In the sugarcane fields of Busoga and the green belts of Bunyoro, farmers have whispered for years about a war they were never equipped to fight. A war fought not with guns, but with weighbridges, political networks, secret ministerial directives, and a 5% “trash levy” that silently drained billions from their pockets.
This week, on a dusty campaign trail in Mayuge, President Yoweri Museveni finally said the quiet part aloud.
They must accept the farmers’ weighbridges. They have no choice.
With that single sentence, the president detonated the most sensitive landmine in Uganda’s sugar sector, a sector worth more than Shs 500 billion in taxes annually, employing over 100,000 people, and producing 700,000+ tonnes of sugar each year, with exports feeding markets across East and Central Africa.
But this was no spontaneous campaign promise. This was a culmination of a long, bitter, behind-the-scenes battle between powerful sugar manufacturers and the outgrowers who feed their factories. And like all silent wars, it has casualties, saboteurs, godfathers, and beneficiaries.
For years, factories imposed a 5% deduction on every truck of cane that crossed their weighbridges, a deduction disguised as “trash”, the unwanted leaves and tops on harvested cane. But farmers knew the truth. The same “trash” factories claimed to discard was being turned into electricity, ethanol, paper products, and other profitable by-products.
The levy wasn’t about trash. It was about control, money, and who controls the scale. So the millers fought to keep all weighbridges under their monopoly, because whoever controls the weighing controls the money.
The Clash Between New Entrants and Old Guards
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Victoria Sugar, a relatively new entrant, threw its weight behind outgrowers and supported community roadside weighbridges, allowing farmers to verify their cane weight before delivering to any factory. This single action threatened the entire pricing architecture controlled by older millers.
Kinyara Sugar Ltd, Western Uganda’s sugar giant and one of the most politically connected industrial players in the region, according to farmers, cooperative leaders, and whistle-blowers, fought tooth and nail to frustrate these community weighbridges. The company argued they enabled cane theft. Farmers insisted they were simply being empowered.
At one point, the war escalated so dramatically that community weighbridges were shut down through a ministerial directive, trucks were impounded, police were deployed, and farmers were left with nowhere to weigh their cane except Kinyara’s own stations. But the farmers refused to back down. Pressure mounted. Investigations were opened. And eventually the ban was lifted, a rare win in a battle heavily tilted against the growers.
Top political actors, especially in Busoga and Bunyoro, have long been accused of acting as gatekeepers for millers. Sources told The Spy Uganda that some MPs received funding from powerful factories during campaigns. Others quietly killed motions calling for farmer weighbridges. Others worked behind the scenes to maintain factory monopolies in specific districts. Even the Sugar Industry Bill was watered down multiple times over the years to protect the big boys.
So when Speaker Emeritus Rebecca Kadaga raised farmers’ grievances directly before Museveni in Mayuge, insiders say it bypassed a network that had long shielded factory interests from scrutiny. That move changed everything.
In Mayuge, the president finally broke rank with the manufacturers. He abolished the 5% levy and declared an end to factory monopoly over weighbridges. Those who know the industry well say Museveni likely understood the magnitude of what he was doing. He wasn’t just siding with farmers. He was dismantling a cartel.
Uganda’s sugar industry contributes more than Shs 500 billion in taxes every year, provides over 100,000 direct jobs, supports more than 6 million Ugandans through the value chain, produces 700,000 tonnes of sugar annually, and exports 250,000 tonnes. Whoever controls this sector controls regional trade routes, fuel-grade ethanol supply, industrial electricity, and rural political loyalty. This is why the weighbridge fight was never about weighing cane. It was about who controls Uganda’s rural economy.
The High-Stakes Battle Ahead
Recently, a new Sugar Industry Stakeholders Council was sworn in, a regulatory body meant to tame the recurring wars between growers and millers. But questions remain. Will it truly resolve disputes, or be absorbed into the old patronage networks? Will it enforce Museveni’s ban on the 5% levy? Will it protect farmer-owned weighbridges from sabotage? And will its sugar levy on millers be used transparently?
Some growers already claim members aligned to powerful millers were smuggled onto the Council to tilt decisions. If true, the real war may now shift from roadside weighbridges to boardroom seats.
Museveni’s order is historic, but its impact depends on enforcement. If implemented fully, outgrowers will weigh cane independently, stopping decades of under-declarations. Millers will lose unilateral control over pricing. The trash levy, a billion-shilling hole, will disappear for good. Community weighbridges will become the new frontline of farmer autonomy. And the sugar sector’s future will shift from factory-centric to farmer-centric.
But if sabotage continues as documented, then the president’s directive could be buried the same way earlier reforms were buried.
IS THIS A TRUE LIBERATION OR JUST A CAMPAIGN PROMISE?
For farmers in Busoga, Bunyoro, Tooro, Luweero, and the Albertine belt, this is the closest they have ever come to economic justice. But powerful sugar manufacturers are unlikely to surrender control quietly.
The coming months will reveal whether Museveni’s words were a genuine attempt to dismantle a cartel, or the opening shot in yet another political negotiation. Either way, the war over Uganda’s sweetest crop is far from over.