Uganda’s democracy does not begin in Parliament. It begins in the village – at the borehole, in the trading centre, at the meeting held under a mango tree to resolve a boundary dispute.
This is why the recently concluded Women Council and Local Council I elections matter beyond the numbers they produced. On July 23, 2026, Ugandans elected Women Council leaders from the village level, where the National Resistance Movement (NRM) registered a strong performance across the country.
That momentum continued on July 28, 2026, when voters elected Local Council 1 chairpersons.
According to the NRM’s interim results compiled from districts countrywide, the party won 51,093 of the 68, 925 villages where results had been received by the time of compilation, with 13,861 independent candidates and 3, 971 Opposition candidates elected, while results from 2, 289 villages were still pending. These outcomes are both encouraging and humbling.
The support our flag bearers received in the two grassroots elections is a clear vote of confidence in the party’s ideology, its leadership, and its record of improving the lives of ordinary Ugandans. But victory at the grassroots is not primarily a political trophy. It is a mandate handed over at the shortest possible distance between a leader and the people – and therefore the mandate hardest to hide from.
Grassroots leadership is in the NRM’s DNA. From the Resistance Councils established during the liberation struggle to today’ s Local Councils, our Movement has always believed that meaningful democracy and sustainable development begin with empowered communities. Long before the NRM assumed the responsibility of leading government, President Museveni and his colleagues understood that transformation is built upward from the household, not dispensed downward from the centre. That is why we treat these village elections not as routine electoral exercises, but as reaffirmations of the values upon which the Movement was founded. An effective LC 1 chairperson is far more than a village administrator. He or she is the first point of contact between the citizen and the State.
These leaders resolve disputes before they escalate, help maintain security, mobilise communities for development, protect public resources, and ensure that government programmes reach the households they were designed to benefit.
The same applies to Women Council leaders, who play a critical role in mobilising women, strengthening families, promoting community participation, and ensuring that women remain active partners in Uganda’s development agenda. Their election reinforces inclusive leadership at the grassroots and strengthens the structures through which communities engage with government.
That role grows more consequential by the year. As government deepens implementation of the Parish Development Model, Emyooga, agricultural extension services, infrastructure expansion, and youth and women’s empowerment programmes, delivery increasingly depends on leaders who know every homestead and enjoy the confidence of the people they serve.
To every NRM candidate who emerged victorious, I offer my congratulations-and a caution. Your election is not a reward for personal ambition. It is a call to greater responsibility. Leadership begins with listening.
Whether a resident voted for you or against you is now irrelevant; every household deserves the same attention and respect. I also commend those who contested and were not declared winners. Internal competition has now served its purpose. The time has come to close ranks.
We are one NRM family, one village and one country pursuing one national objective: a peaceful, prosperous and self- reliant Uganda.
I thank the Electoral Commission, security agencies, election officials, candidates and above all the voters for ensuring generally orderly Women Council and LC1 elections.
Our task now is not to celebrate, but to deliver. The true measure of leadership has never been the winning of elections; it is whether people’s lives are measurably better afterwards.