Amuriat slams govt over power blackouts, poor roads in Arua 

Opposition Forum for Democratic Change presidential candidate Patrick Amuriat has criticised President Museveni’s government for granting Arua City status without adequate infrastructure such as sufficient electricity and good roads.

Arua City has suffered power outages for long, with only 3.5 megawatts supplied by Wenreco from Nyagak power station per day.
“Mr Museveni is a joke. He gave you Arua City without sufficient electricity. He gave you a city without clean and safe water connection to suburbs, roads, and without completion of the airport. What a joke!” Mr Amuriat said on Sunday.

Most of the roads in the city, especially in Ayivu East and Ayivu West divisions, are in a poor state.
Mr Amuriat, who moved through several parts of the city on Sunday, witnessed some of the bumpy, dusty roads, especially the Lia-Onduparaka road.
Addressing supporters at Arua Primary School playgrounds, he said the insufficient electricity and poor roads have affected cross-border trade with DR Congo by keeping away investors.

“It is very sad that Arua City has the worst roads in West Nile because I drove on one from Terego through to Odramacaku to Onduparaka, and it is pathetic. Yet the vital revenue comes from Arua through these roads,” he said.
Mr Amuriat said once elected president, he will ensure that the expansion of Arua airfield into an international airport is realised.

He added that he will ensure that roads leading to the border points such as Adumi-Lia and Vurra-Zombo are tarmacked to facilitate easy transportation of goods to DR Congo.
Uganda Revenue Authority collects about Shs14b in revenue every year from the goods that are transported through Odramacaku-Lia road that connects to Ariwara Town in eastern DR Congo.

Later in the evening, while the FDC presidential candidate was having a radio talk show, power went off.
On November 15, while addressing youth at Muni University, Mr Museveni admitted that he granted Arua City due to pressure by the local population and leaders.
“Your leaders were shouting city, city, city. But because I wanted some peace, I just kept quiet. Even some of these new districts could wait a bit. Could we not have started with capital for the youth and women and then the cities and districts come later?” he said.

Ayivu West MP Benard Atiku (Independent) agreed with Mr Amuriat about the poor infrastructure in West Nile.  “The road from Arua Centre to Lia is the only one to the border post that has remained with murram. There is a lot of traffic on this road because we do a lot of trade with DR Congo. And it brings a lot of revenue nationally. It deserves to be tarmacked.”

Financial dilemma
Since being granted city status, Arua has been operating on the old municipality budget until last month where it was allocated Shs14 billion by the central government. The city clerk, Mr Christopher Kaweesi, said the Shs14 billion funding from the central government will help them to improve service delivery.  “Our priority is to ensure that some of the roads are worked on. We also plan to construct border markets in Odramacaku because these would enable us get more revenue to carry out other developments.”