By Doreen Kabatsi
Located at one of the busiest roundabouts in Kampala, Kalerwe market had become famous for the daily heap of garbage that lay unattended to with a swarm of flies hovering between the rubbish and the fruits displayed for sale.
Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays would be terrible for road users because the dirt spread down to busy Kalerwe-Makerere road when farmers brought in their crop produce.
So, when President Yoweri Museveni, the leader of the great revolutionary party, the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM), appointed Lukka Kagenyi as Deputy Resident City Commission (RCC) of Kawempe Division on July 28, 2025, one of his first task was to hold meetings with all stakeholders in Kawempe.
From meeting with the Town Clerk of Kawempe Division and the technical team, Makerere University Chancellor, Prof. Barnabas Nawangwe and his leadership team, Mulago National Referral Hospital management teams, the political wing of Kawempe Division to the informal sector players such as taxi operators and market vendors and their management, Kagenyi made efforts to listen to the pulse of Kawempe Division.
From the discussion with stakeholders, many issues came up. At Kalerwe market, the populance had resigned to fate of living with the stench. However, with the coming into office of Kagenyi this fate is changing.
During his first appearance before the press, one thing was clear- transforming Kawempe Division.
He immediately got to work. He organised the Citizens’ day in Kawempe Division where citizens give their views on several issues affecting them. Here people shared experiences and relayed challenges affecting them, with some citizens giving solutions on how best they can be solved.
By doing so, Kagenyi has set the pace for service delivery within Kawempe Division. He has also extended this bottom-up approach to governance to the Parish Development Model (PDM) monitoring within Kawempe Division. This has enabled him to mobilise citizens to embrace PDM, one of the flagship programmes that will enable masses fight poverty and improve their household income.
Within the the taxi parks, the conversation that Kagenyi has triggered is to provide an organised mechanism to enable them work smoothly and provide services to the people of Kawempe Division and beyond.
For effective communication, Kagenyi has also executed mobilisation drives on television and radio talkshows, where he explains various government programmes, rallying citizens to embrace them and transform their lives.
Kagenyi’s resolve is a mastery of good service, which has shaped his service delivery ever since he was appointed by the President.
He is among the few whose working day starts at 3am and ends at 11pm every day. But each passing day, a new load is added onto his shoulder.
His task is to mobilise masses to embrace President Museveni’s message of social-economic transformation and elevate 39% of Ugandans trapped into subsistence economy into the money economy.
Going by the first 90 days in office, Kagenyi has proved that he is up to the task. His work is well cut out—institutional transformation for better service delivery of public services. And the public is the judge.
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