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The 100 most influential Ugandans
L-R The Mukwanos, Shri Nanjibhai Kalidas Mehta, Mulji Prabhudas Madhvani (1894–1958), James Mulwana, Aga Sekalala and Emmanuel Tumusiime-Mutebile and many more
What you need to know:
Powerful. Who are the most influential Ugandans of all time? That is the question many Ugandans ask whenever medals are handed over to “distinguished” citizens at national celebrations. In a special series exclusively in Sunday Monitor starting this weekend, our writers Eriasa Mukiibi Sserunjogi, Henry Lubega & Gillian Nantume unveil “The 100 Most Influential Ugandans” whose footprints have impacted on the country grouped in 10 different categories.
Influence is a controversial word in itself. Can someone be influential in a negative way? Some will say it is possible. In this compilation, however, we try as much as possible to concentrate on Ugandans who have influenced life for the better.
But this is not easy in many instances, especially regarding the politics category. Would one say, for instance, that Idi Amin influenced Uganda for the better?
Most agree that he was the most brutal dictator Uganda – or post-colonial Uganda at that – has experienced to-date and his regime was dotted with murders and disappearances of many citizens.
But Amin took serious decisions which had far-reaching effects and remain etched in the history of Uganda.
Consider, for instance, the expulsion of Asians; the land reform decree of 1975; his role in the Israeli hostage-taking and rescue incident of 1976; and the invasion of Kagera which sparked off what came to be called the 1979 Liberation War.
Still, some of the country’s most influential sports personalities, such as Robert Aloro, were made in the Amin era and Uganda enjoyed a golden age in sports during his time.
We dwell on Amin here because he is an extreme case, but the same would be said of most politicians. Because they make decisions that directly affect people and have sometimes wielded power over life and death, they are the most divisive category, usually loved by some as much as they are loathed by others.
The country still has serious political questions to resolve, but we could not help it. Our list of the 100 most influential Ugandans still contains 13 individuals who participated in its politics in different eras, dating back to the pre-colonial days. The politics category aside, we group the influential Ugandans in eight other categories – armed forces, sports, economy, education, health, arts and others. We also include a category for non-Ugandans who made Uganda their home and had a significant impact on the lives of Ugandans.
Another sub-category, which was a subject of intense debate, is of “Ugandans who should not have been born”. Here we refer to Ugandans who did evil for the sake of it.
There was debate on whether to include Jamil Mukulu in this category.
The leader of the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) rebel outfit was recently arrested in Tanzania and extradited to Uganda. His group was accused of carrying out heinous atrocities, the most memorable of which was the torching of students in a dormitory at Kichwamba Technical College in 1998. They are also accused of throwing bombs in Kampala and other places.
An Islamic extremist, Mukulu is said to have attempted to overthrow the government of Uganda with the view of replacing it with a state governed on Sharia law.
Mukulu will soon be tried and the full extent of his crimes will hopefully come to light. We left him out of this category, however, because we regard him as a borderline case between militant politics and crass criminality. Our assessment of Joseph Kony, however, was less lenient. The leader of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) superintended over a force that was accused of abducting, maiming and killing thousands. He did not seem to have an objective of taking over power and had no political agenda to speak of.
We therefore group Kony with Joseph Kibwetere, the man who was accused of torching thousands in a church in Kanungu, as the stand-out Ugandans who should not have been born.
Returning to the challenge of determining who is influential, we recognise the danger posed by the current political season. The choices we make will likely be controversial.
Including some and leaving out others as the political players position themselves for the coming election, we appreciate, may raise questions. But the rationale is simple.
In determining the most influential, one important consideration is the extent to which one’s influence lasts. We have included pre-colonial figures such as Omukama Kabalega and Kabaka Mwanga, for instance, because their names remain imprinted in the country’s history.
Former prime minister Amama Mbabazi, however, does not make the list despite dominating media coverage for almost two years now. We recognise that he was a key player in President Museveni’s power machine for decades, but our view is that what he exercised then was borrowed authority.
We need to observe him for years acting on his own accord as his own man for us to decide whether he ranks among the most influential Ugandans over time. In talking about time as a measure of influence, we also recognise that some of the choices we make may be questioned on the same ground. In the arts category, for example, musicians Joseph Mayanja, aka Jose Chameleone, and Juliana Kanyomozi, make the grade. In debating whether to include these two, the contrary argument was that we may only include musicians like Philly Bongole Lutaaya whose music has continued to enjoy airplay decades after his death.
