There is a particular kind of silence Ugandans have learned well. Not the silence of ignorance, but of calculation. The kind that asks whether speaking is worth the trouble. Whether it changes anything. Over time, that silence stops feeling like caution and starts feeling like routine. On December 6, Gulu City offered a different picture.
The city hosted the Gulu City Marathon, themed ‘Running for Culture and Heritage.’ It was a modest event by global standards, but its intention was serious. To suggest that tourism in Uganda can be more than wildlife, that cities like Gulu can invite visitors to stay, spend, and return.
The logic is not complicated. Tourists leave Uganda early and with money unspent because there is often nowhere else to go once the game drive ends. Cultural events, sports tourism, city festivals-these are not luxuries. They are economic tools we can diversify our tourism revenues with.
After Covid-19, tourism is only just recovering. In 2024, Uganda recorded over 1.37 million international visitors and earned roughly $1.28 billion. More than 800,000 people depend on the sector directly.
Many more do so quietly. That context matters. The week Gulu was trying to sell culture, Uganda once again exported images of confrontation. Violence surrounding Robert Kyagulanyi’s campaign stop replaced the marathon in the public imagination.
Admit it or not, a tear gas scene travels further than a picture of smiling runners. The responses were familiar. Condemnations were issued. Distancing statements followed. The police opened investigations. None of this was surprising. One incident is enough to erase months of work by city authorities, tour operators, and ordinary residents trying to rebuild a reputation.
This problem does not end with tourism alone. Investors notice atmosphere before they study policy. Uganda may license hundreds of projects and attract billions in Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), but confidence is fragile. Capital has options. So do tourists and investors.Take Kenya, for instance. Despite its own share of post-election violence, it remains a regional leader in attracting investment, partly because it has been careful about maintaining stability.
The political risks are acknowledged, but Kenya has built a reputation for weathering turbulence without significantly damaging its economic environment. It has retained its investment appeal largely by keeping violent disruptions to a minimum.
Stability is not announced; it is inferred. And Uganda’s signals are increasingly mixed. Campaign seasons now come with expected images: young men dressed like soldiers, symbolic displays of force, roadblocks that appear without explanation. These are not official policy, but they communicate something nonetheless. They suggest that politics remains managed through fear as much as through consent.
The greatest danger is not the violence itself, but our acclimatization to it. When apologies follow violence, they are accepted with weary familiarity. When calm appears briefly, it is treated as anomaly rather than progress.Uganda has spent years marketing itself as open, stable, and ready for business. But nations are advertised less by slogans than by behaviour. What we tolerate, repeatedly and publicly, becomes our message.
Silence, in this context, is not neutral. It is instructive. What Uganda projects to the world, through its actions, not just its speeches, is a deeply fragile image. What meets you gaze when you google about Gulu, Fort Portal, or Kampala feels like a nation at odds with itself. As long as the balance between political stability and violence remains precariously tipped, we will continue to lose the narrative we’ve worked so hard to build.
Investors may be swayed away. Tourists may disappear before they even arrive. What are we advertising to the world? If we don’t change course, we’ll be selling the story of a nation at odds with itself.