Hub cities

Kampala is the capital city and main urban agglomeration of Uganda. With 1,9 million inhabitants in 2015 and an average annual growth of population of 4%, the city faces many challenges: day population is estimated to reach 4 million people, 39% of the population lives under the poverty line (while only 9,6% of urban population leaves under the poverty line at national level in 2012 according to UN-Habitat), the unemployment reached 11,4% in 2010, 43% of the Kampalese have no formal employment, and almost 60% of the Kampalese population lives in informal settlements, the city comprises 62 informal slums, housing an estimated 560 000 families (in 2014, 53.6% of Uganda’s urban population lived in slum areas). 

In 2012, of its 192 km², only 23% of Kampala was considered to be fully urbanized with access to a full range of municipal services, 60% peri-urban and 17% rural. Consequently, service delivery is not universal yet: according to UN-Habitat, in 2011, 82,5% of Kampala households had access to improved water, 91,7% to improved sanitation, and only 38,6% to electricity. As another side effect of the growth of population, the local government has to deal with the constant geographical expansion of the city at a runaway speed, some districts had a doubling of their population in less than ten years.

According to the World Bank, the population increase is associated with a massive economic growth. Real gross domestic product (GDP) growth averaged 7% per year in the 1990s and the 2000s, placing Uganda among the 15 fastest growing economies in the world, and Kampala is the main responsible for this growth representing 80% of national GDP. However, this economic growth is linked with strong disequilibrium in wealth repartition. With a Gini coefficient of 44,3, Uganda is ranked among the twenty countries with most income inequalities, although this coefficient is lower in Kampala, in 2012 it was 0,34 according to UN-Habitat. In 2011, 86,4% of urban population in Kampala had a mobile phone according to UN-Habitat (against 52,3% at national level in 2014 according to the Uganda communications commission). 

From an institutional point of view, the Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) took over from the previous institution called Kampala City Council (KCC) through a parliament act in 2010. The KCCA is led by an Executive Director appointed directly by the President and by a Lord Mayor elected by residents.