The forecasting of the Water and Environment ministry’s Department of Meteorological Services usually goes unremarked. Recent deluges in downtown Kampala, however, forced Mr Charles Ssemanda, a shoe dealer at Nana Shopping Centre, to pore over the much-maligned department’s seasonal rainfall outlook for September to December 2025. ‘The onset of rainfall is expected around mid-September. The peak is expected by mid to late October, with rainfall cessation expected around early to mid-December,’ the report reads in part.
For Mr Ssemanda, this makes for grim reading if anything, because the festive period is when businesses such as his finish off the year with a bump. Or at least intend to. For the past seven years, Mr Ssemanda has shipped in and sold men’s footwear sourced from Dubai, China, and parts of Europe. He tends to increase orders-considerably-at the backend of the year, safe in the knowledge that even the frugal join the spendthrifts in spoiling themselves. Yet his stock for the festive period arrived precisely when the Department of Meteorological Services warned that rainfall in downtown Kampala would peak.
‘I suffered a loss of Shs9.8 million in sneakers and canvas shoes. That is minus the Shs3.7 million loss incurred on the gentle shoes. All these had been stocked for the festive season, but it was all wasted away,’ Mr Ssemanda tells Sunday Monitor. Per the Department of Meteorological Services’ forecasting, rains will continue to pound downtown Kampala. Only relenting in mid-December. This past week rising floodwaters inundated shops that hug Kampala’s main stormwater artery-the Nakivubo Channel-with a sense of foreboding having an icy grip on traders like Mr Ssemanda
The shoe trader says he has lost much more than just his Christmas stock. He has no peace of mind, with his heart pounding faster at the slightest mention of one word-rent. ‘The landlords have refused to waive off the rent arrears and yet we are have no way to secure the funds to pay up,’ Mr Ssemanda, who rents space in Nana Shopping Centre’s basement area, shares. He adds: ‘I have tried to re-wash the few shoes that I recovered from the floods, but buyers are only willing to pay Shs10,000 for a pair that previously fetched me Shs60,000.’
Little to no hope
While traders in the weather-beaten downtown Kampala have gained renown for having a high pain threshold, the mood in the area relays a story of betrayal. This is especially so after the Government of Uganda (GoU) green-lit a construction project by Mr Ham Kiggundu in a flood plain. ‘Hamis Kiggundu is backed by State authorities and, therefore, nothing much can be expected from him as compensation,’ Mr Ssemanda discloses. He adds: ‘[GoU officials] came here, registered all traders in shops that were affected by the floods.
They only asked for details on the trading licenses that we had in our shops and have not given us any feedback about the compensation. I personally doubt if we shall be compensated by this government. I mean, if [the] Kiteezi [landfill tragedy] that killed people and broke houses has not yielded compensation, how about us who have only lost shoes?’ Compensations might not be forthcoming after the recent downpours left downtown Kampala submerged, with billions of shillings in traders’ goods washed away, but the political implications could come with a sobering jolt. Both the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) party and its arch-rival the National Unity Platform (NUP) party find themselves in the eye of the storm.
After the Museveni administration gave Mr Kiggundu the all clear to build in a flood plain, NUP councillors at City Hall-the seat of the Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA)-offered support. Minutes from an April 3, 2025 council meeting suggest as much. Minute seven, which reportedly establishes the guilt of most of the councillors, has been endlessly debated and recalled as Cleopatra’s nose was. Parliamentary and local government races in not just Kampala Central but also electoral constituencies like Makindye West could be impacted in specific and harsh ways for the accused.
Increasing urban runoff
Yet there is little solace to be found in such an outcome. The here and now is the fact that-because of a perfect storm-the work of traders, like Mr Ssemanda, in downtown Kampala is full of defeat and other people’s profits. This appears to be such a sledgehammer blow even for people who have long endured the boom-or-bust nature of business relevance in the Central Business District (CBD) of Kampala. A 1999 World Bank report entitled Nakivubo Channel Rehabilitation Project: Environmental Impact Assessment captures how the tentacles of the businesses along Kampala’s main stormwater artery stretch far and wide.
It disclosed that 29 percent or just under 60 hectares of the industrial area stretches into the Nakivubo Channel catchment area. The report further found that five percent or slightly over 10 hectares of the channel’s catchment area shoulders markets, car parks, and bus stations. That is not to mention the three percent combination of residential and mixed-use buildings on the contours of the channel’s catchment area. While no other similar comprehensive study has been done, anecdotal evidence suggests that the number of businesses in and around Kampala’s principal drainage channel has bulged. Exponentially.
The 1999 report also found that ‘more than ninety-five percent’ of the city’s developed central urban area drains into the nine-kilometre natural channel. With that number more likely than not to have increased, and the impact of climate change having resulted in significantly more storm water during the rainy season, experts say the 1999 recommendation that Kampala’s main storm water artery be widened should not have gone unheeded.
The nine-kilometre natural channel has a catchment area that spans 27 kilometres, snaking its way from the slums of Kampala through to Lake Victoria, via Murchison Bay, in Luzira. It is a natural waterway that moves from Kampala’s low-lying areas to the lake, channelling storm water and flood water from the former to the latter. As well as widening it, the World Bank report recommended that the 20th-century channel that underwent refurbishment in 1958 be de-silted, realigned, culverts constructed, and trees planted along its banks. This was supposed to be in response to the increasing urban runoff.
Quiet agitation and fear
Mr Kiggundu’s construction atop the channel is but one of several human activities-undertaken in the absence of proper planning and controls-that have contrived to make a bad situation worse, impacting the largest of the city’s 12 green corridors or wetlands-the Nakivubo Swamp. ‘The wetland is fed by the Nakivubo River and its tributaries the Katunga, Kitante, Lugogo and Nakulabye. It is dominated by papyrus grading to dry land through cat tails and common reeds, with a large area on the north east side covered by Miscanthidium grass. The wetland is bisected by a railway line, running from the city to Port Bell on the shore of Lake Victoria,’ a 2003 report by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) discloses.
The report adds: ‘This effectively divides it into two zones of human influence. While wetland areas to the south of the railway are still relatively intact, northern parts have been modified substantially. Much of the shallow upper zone has been reclaimed for settlement and industrial development, or is under cultivation. The deeper, lower zone below the railway line comprises a floating papyrus swamp, and contains only a small amount of cultivation on its fringes.’ A Makerere University researcher encapsulated, in a 2022 study, how things look grim and uncomfortable two decades later, writing:
‘Nakivubo drainage channel is under intense strain due to rapid urbanisation, increased impervious areas, high intense rainfall, poor waste management and siltation, which causes hydraulic overloading resulting into pluvial flooding that damages infrastructure, disrupts traffic movements and economic activity and increases ground water pollution.’ The description could not be more chillingly accurate. As Mr Ssemanda licks his wounds amidst dwindling foot traffic into his shop at Nana Shopping Centre, and the prospect of an unannounced visit from the landlord, the mood in downtown Kampala remains one of a moan of quiet agitation and fear. The sun has disappeared and continues to hide behind a dark cloud.
Nakivubo
Nakivubo Channel, a nine-kilometre natural channel, has a catchment area that spans 27 kilometres, snaking its way from the slums of Kampala through to Lake Victoria, via Murchison Bay, in Luzira. It is a natural waterway that moves from Kampala’s low-lying areas to the lake. The channel was refurbished in 1958.
Pain point.
“I suffered a loss of Shs9.8m in sneakers and canvas shoes. That is minus the Shs3.7m loss incurred on the gentle shoes. All these had been stocked for the festive season.” – Charles Ssemanda, shoe dealer.