Uganda’s Shs240 Million Power Projects Unlock School and Rural Industry Connections

Petete Primary School had electrical wiring but no connection to Uganda’s national grid. Nearby, a mini-industrial park under construction depended on a small transformer about 600 metres away. Two electricity projects worth 240 million Ugandan shillings are addressing those gaps in Butebo District, bringing power to the school and dedicated infrastructure to the industrial site, according to Daily Monitor Uganda (direct).

Prime Minister Robinah Nabbanja commissioned the Uganda Electricity Distribution Company Limited projects in Petete Sub-county at the weekend. The event took place during a thanksgiving ceremony honouring Science, Technology and Innovation Minister Monica Musenero. Nabbanja praised the company, known as UEDCL, for extending electricity to schools and rural industry, saying the government sees wider access as a driver of economic transformation.

From unused wiring to a grid connection

At Petete, UEDCL extended its distribution network—the local infrastructure that carries electricity to users—to reach the primary school, Petete Church, town council offices and surrounding households. The work included installing a new transformer, equipment that adjusts voltage for electricity distribution. For the school, the missing piece was not internal wiring: that work had already been completed. It was the connection to the wider power system.

The projects are expected to serve households, businesses, local government offices and educational institutions. Nabbanja linked reliable electricity to better education, more jobs and agro-processing, the business of turning farm produce into processed goods. She singled out both the school connection and support for the industrial park in Kabarekere as examples of the changes the government wants to see in Butebo and across Uganda.

Nabbanja said dependable electricity is essential to better schooling, agricultural processing and employment.

A larger transformer for a growing industrial site

In Kabarekere Village, near St Paul High School, UEDCL installed a 100-kilovolt-ampere transformer to supply the mini-industrial park. Kilovolt-amperes, abbreviated as kVA, describe a transformer’s electrical capacity. The park remains under construction, making the installation a step towards supplying the businesses the site is intended to accommodate, rather than evidence that those operations are already running.

Previously, the site had no dedicated electricity infrastructure. It relied on a distant 25kVA single-phase transformer, which the report described as inadequate for the park’s projected demand of 48 kilowatts, a measure of power use. The new transformer has four times the old unit’s stated kVA capacity. That upgrade addresses a specific supply constraint at the site, where the existing arrangement could not meet anticipated needs.

UEDCL Managing Director Joselynne Rwabwogo said growing commercial and agricultural processing activity in the district informed the upgrade. The company expects electricity demand to rise and installed the larger transformer to provide capacity for those activities, she said. Rwabwogo also described a nationwide effort to engage local leaders, respond to customer concerns and improve service delivery through closer collaboration.

The next point to watch is how the Kabarekere park’s construction progresses and how electricity demand develops around the new connections. UEDCL presents the work as part of its effort to strengthen distribution, improve reliability and deliver better-quality power. For Butebo, the immediate change is concrete: an already-wired school is connected, and an unfinished industrial site has a larger, dedicated source of supply.