living standards. Improved incomes are likely to lead to enhanced purchasing power, which should be good news for those dealers and manufacturers of especially household products. It should by extension, also be good news to Uganda Revenue Authority (URA).

Given the multiplier effect that it is bound to have, it is important that work gets underway as soon as yesterday.

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