A Council meeting on Monday showed that the political wing of Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) is not nearly as vulnerable as its adversaries assumed, but not nearly as free to shape its own destiny as the councillors themselves presumed. The meeting put much stock in making KCCA’s political wing, dominated by National Unity Platform (NUP) councillors, look squeaky clean, following the puzzling backstory that they gave Kiham Enterprises the green light to take over the Nakivubo Drainage Channel. A mixture of derision and alarm greeted the treatment accorded to minutes from a 3 April 2025 Council meeting. The minutes reportedly capture how Kiham Enterprises got the all clear to advance its business interests on a drainage channel that spans a little over nine kilometres. Benon Kigenyi, KCCA’s Deputy Executive Director, who also runs the rule over the entity’s physical planning committee, which was expected to call Kiham Enterprises to order, remarkably disclosed that he had not yet pored over minutes from the impugned meeting. When Erias Lukwago, Kampala’s Lord Mayor, tried to speak to minute seven that he claims establishes the guilt of most of the councillors, his microphone was sensationally switched off. Zahara Luyirika, KCCA’s Speaker, claimed a fragile intermediate success. It, however, remains to be seen if it will hold when both technical and political wings of the Authority appear before the House Committee on Commissions, Statutory Authorities and State Enterprises (COSASE) for showdown talks on the status of Kampala’s principal drainage channel on Tuesday.
The major takeaway after House Speaker Anita Among hosted local government speakers at parliament on Monday was that there is no love lost between her and Rebecca Kadaga, the First Deputy Prime Minister. Speaker Among is looking to unseat Kadaga from the position of Second National Vice Chairperson (woman) in the top organ of the ruling NRM party, the Central Executive Committee (CEC). During the meeting, Among needed little invitation to have a dig at Kadaga who was derided for being old and frail. After being unsuccessful in calling a truce between the two warring parties, the higher-ups at NRM cleared both Kadaga and Among to pitch delegates at the party’s forthcoming National Conference (NC). If the goings-on of Monday’s Special Interest Group (SIG) elections at Kololo Independence Ground are anything to go by, a tumultuous process awaits. While the SIG electoral processes returned wins for Moses Mushabe (Veterans League), Arinaitwe Katambuka Rwakajaara (Workers League) and Shafiq Mwanje ( PWDs League), the failure to elect the Chairperson of the Entrepreneurs League cast a stain on the party’s collective conscience. The electoral process was placed on the back-burner after a litany of complaints were made about all manners of dark arts being employed. Hassan Basajjabalaba and King Ceasor Mulenga are believed to be involved in a two-way battle for the reins of the Entrepreneurs League.
Defending Ugandan champions Vipers SC and the country’s record champions SC Villa released a joint statement on Monday that poured scorn on competition reforms announced by FUFA ahead of the 2025/2026 season. The football body in a 20 August 2025 circular tweaked the structure, player registration, and revenue sharing model of Uganda’s top flight football league—the Uganda Premier League (UPL). FUFA says the tweaks are tailored at making the UPL competitive and financially transparent. The changes will see the league champion crowned after a labyrinth of three rounds is peeled. All clubs are also expected to submit both sporting and business data after each game. An 85-15 per cent revenue split between clubs and FUFA/UPL, in that order, during single-header fixtures was proffered. For the double-header fixtures, the revenue split works to 65-35 per cent, with FUFA/UPL taking the lion’s share. Elsewhere, regarding player registration, a rule that restricts participation to players with at least two years remaining on their contracts has raised eyebrows. In Monday’s joint statement, Vipers and Villa said the reforms are “ill-conceived, undemocratic, and a threat to the future of Ugandan football.”