Whereas this is a strong argument, we recognise that Chameleone and Juliana stood out from their peers and influenced many a musician. Their names, of course, may in the future be struck off the list if the influence of their works wanes when they are dead or retired. And that takes us back to time as the greatest arbiter.
The Mukwanos
Amirali Karmali is by far the most famous “Mukwano”, but his father, Ali Mohamed Karmali, who is said to have come to Uganda around 1904, was the pioneer of a business empire – the Mukwano Group – that some estimates say employs some 10,000 people. The elder Karmali, it is said, was nicknamed “Mukwano gwa bangi” by people in Bukandula in Mpigi District, where he traded in cotton and coffee. He later came to be known as Mukwano, which name has been handed down to his family members and the business empire. His son, Amirali Karmali, born in the mid 1930s, would later take up the business and transform it into an empire dealing in manufacturing, real estate, transportation, among other things, spread across Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania and Rwanda. Alykhan Karmali, Amirali Karmali’s son, now controls the empire.
Mulji Prabhudas Madhvani (1894–1958)
The Indian-born Ugandan businessman, entrepreneur, industrialist and philanthropist, migrated to Uganda in 1908 at a tender age of 14 years. In 1912, he started out in the business world in Jinja, the Vithaldas Haridas & Company, while he was still an employee of his uncles. In 1918, the company bought 800 acres of land in Kakira, for the purpose of starting a sugar factory, with the sugar complex, known as Kakira Sugar Works, opening in 1930. By adding to the original parcel of land, through purchases, the current company land holdings at Kakira, are in excess of 9,500 hectares, as of April 2009. Muljibhai later ventured out into textiles and beer. Using what was probably the first International Finance Corporation loan to an African country, he set up Mulco Textiles in Jinja, acquiring Nile Breweries in 1957. As businessman, he was keen about the well-being and welfare of his employees and the community, enjoying free education, housing and healthcare. He died in July 1958 in Kakira where his body was cremated.
Shri Nanjibhai Kalidas Mehta
The founder of the Mehta Group was an entrepreneur humanist and philanthropist. Born in Gujarat India in November 1887, at the age of 13 he set sail for Africa. From his small trading outpost, it did not take long for his entrepreneurial ability to realise the vast potential of the land and start with vegetable growing. He also introduced varieties of cotton through seeds imported from India, and soon had 29 ginneries. He created employment more than 10,000 opportunities before refocusing to his country of origin. The impact he had on Uganda’s economy can be summed up in former President Milton Obote’s remarks when Mehta’s death was announced in 1969. “In the passing away of Mr Nanjibhai Mehta, Uganda has lost a true friend and a man who made tremendous contributions in laying the foundations of our economy. It is sad to see the passing of a man of Mr Mehta’s stature, but he will, I am sure, be long remembered for his charitable acts, not only in Uganda and East Africa but also in India.”
Sembule Group
Some might still remember the Sembule TV “Super Makula” and radio cassettes. In a time span of over 30 years, from steel to electronics, Sembule Group has had a hand in almost every sector of the manufacturing industry. Sembule Steel Mills Limited was the first locally owned company to manufacture steel products. The group diversified and set up a television and radio assembling plant. They also ventured into the banking and insurance business – Sembule Commercial Bank and Pan World Insurance Company, respectively. But the global economic downturn affected the Group, with most of its holdings auctioned off for failure to repay loans.
Sudhir Ruparelia
One of Uganda’s largest property owners, the businessman, through his Ruparelia Group owns more than 300 commercial and residential properties in Uganda. Among his properties are a commercial bank, a string of forex bureaux, and a university. Because of his wealth, his name “Sudhir” became a catchphrase for wealth in the city. His is an intriguing story that began in a cab in London, UK, where he worked as a cab driver. Recently Ruparalia was named the wealthiest person in East Africa when he joined the Forbes World Billionaires list. His wealth is estimated to be $1.1 billion, which is generated from real estate investments.
James Mulwana
His products are among the few Ugandan products that locals will buy with pleasure. From the tooth brushes, to the jerry cans and batteries, to the milk, he was a leader in industrial quality.
