Attorney General warns against terminating contract of Entebbe Expressway toll operator

What the report says

Uganda’s Attorney General has warned that ending the contract of the company running toll collection and operations on the Kampala-Entebbe Expressway could expose the government to costly international arbitration. The warning came in response to a parliamentary committee on physical infrastructure, chaired by Mwine Mpaka, which urged the immediate removal of French firm EGIS Road Operation S.A. and recommended bringing the expressway under direct government control.

According to The Observer, the dispute centers on EGIS’s five-year agreement with the Uganda National Roads Authority, signed in 2021, and on allegations that several operational and safety obligations have not been fully met. MPs cited gaps such as incomplete traffic monitoring systems, weaker-than-expected lighting and fencing, and shortcomings in overload-control equipment. But deputy Attorney General Jackson Karugaba Kafuuzi said a valid contract cannot simply be cancelled without first proving persistent breach and following the termination steps set out in the agreement, including formal notice and a chance to remedy the problem.

The legal opinion also challenged Parliament’s push to hand toll collection to the Uganda Revenue Authority, saying the current law assigns tolling to the roads authority unless legislation changes. Instead, the Attorney General backed a forensic audit of the expressway’s revenue systems to check whether government has lost money needed to service the project debt. The office also disputed some of Parliament’s concerns about a related security contract and said questions about possible prosecutions should be left to the proper investigative and prosecutorial bodies.