KCCA takes baby steps on ambitious drive to ‘smart’ city

Lately, Irene Ochwo, a communication and media consultant, pays attention when in Kampala city. She enjoys every ride and while at it, has noticed some areas that have gotten cleaner.

She would like her city to have more pedestrian walkways and less activity, especially in shopping areas. 

“When we travel to other countries, we do more of walking in their cities because you enjoy your shopping when you’re walking with freedom. I would love to see a more discerning city users, especially on the road, respectful of one another, less road rage, and proper use of the pelican crossing. Can you imagine, we have pelican crossing at the traffic lights, but because we have a non-discerning or uneducated user of the roads, we cannot use the pelican crossing well,” Ms Ochwo adds. 

READ: IGG cancels KCCA road deal over corruption

Four days before she officially took office, two years ago, Ms Dorothy Kisaka, the executive director of Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA), made seven commitments to the city; lead from the front and be an example, serve Kampala in its diversity, fast track service delivery to achieve the goals in the strategic plan, pursue a participatory approach in leadership, build bridges that promote peace, promote a value-based leadership, and be a good steward. 

KCCA serves Kampala through five service directorates; Public Health and Environment, Education and Social Services, Physical Planning, Engineering and Technical Services, and Gender Community Services and Production, which takes care of the needs of the youth, women, and vulnerable people in the city.

To address concerns of city folks such as Ms Ochwo, Ms Kisaka says in their ground operations, they have addressed the decongestion of streets in downtown Kampala under the Smart City strategy by relocating vendors to the markets. 

 “All unplanned structures in the city that have in the past stifled licensed business and challenged movement while increasing petty crime are being demolished. This Smart City campaign is still ongoing and being rolled out to the other divisions. We set out as management to deal with this systematically, which involves several ongoing stakeholder engagements, including police, political and technical leaders,” she says. 

According to the director of the city authority, the goal is to ensure they have law and order on the street and not vendors selling their merchandise on every veranda. 

 Kampala City Lord Mayor Erias Lukwago says the city has no clear identity and is split between being a multi-faced capital with commercial, industrial, and administrative elements. 

“The major emphasis of my leadership has been on planning for the city. Unfortunately, not so many stakeholders appreciate the full importance of that critical element, why we should redesign Kampala and plan it afresh and start the structural plan. We had to go to the extent of hiring consultants from Israel and South Africa to help us carry out a study of the status of Kampala and how we can transform it into a modern city,” Mr Lukwago says.

Kisaka says she has intentionally established systems that enable participation and team work to minimise conflicts at city hall with two strong arms at KCCA, namely the political, which handles policy through the council, and the technical wing, which handles operations.

However, leadership is not streamlined at the city hall, which continues to dog and bog efforts to develop the city. The power centres are many and often the mayor reads from a different plan book from the executive director, the Minister of Kampala, and the Resident City Commissioners. 

Budget constrains

According to the State of Kampala Capital City affairs address, the mayor observes that budgetary constraints have stifled the city authority’s multi-model plan. In September 2020, KCCA launched the Kampala Capital City Strategic Plan 2020/2021 to 2024/2025, to guide the development agenda of the city for the next five years.

The occasion was presided over by the special envoy for the special duties in the office of the President, Dr Ruhakana Rugunda, with a commitment spelt out on page xiii that “by June 2025, Kampala will be an inclusive, liveable, resilient and well-planned city that provides economic opportunities.” 

The projected funding was estimated at $1,917 million (about Shs7.3 trillion). The city’s strategy and business development team together with National Planning Authority have indicated that the amount is likely to double to more than Shs15 trillion. 

The ceiling released by the Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development for the Financial Year 2022/2023 indicates that KCCA is allocated Shs420b, which dismally falls short of the projected annual budget of Shs1.4 trillion as guided by the Strategic Plan, which is approximately 30 percent of the required amount for the financial year. 

“Government did not allocate adequate funding for planning because it does not consider it as a priority. We do piece meal planning and (actually) plan in silos, which the experts wouldn’t advise us to do, but we are forced to do because of the prevailing circumstances,” Mr Lukwago explains.

