Although Eng. David Luyimbazi Ssali, the designate KCCA Deputy Executive Director is only 48 years old, he comes into the job with quite a profile, many can engineer dream of.
Luyimbazi has been nominated by President Museveni to deputise, Mrs Dorothy Kisaka, who has also been designated as the new Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) Executive Director. Both nominees have to pass interviews by the Public Service Commission.
When Uganda National Roads Authority was instituted in 2007, the then 36-year-old Luyimbazi was the road authority’s first Director of planning, a job he assumed in 2008.
It is here that he achieved perhaps, some of his greatest lifetime accomplishments but also two of Uganda’s major engineering marvels. These are: the USD$476 million Entebbe-Kampala Expressway and Uganda’s first cable-stayed bridge, the 525m long and USD125m Source of the Nile Bridge.
As Director of Planning, he was in charge of both projects’ preparation which entailed identification, scoping, feasibility studies and engineering designs. For the Kampala-Entebbe Expressway, he also spearheaded implementation.
Both projects were commissioned in 2019.
Speaking to The Observer newspaper in January 2019 following the opening of this bridge, Eng. Luyimbazi said, in designing the Source of the Nile Bridge he was inspired by the need to create something exceptional.
“We could have done a simple steel bridge, but we needed to do something that keeps a legacy,” he told The Observer’s David Lumu.
“We didn’t have much to look up to as far as major bridge construction is concerned but after thorough assessment, we had no option but to go for a new bridge to fit into the traffic trends. In my first job as a civil engineer in the mid-nineties, I had worked with Victoria Construction Company and we built several bridges in Mbale. I had also been involved with doing repairs on the Owen Falls dam while working with Kagga and Partners. But none of those jobs could be equated to the scale of the task that lay ahead,” he recalled.
In the extensive interview, Luyimbazi said that before the setup of UNRA in 2007, donors would determine the infrastructure agenda and oftentimes government was never involved in the planning stage, but he was intent on changing that.
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Luyimbazi the man and career profile
Born to Ssali Lule and Elizabeth Nalunkuuma Ssali Lule (RIP) of Makerere Kavule 48 years, ago, he attended Makerere College School (O and A-level) and went to Makerere University for his Civil Engineering degree. He would later complete his Master of Science in Major Programme Management at UK’s University of Oxford and later a Masters in Highway Management and Engineering from the University of Birmingham still in the UK.
He worked at Victoria Construction Company, Kagga and Partners as well as Ministry of Works before joining UNRA in 2008- a career spanning over 20 years and several infrastructure masterpieces in Uganda.
Luyimbazi, if selected by the Public Service Commission, will join KCCA, just in time as the city Authority starts on its landmark Kampala Flyover Project that involves the construction of flyovers at the “Clock Tower”, and at “Kitgum House”, the widening of Nsambya and Mukwano Roads, including the improvements of interfacing roads and junctions. The project will cost USD148 million.
He is battle-hardened too, having had a rough taste of government agency politics. While still at UNRA, his name was dragged into the infamous Mukono-Katosi UGX24 billion saga. However, following extensive investigations by the Inspectorate of Government, he was cleared of any wrong-doing.
In a letter dated January 10th, 2019, that absolved him of all wrong-doing, the Inspector General of Government, Mrs Irene Mulyagonja Kakooza wrote:
“This is to inform you that the Inspectorate of Government did not find you culpable in the mismanagement of the procurement of a contractor in the construction of the Mukono-Katosi Kisoga/Nyenga Road and therefore this letter serves to clear you of any allegations made against you with regard to that procurement.”
Having left UNRA four years ago, Eng. Luyimbazi has been the CEO of Basic Group Limited, a multi-disciplinary company with offerings that span engineering, construction, real estate, manufacturing, energy, oil & gas, agriculture, education, commodities trading, technology and financial services.
