
President Museveni (C) and other government officials during the commissioning of the rehabilitated Mukono-Kampala meter gauge railway line on December 21, 2024. PHOTO | ABUBAKER LUBOWA
On an average day, one can take between one to two hours to travel from Mukono District to Kampala City by road. On a bad day, this time could go up to three hours.
On the rattling clickety-clack metre gauge train, however, one is at their destination in around 40 minutes. This, according to leaders and residents of Mukono, has been the transformative power of the recently launched passenger services on a renovated line.
It is against this backdrop, that the Ministry of Works and Transport and the Uganda Railways Corporation (URC) are looking to expand the railway services to other areas, like Kyengera, Bujuko and Port Bell, Lugazi and Jinja, a plan President Museveni has fully supported.
Speaking at the launch of the newly-reconstructed Kampala-Mukono rail line at the weekend in Kyetume, Mukono, President Museveni said he will support the acquisition of an unspecified amount of money by the government to facilitate the rehabilitation and renovation of the metre gauge railway lines connecting Kampala City centre to Jinja, and other parts of the country to increase the cargo and passenger railway services as an alternative to the busy roads.
“We are going to work very hard to get the money so that you can get more trains, more locomotives, and the wagons and extend to Kyengera, Bujuko, and Port Bell. So I will support the taking of money from the Spanish government to finish this path from here to Lugazi and then to Jinja...But even without external support we are going to do it, we are going to find it. Because we have no alternative. But I am glad
the Spanish government is helping us,” he said.
Mr Museveni said it was time to rethink and diversify Uganda’s transportation systems.
“They [roads] can’t cope rationally with the pressure. This is because everything is on the roads. Cargo, dry cargo, wet cargo, petroleum products, and passengers, are all on the roads. The rational thing is that petroleum products must be transported through pipelines. To and from Mombasa, to and from Dar es Salaam, and later on, from the refinery in Hoima, to the distribution points in Bujuko. We are not going to Kigogwa where people burned themselves trying to get free fuel when a petrol tanker overturned because much of the petrol will be transported by pipelines.”
He added: “Then the cargo should go from the roads to the railway. What we are doing here is endozo [trial].”
The renovation of the 26.8 km long Kampala-Mukono line started in April 2023. The new line is fitted with heavy concrete sleepers weighing 185 kilogrammes each as opposed to the former line that was made of steel sleepers. The URC said the latter is more prone to vandalism and theft.
The project, according to Mr Josephine Aguti, the project engineer, cost 19.8 million euros (about Shs75.4 billion). It is designed for a speed of 120 kilometres per hour, as opposed to what it was with the slipper, with the steel slippers, where the train could only move at 20 to 35 kilometres per hour. The government is also rehabilitating the 382-kilometre Torolo-Gulu-Nimule line.
Gen Katumba Wamala, the minister for Works and Transport, said more Ugandans are now interested in the train services because of convenience, adding that the government is set to improve and modernise both the passenger train and cargo services, establish more halts as well as park and ride stations.
“The railway line you have commissioned...is a vital infrastructure in reviewing the transport challenges for people. The commuter train, we started it as a trial. What started as a trial has now become a challenge in how to increase the services, which have moved up to Mukono, and yet now the demand is that we move up to Lugazi. Your Excellency, on average, we move every morning and evening about 650 people at a go. Now, if you take that in terms of taxis, those are about 46 taxis off the road. So we are saving people to move from 46 taxis and within 40 minutes from here to Kampala," he said.
More cargo
The line also facilitates the haulage of more cargo. “The actual capacity has also increased from 18 to 25 tonnes, enabling heavier loads and greater efficiency, especially the manufacturers in Namanve Park, like Roofings here, they move cargo, their coils and roads which they move from Mombasa are so heavy that if you were to put them on the road, some of the roads would not survive for two years. So this line answers the challenge in that direction. On average, we move it up to about 25,000 tonnes of cargo, but that's still small, looking at what cargo demand is,” Gen Katumba said.
The choice by the government to invest billions of shillings in the outdated MGR comes after years of failure to set up the modern long-awaited Standard Gauge Railway (SGR).
The Metre Gauge Railway was constructed in the 1900s by the British colonial administration connecting land-locked Uganda to the sea, through Kenya. The post-independence period to the 2002s, however, saw a destruction and near collapse of the services due to mismanagement.
Vandalism of the infrastructure has also been a major concern. The government has since 2017 been trying to revamp the service under the URC, but with slow progress.
Mr Abdallatiff Dhakaba Wangubo, the chairperson of the URC board, at the weekend said the budget of the corporation was cut, in addition to outstanding obligations by the government that have crippled their operations.
“The corporation has suffered with cash flow challenges over the years. Since 2018 when the concession was terminated we have not been able to meet several staff obligations due to cash constraints. URC's subvention has been declining over the years and it’s not about to change since the indicative figure for 2025 is Shs570 million,” Mr Wangubo said.
He also appealed to the government to clear its arrears to the corporation to the tune of Shs266 billion accruing from the sale of the corporation's land to the government. He said they plan to procure 10 locomotives, 100 flatbed wagons, and a multipurpose vessel for container loading.
“...big numbers of Ugandans are using the old passenger train. They push one another to get there. We are overwhelmed, and we pray that we get more coaches. As of now, we have only five coaches that we are operating. By the time that train gets to Kampala, hardly anybody has room to sit. So we end up operating four trips a day. We would have loved to have more than that. We are handcuffed," he said.
Mr Benon Kajuna, the director of Transport at the Ministry of Works and Transport, decried the vandalism of railway infrastructure and appealed for proper use, as well as awareness creation among the citizens.
“We normally have human activities destroying our lines, the people walking and vending on the lines, that affects the line. The leaders of Mukono please help us," he said.
President Museveni also reiterated his commitment to the SGR construction. “On the western side, those people uprooted the whole thing [metre gauge]. They are so greedy. So we shall have to build the standard gauge railway from there to Kasese, Kampala. And we are going to build the standard gauge railway from Malaba to Kampala,” he said.
About the Standard Gauge Railway project
Last month, President Museveni launched the construction of the Shs10 trillion Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) line from Kampala to Malaba, bolstering trade with a capacity to transport 1,000 tonnes of cargo at a go, thus lowering the cost of transportation. Mr Museveni set a 48-month timeline for the contractor to deliver the line. The SGR project has dragged on for close to a decade.
Mr Museveni, his counterparts from Kenya, Rwanda, and South Sudan under the Northern Corridor Integration Project undertook the multi-billion dollar project, but Uganda has yet to start construction of its 272km line. Tanzania and Kenya, have advanced in their constructions, with the services operational. The government has cited financing troubles as the main stumbling block to the SGR dream.
In total, Uganda plans to construct 1,700 km of the SGR connecting all parts of the country- Tororo-Gulu-Nimule to South Sudan, Kampala-Bihanga-Kaseses to Mpondwe at the DRC border, and in the south from Bihanga to Rwanda. The SGR is electrically powered compared to the metre gauge railway, which is slower.
“If Uganda stays committed to revitalising the railway it will be the lifeblood of this growing economy, facilitating the movement of people and goods in a way that supports progress at every level,” Mr Julián García Valverde, the chairperson of Imathia Construction in Uganda, the contractor who undertook the reconstruction, said.