A businessman and manufacturer, he proved that a local entrepreneur can take charge of more than one company at a time, and make a success of each one of them. Over a span of five decades, become a household name and mentor to local businessmen. He also revived the industrialist’s guild, Uganda Manufactures Association. In an era where businessmen are tainted by corruption scandals, Mulwana was scandal free.
Aga Sekalala
Who knew the chicken business could make someone wealthy? We know Sekalala more for Ugachick Poultry Breeders than anything else. Such is his fame that Ugachick is a brand name in the regional market. Most arguably Uganda’s largest agro-industrialist, his Sekalala Enterprises encompasses vanilla, fish, animal feeds and a radio station. The enterprise now employs people in the hundreds and has helped other small scale growers and retailers who form its supply base. He built a large vanilla processing plant to export the product to America at a time when farmers were exporting vanilla in its raw form.
Gordon Wavamunno
Gordon Wavamunno, the exclusive holder of the Mercedes Benz franchise in Uganda under the Spear Group, is one of the few Ugandan entrepreneurs and businessmen who have stood the test of time. The son of a retail trader born in 1943 in the present day Isingiro District has since diversified into broadcasting and manufacturing, employing hundreds. He is among a select group of the mildly educated Ugandan business class that has stood the test of time.
Emmanuel Tumusiime-Mutebile
No single individual dominated economic thinking during Museveni’s presidency more than Emmanuel Tumusiime-Mutebile, the “free market fundamentalist” who is serving a hitherto unprecedented third five-year term as governor of Bank of Uganda. Probably his success in the field of economics is what prevented him from pursuing a political career, which he had embarked on earlier in life, when he became guild president of Makerere University in the early 1970s. He won a fierce debate with Dr Ezra Suruma, who was less inclined towards market economics, and went on to have almost free reign to run the economy, first as secretary to the treasury and later as BoU governor.
Allen Kagina
Allen Catherine Kagina is just 54, having been born in 1961. But, in President Museveni’s opinion, she has already sorted out the workings of Uganda Revenue Authority and has since been re-assigned to sort out another public body, the Uganda National Roads Authority. She earned respect for turning around the tax collection body from an institution riddled with corruption and habitually falling behind its targets to an efficient organisation regularly overshooting its tax collection targets.
Patrick Kasulu
The current booming real estate business, particularly modern land brokerage, was pioneered by Patrick Kasulu, who in 2000 started Property Masters. His Property Masters spread as far as Jinja, Mbale, Gulu, Masaka, Lira and Arua. He went international by opening up offices in Kenya and Tanzania with agent offices in United Kingdom and Washington DC. By close of 2003, Property Masters had become a reference point for not only Ugandans but also those living abroad and in need of property here. However, with such fast paced growth, in a space of four years holes were punched into Kasulu’s Property Masters Empire in 2004 when one of his clients Faridah Birabwa, sued him for issuing a bounced cheque of Shs 48m, this opened a myriad of arrests leading to a stint in prison. When he regained his freedom, he revived the trade under Aguklilawo but the damage had been done and he had opened the eyes of many others onto the lucrative business of real estate.
Justin Okeny & Jack Dwonga
Justin Okeny and Jack Dwonga are among Uganda’s pioneer industrialists who in 1974 set up Vitafoam Industries Limited in Njeru-Jinja after buying the franchise from British-owned Vitafoam International. The two went on to build a very successful mattress enterprise defined by high quality and for many years was the household name in Uganda, successfully standing tall against cheap and low quality imports from Kenya that permeated the country in the 1980s and 1990s. In 1995, the two set up a second mattress factory, Gulufoam in the northern town of Gulu but their efforts were scuttled by the LRA war and had to relocate it to Jinja.
Sulaiman Kiggundu
Dr Sulaiman Kiggundu had his contract as Governor of Bank of Uganda revoked in 1990, but bounced back to affect Uganda’s banking industry in a significant way. This was by founding Greenland Bank in 1995. At Greenland Bank, the banking hours were longer than in other commercial banks, and processing loans was less stringent. One of the reasons Bank of Uganda gave for shutting down Greenland Bank was that some banking rules were flouted, saying, for instance, that a number of unsecured loans had been given out. Dr Kiggundu denied this until his death in 2008, saying that the bank was closed for political reasons. Be that as it may, however, many of the practices Greenland Bank pioneered have been taken up by other commercial banks, and there is a drive to make banking more accessible to the common people. Greenland Bank was the only bank, for instance, that enabled traders to bank their money late into the evenings.
