I met Sebamala at his home in Masaka. He was so open as though we have known each other for years. He was in shorts and freely tilling the garden; far from the well-suited MP who moves in sleek SUV.
“I like to spend a lot of time with family, I have five children and one wife. After cleaning the compound, I am going to watch a movie. On a free day, I like to spend time with friends playing some football, I do a lot of reading especially leadership books,” he says.
“Currently I’m reading an interesting book titled, ‘How to be surrounded by Idiots,’ and it has a lot of insights. I also do a lot of mentorship, especially with the youth, I believe strongly in mindset change; so, whenever I am around people, we talk about how to make our lives better.”
Sebamala looks and speaks like a contented man but he doesn’t believe he has reached anywhere there.
Business journey
During his senior four vacation in 1998, Sebamala says, he got a job as an attendant at a Toyota showroom but this did not please his father, who called him to Masaka.
“He portioned me a piece of land to farm with strict instructions that if I did not finish planting, I would not go back to Kampala. I planted coffee, banana plantations, eucalyptus, among other things, this was around 1998 and it’s thriving to date,” he says.
From then on, he embarked on a trait of creating his own income. Real work started during industrial training in his first year at Makerere University while studying engineering.
“I found a construction site on my way back home and the only job they had was digging trenches; so, I took it up. I got the pleasure of meeting Andrew Kasagga Zzimwe, and because we both had roots in Masaka, we bonded very well,” he recalls.
Zzimwe would take him on a month later as a site engineer for his home construction in Seeta. From then on, Sebamala’s luck had turned. “I was paid Shs 10,000 per day. I worked on constructing his grain mill, piggery, project, his residence that comprised of servant quarters, pool, and sports field. Basically it was a palace and big project. By the end of my first year, I bought a car.”
Zzimwe went to hire Sebamala for the project to construct State Lodge in Napak as well as many other projects. In 2007, the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) offered another opportunity to expand his knowledge.
“I joined a company called Lamex group which had contracts like modernising of the Constitution Square and I got good money. In 2009, I joined a friend to start a company called Axis Lines. We were the first people to get a contract with KCCA under Jennifer Musisi. In one year, we had construction projects of up to Shs 3.5 billion. I registered another company and got my first job in Jinja city to rehabilitate Madhvani road worth Shs 240 million.”
In 2013, Sebamala joined public service as Iganga municipality principal engineer. While there, he says, he brokered a deal between a Chinese company and Uganda National Roads Authority.
“I worked on their application papers and submitted them at a fee of $10,000. Fortunately, they got the deal and this gave me a new idea,” he says.
Sensing new opportunities, he returned to the private sector in 2015 and started a new office called Investors’ hub, where he would send proposals to foreign companies to be their manager in Uganda.
“So, whatever project was in Uganda, we would send proposals and if they were interested, then we would work and submit proposals on their behalf, and got a 10 per cent cut. This is how I crossed back to the private sector,” he says
Joining politics
On February 3, 2019, Bisanje parish was marking 50 years when he was invited as a guest of honour.
“After the event, the late Bishop John Baptist Kaggwa called me back to talk about how deeply I can root myself in the constituency. I told him about my Bisanje students association but he insisted that was not enough. At his insistence, I decided to run for political office,” he says.
Sebamala says he gathered youth groups, formed teams and did baseline surveys on service delivery in the area.
“I realised the hardest problem that was water shortage, and started repairing and building boreholes. I introduced microfinance support centres and other people that would help support their groups, I went on to give out 200 coffee seedlings to all the 147 villages to further my agenda of economic development.”
Unfortunately, he says, when word of his intentions to stand for MP went around, he was arrested and remanded to Kitalya prison. “When I was finally released, I became more convinced that I had to stand for Member of Parliament. I had to set our agenda to open people’s eyes and the people accepted my message,” he says.
Beyond parliament
Sebamala says he has already set his sights to be an international figure within 10 years.
“When you are a politician, sometimes you wonder whether you can make the most impact there, or you can have more impact changing the world more independently. In 10 years, I see myself in the UN, with a higher level of education and experience, so that I can monitor the Ugandan government at a decision-making level. I want to monitor Africa and the world in a space where I see everything. In five years, I am debating on whether I will still be a politician or not,” he says.
