Prime
Kasese seeks Shs20b to repair flood-affected roads
People on the street after flood waters entered their home in Kisanga Cell, Nyamwamba Division on the night of May 22, 2024.
What you need to know:
- Since May 2023, Kasese has lost 54 people to floods and hundreds are still displaced from more than 5,251 households.
Kasese District leaders are looking for Shs20 billion to rehabilitate its road network, which has been rendered impassable since the May 2024 floods.
The disaster left 13 people dead and properties destroyed. Since May, most bridges remain non-functional.
In an interview with Monitor, the Kasese District engineer, Mr Alphonce Katswamba, said almost 80 percent of the roads in the flood-affected sub-counties have become impassable.
“Almost 80 percent of our road networks have a lot of gullies. Most of the drainage works like culverts are blocked due to the high silt from the mountainous areas,” Mr Katswamba said.
He added that the most affected road networks are in the sub-counties of Kyarumba, Bwesumbu, Mbunga, and Kyondo, where more than 147.5 kilometres of the road network remains impassable.
“We need the money to work on roads and address the drainage systems because landslides and large boulders have fallen in the middle of the roads,” he said.
Mr Katswamba also mentioned that 17 bridges, including the recently completed Kyanjuki were destroyed.
Some of the roads that need rehabilitation include the Mubuku-Karusandara-Prisons Road (21.7 km), Katiri-Kibandama-Kabwarara Road (17 km), Ssebwe Amco Culvert Crossing in Kinyayobyo-Karusandara, Katoke-Ndughutu Bridge, Rwapapara Steel Armco Culvert, Kasenyi Motorable Timber Bridge, Bughendero Motorable Timber Bridges, and Korukukmi Motorable Timber Bridge.
Mr Haruna Muhindo, a resident of Kaghema Village in Kyarumba Sub-county, told this publication that the community access road connecting Kasanga Trading Centre to Kyarumba Town Council is now impassable due to many gullies created by floods.
Mr Muhindo added that to ensure access to various destinations, including schools and health centres, locals have improvised a makeshift bridge.
The Kasese District chairperson, Mr Eliphaz Muhindi Bukombi, said the poor state of roads has affected socio-economic transformation, especially the government’s Parish Development Model.
“We are finding it hard to effectively supervise and implement the Parish Development Model,” Mr Bukombi said.
However, Bukombi mentioned that his leadership has already commenced a campaign that embraces tree planting through support extended to the district by the Ministry of Water and Environment in partnership with the Rwenzururu Kingdom. The campaign aims to plant more than 10 million trees in five years across the Rwenzori mountains.
Mr Mustafa Kikusa, the district principal secretary, told a meeting organised by Oxfam International at Kasese Municipality at the weekend that a post-disaster recovery plan was compiled and they required more than Shs600 billion to address all the damages registered in each sector of the economy. He said their budget for funding has been submitted to the Office of the Prime Minister and they are still waiting for the response.
Disaster assessment
The Kasese District Disaster Management Committee that is chaired by the Chief Administrative Officer, recently revealed that the district has lost more than Shs84 billion to natural disasters in the past 10 years.
Since May 2023, Kasese has lost 54 people to floods and hundreds are still displaced from more than 5,251 households.
