UNMASKED! Secrets Nobody Told You About the Two Engineers at the Centre of Sh1.7Trn Busega-Mpigi Expressway Scandal
KAMPALA: Until last week, they were among Uganda’s respected highway engineers, quietly designing and supervising some of the country’s biggest road projects.
Today, Dickens Ahimbisibwe and Edwin Raymond Kiyaga have become household names for an entirely different reason.
The two engineers are now at the centre of one of Uganda’s biggest infrastructure investigations after being suspended by the Ministry of Works and Transport on the orders of the Inspector General of Government (IGG), Lady Justice Naluzze Aisha Batala, following a directive from President Yoweri Museveni.
The suspensions are linked to allegations that engineers manipulated the alignment of the SHS1.7 trillion Busega-Mpigi Expressway, triggering fresh land compensation claims and contributing to a massive escalation in the cost of one of Uganda’s flagship road projects.
While the allegations remain under investigation and the two engineers have not been found guilty of any wrongdoing, their impressive careers have suddenly come under intense public scrutiny.
Dickens Ahimbisibwe: From Ntare School to Senior Engineer
Dickens Ahimbisibwe’s journey into engineering began at Ntare School in Mbarara, one of Uganda’s leading secondary schools, before joining Makerere University, where he graduated with a First Class Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering.
Determined to specialise further, he returned to Makerere to earn a Master of Science in Civil Engineering, focusing on Highway and Transportation Engineering.
His qualifications quickly positioned him among Uganda’s rising road engineering professionals.
Ahimbisibwe started his professional career in 2012 as a trainee engineer at the National Water and Sewerage Corporation (NWSC) before joining Ambitious Construction Company Limited as a Site Engineer.
In 2014, he worked as a Graduate Civil Engineer with URS Corporation, one of the world’s respected engineering consultancies, before moving to ICS Engineering and Environment, where he spent nearly three years working on civil engineering assignments.
His breakthrough came in March 2017 when he joined the Uganda National Roads Authority (UNRA) as a Highway Engineer.
Over nearly eight years at UNRA, Ahimbisibwe worked on highway engineering, road design, earthworks estimation and transport infrastructure planning, building expertise in sophisticated engineering software including Bentley MXRoads and AutoCAD Civil 3D.
Following the merger of UNRA into the Ministry of Works and Transport, he briefly served as Highway Engineer before being promoted in May 2025 to Senior Engineer (Civil), a position carrying significant responsibility in overseeing road infrastructure.
Professionally, Ahimbisibwe is a Registered Engineer with the Engineers Registration Board and a Corporate Member of the Uganda Institution of Professional Engineers (UIPE), credentials regarded among the highest in Uganda’s engineering profession.
His own professional profile describes him as an experienced highway engineer with demonstrated expertise in highway design, transportation engineering and road infrastructure.
That distinguished profile now contrasts sharply with the allegations investigators are examining.
Edwin Raymond Kiyaga: The Highway Designer Behind Uganda’s Mega Roads
Like Ahimbisibwe, Edwin Raymond Kiyaga built his career around designing some of Uganda’s most important transport corridors.
After studying at St. Mary’s College Kisubi (SMACK), Kiyaga travelled to the United Kingdom, where he earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Civil Engineering from the University of Southampton, one of Britain’s respected engineering institutions.
During his studies, he participated in the internationally recognised Constructionarium Programme, where students worked alongside engineers from global construction giant Laing O’Rourke to construct a scaled-down version of the famous Brewery Wharf Footbridge in Kings Lynn.
The programme exposed him to project planning, risk assessment, construction supervision, reinforcement works, concrete casting and leadership under real construction conditions.
Returning to Uganda, Kiyaga joined UNRA in January 2013 as a Graduate Engineer before moving to Infra Consulting Services Limited as a Highway Design Engineer.
In March 2017, he returned to UNRA, where he specialised in highway design, transport modelling and preparation of Bills of Quantities for major national road projects.
Over the years, Kiyaga worked on several landmark infrastructure projects.
He contributed to the Kampala Flyover Project, working alongside experts from the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) in collecting Geographic Information System (GIS) data, developing Building Information Modelling (BIM) structures and preparing three-dimensional visualisations.
He also participated in designing the proposed Kampala-Bombo Expressway, one of Uganda’s future strategic transport corridors.
Another major assignment involved preparing concepts for improving the Munyonyo Spur, including the design of interchanges at Serena and Akright to improve safety and traffic flow.
Perhaps most significantly, Kiyaga was one of the engineers involved in the design of the Busega-Mpigi Expressway between December 2017 and February 2019.
According to his professional profile, his responsibilities included preparing the horizontal and vertical alignment, Right of Way mapping, strip maps and Bills of Quantities for the project.
Those technical responsibilities now place him at the centre of investigations into allegations that the expressway alignment was later altered, resulting in additional compensation claims.
A Career Built on Roads, Now Facing Questions
Ironically, both Ahimbisibwe and Kiyaga built reputations designing and delivering road infrastructure intended to improve Uganda’s transport network.
Both spent years working within UNRA before the agency’s integration into the Ministry of Works and Transport.
Both possess strong academic credentials.
Both worked on nationally significant highway projects.
Now both find themselves suspended as investigators seek to establish whether public officials manipulated one of Uganda’s biggest road projects for personal gain.
President Museveni has alleged that engineers diverted the expressway from its originally compensated route and redirected it through land requiring fresh compensation, contributing to the dramatic increase in the project’s cost from about SHS600 billion to approximately SHS1.7 trillion.
The Inspectorate of Government, working together with the Office of the State House Comptroller, is now expected to determine whether the changes were justified by engineering considerations or whether they amounted to abuse of office and misuse of public resources.
For two engineers whose careers have been defined by designing Uganda’s highways, the investigation could become the defining chapter of their professional lives.
GOT A HOT STORY? LET US KNOW!
Got breaking news, explosive secrets, or hard evidence?
Email us: redpeppertips@gmail.com
We accept tips, documents, videos, photos, and recordings—the more evidence you have, the better.
CONFIDENTIALITY IS OUR TOP PRIORITY. SOURCES ARE ALWAYS PROTECTED!
About Post Author
