Uganda as a country has 45 airfields and these are run by three groups of people, the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), the local government and the private sector. CAA runs 13 of the airstrips and these include Arua, Lira, Jinja, Masindi, Kasese, Mbarara, Gulu, Pakuba, Kidepo, Soroti, Kisoro, Tororo, and Moroto.The main aim of CAA is to make sure the safety conditions are followed by all the airfields it runs.
CAA is always funded by the country’s treasury to look after the airstrips. In 2002/2003, it received 575 million shillings and in 2007/2008, the amount reduced to 3.3 million shillings. This was not enough and in 2005, the payments were above the amount of money the company had in its bank accounts. This year, CAA is to get 1.6 billion shillings to mend its current position because the image of the domestic aviation industry is too disappointing.
Ignie Igunduura, the Public Affairs Manager of the CAA, said there has been a reduction in the number of passengers where by in 2003, there were 43,766 passengers and in 2007, there were21, 868.In Arua, there were 29,783 passengers in 2003 and 11,899 in 2007 which was the same case with the Gulu airstrip.
Igunduura said CAA gives 4million shillings a month to the Arua airstrip, Kidepo gets 3million shillings every month and Gulu receives 6.5million shillings every month and all for protecting the surface of the field and the buildings.
According to CAA, an airstrip will be constructed at Namanve or Lubiri. It renovated the neglected airfield in Jinja and it provided money to Arua, Kidepo and Gulu airfields in the developing of the new terminal buildings. A murram road of Arua airstrip will be changed to tarmac so that people could use it even in the rainy period and the 1,860 metres Soroti airstrip runway will be widened to 2,500 metres with landing lights that operate everyday. The Kasese airstrip will also be widened from 1,750m to 2,500m with landing lights, construction of a new terminal building, a control tower and CAA has paid 40 billion shillings for the project.
Uganda chose three airfields which include Jinja, Arua, and Kasese to be developed by the East Africa Community.
Airfields controlled by the local governments are always ruined because of low funds. A Uganda Wildlife Authority aircraft crashed in Adjumani airstrip because of the presence of the long grass and this lead to the declaration of the airfield a no-flying zone.
