Africa-Press – Uganda. The 33 local governments that took part in the recently concluded Uganda Support to Municipal Infrastructure Development initiative (USMID) have received praise from the World Bank.
The World Bank’s Task Team Leader, Stephen Ajalu, recognized nearly 10 implementing regional cities, municipalities, and districts that achieved excellent project outcomes.
“We will continue to provide these local governments with development funding using the same criteria and scorecards. We observe positive outcomes from the organizations that adhere,” Ajalu said.
“In the subsequent funding to the local governments, assessment tool will be used as the basis of funding. We expect that the lessons learnt will be vital in supporting you to plan better and achieve even better outcomes.”
The senior urban specialist with the World Bank, made the remarks during the closure of the 2-day National Urban Development Conference 2025, held at Speke Resort Convention Centre Munyonyo.
Obiga Kania, the state minister in charge of urban development, urged towns and municipalities to increase physical planning in order to guarantee better living and working conditions for their populations.
“Let us avoid any shortcomings. Let us keep enforcing appropriate planning in our cities. Economic activity will become more profitable and efficient as a result,”Obiga suggested.
Roads, street lighting, taxi parks, markets, lockups, and resource centers were among the many projects that the local administrations carried out.
Ten regional cities, 22 municipal councils, and eleven refugee hosting districts took part in the US $360 million USMID initiative, which run over a ten-year period (2023–2024).
Some of these implementing local governments were saluted for outstanding performance. Mubende, Gulu, Lira, Mbarara, Masaka, Apac, Kasese, Kamwenge and Lamwo,
In just five years, Mubende municipality achieved an average score of 79.2%, propelling it to the top of the program. They built a mayor’s garden, a taxi park, and 8.8 kilometers of roads, continuously taking the lead in institutional development and infrastructural delivery.
Mubende mayor Innocent Ssekiziyivu, praised the World Bank and government for the funding to the municipality which amounted to shs61 billion that enabled the projects to be completed on time.
“We stuck to our plans as designed, ensured timelines for civil works were adhered and we worked as a team. In Mubende municipality, we focussed on value for money and received a lot of cooperation from our community members. This enabled the contractors to work with much ease,” Ssekiziyivu, noted.
Mbarara City, was also cited for good performance in the area of revenue generation and growth. It has increased its own source revenue from shs 2.67 billion in 2019–20 to an impressive shs 8.2 billion by the end of 2023–2024—collecting shs25.9 billion during this time—by implementing the electronic Integrated Revenue Administration System (IRAS).
The Mbarara city mayor Robert Mugabe Kakyebezi, said “we are taking work very seriously. We urge our business community to pay their dues and we scale up on service delivery. We have bought our own road maintenance equipment to ensure we keep our roads in good shape.”
In the mid northern region of Apac, the new municipality rose above all odds. In Year 4, it rose above all ten cities and 11 other municipalities to achieve the highest combined score in institutional strengthening and infrastructure performance with an outstanding 80.2.
Alongside its impressive governance record, it also delivered 4.6 kilometres of quality roads to transform urban mobility.
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