He adds that they have divided Kampala into 25 areas and are focused at drafting the Kampala drainage master plan that will require roughly $210m (Shs810b). So far, the authority is getting donor support from World Bank, which has financed the Lubigi and Nakamiro channels, Bwaise corridor, Kalerwe, and Kawempe prone to floods.

“We are not satisfied with the performance of the contractors because the civil works are behind schedule. But by and large, we still have a long way to go. We must reconstruct the Nakivubo Channel as the state-of-the-art drainage system as well as Mayanja, Kinawataka and a couple of other major drainage channels,” the Lord Mayor further explains. 

The State minister for Kampala Capital City and Metropolitan Affairs, Mr Kabuye Kyofatogabye, says amid challenges, they have managed to construct roads and rehabilitated about 20 urban roads with the help of development partners, African Development Bank.

Ms Kisaka says the city authority has completed the construction of more than 35 kilometres of roads. These include Lukuli Road in Makindye Division, Kisaasi Junction, Factory Lane and Nakawa, Ntinda road in Nakawa Division, John Babiiha Road/Acacia Avenue, Windsor Crescent in Kampala Central Division, Kabuusu, Kitebi, Lweza, Katale, Ngobe, and Gyaviira in Rubaga Division.

She adds: “We have completed rehabilitation of more than 50 kilometres of community access roads and we continue to undertake routine maintenance of the City network. We Commenced reconstruction of several drainage improvement projects in the city and the following are still ongoing.”

Mr Lukwago commends development partners such as the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), which undertook the flyover project as well as the African Development Bank and World Bank under Kampala Institutional and Infrastructure Development Project (KIIDP).

However, he decries over-costing and inflating of the unit cost. 

 Mr Kyofatogabye says: “We have not performed to our expectation when it comes to lighting the city, but we are optimistic that we will be putting up more streetlights. The procurement is ongoing under the French Development Agency that’s supporting us with €77 million (about Shs296b).” 

He adds that 20,000 lights are expected to be installed with priority in markets, taxi parks, informal settlements, areas around university hostels, and crime hotspots identified by the city authority’s technical team in collaboration with the Uganda Police Force. With less crime and better visibility, Kampala will progress with a branding strategy, which the mayor and Kyofatogabye agree, is a step in the right direction.

“Kampala has no clear identity right now. We struggled to have Kampala classified by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organiaation, which has got clusters of cities, of design, learning and cultures. We are struggling to have a symbol,” the Lord Mayor observes, adding that there is work to be done on green belts in the city, the Independence monument, and Jubilee Gardens at Sheraton Kampala Hotel. 

On Tourism, Ms Kisaka says the authority has promoted city tourism with financial support from Uganda Wildlife Authority and unveiled the Gorilla and Impala Bronze Wildlife monument products (10 wildlife sculptures) on Kimathi Avenue, Kiira Road also nicknamed “Wildlife Street’’. That was completed with the construction of the Kampala City Tourist Information Centre at Kampala Sheraton Hotel, a one stop tourist centre as part of efforts to position Kampala as a tourist destination. 

What some citizens say

Mr Isaac Kuddzu, an actor, says: “I want a city that is aptly planned, that doesn’t cost me time because we believe that time is money. The people who run this city are very brilliant people, but we do not have maintenance of roads. If we maintained our city, I believe we would have a beautiful city. That’s the kind of Kampala I would love to see. 

While Mr Wilberforce David Mutete, a policeman, said: “I dream of a Kampala that gives peace of mind. When we are on our roads, we become lunatics starting from the smallest person to the highest. We have failed to understand who is leading Kampala. I want a city with no boda bodas. I want to live in a city with security and proper lighting.

About kampala

Kampala is the commercial and political capital city of Uganda with a resident population of 1.8 million people and a transient day-time population of 3.5 million people. It originally had seven hills, but the number has since increased. It stands at about 4, 000 feet above sea level.