The Deputy Speaker of Parliament Thomas Tayebwa has summoned the Minister for Kampala Capital City Authority and Metropolitan Affairs Hajjat Minsa Kabanda to come to Parliament and present a full statement stipulating how the authority spends money on both road maintenance and construction in Kampala City.
While making his communication during the opening of Tuesday’s plenary, Tayebwa informed the House that he has received complaints from the members about the dire state of Ugandan roads and how they are now affecting the lives of the citizens.
Mr Tayebwa noted that the House needs Minister Kabanda to show the members how much money KCCA has received for road construction and maintenance for the last 3 years, which roads were constructed and maintained using the funds and the current status of each infrastructure.
“We have potholes of every design, every size, the beautiful ones, the ugly ones, the deep ones, shallow ones, the wide and narrow ones. They are all in Kampala. Hon. Linos came to me complaining that some men are no longer functioning properly because their backs are broken because of the potholes. Hon. Cecilia told me that the women are producing prematurely (miscarrying) because of the potholes,” Hon. Tayebwa
The DeputymSpeaker move to summon the Minister follows the viral social media campaign that was started by renowned cartoonist Mr Jim Spire Ssentongo, on April 15, who tweeted: “Our preliminary KAMPALA POTHOLE EXHIBITION starts on Monday, April 17. We shall exhibit Kampala pothole photos on every tweet by @KCCAUG @UNRA_UG, @NRMOnline, @GenWamala with the location of the pothole (pondhole), age of the pothole, estimated size, and a note of thanks.”
By Monday, the entire social media (Twitter) was washed with pictures showing Kampala roads in a poor state and full of potholes and within a short period of time the hashtag had garnered more than 13,000 tweets.
Mr Ssentongo’s campaign has been supported by many prominent Twitter users such as Mr Gaetano Kagwa, a presenter at Capital FM in Kampala, who tweeted: “Welcome to Kampala, Uganda. The pothole capital of the world. Please enjoy your stay.”
Samwise Gamgee twitted; Kampala has 10 MPs in Parliament, with two full ministers responsible for Kampala Affairs. But look at the state of Kampala roads and the garbage situation in Kampala!! That is why as Kampalans, we all have to amplify Spire Jim Ssentongo’s campaign of exhibiting Kampala’s potholes/pond holes.
Janice Kyakundwa said: “No, these are not craters on the moon!! These are potholes on Kampala City roads after 36+ years of reconstruction.”
Silver Kayondo; Poor countries are poor because those who have power make choices that create poverty. They get it wrong not by mistake or ignorance but on purpose.”~ Daron Acemoğlu, Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity and Poverty.
Jeje Odea; a number of government programmes to fight against poverty have failed, and do not expect city roads to be any better.
Many others wrote while others only posted pictures and the names of the roads.
Meanwhile, the Lord Mayor of Kampala City Erias Lukwago is too happy about the campaign.
“Continue showing how bad Kampala is, there are a lot of panics now; secondly, that situation will persist unless you upgrade this campaign, I don’t see anything significant that KCCA will react to, because all our suppliers are on strike because they are demanding a lot of money. Total company has not supplied fuel to KCCA for 4 months because of an Shs2.6B debt,”he told journalists on Tuesday while at Katonga road.
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