The richest people in Uganda 2022 include native Ugandans as well as businessmen who are born to immigrants. Uganda is an East African country with a thriving economy. Most of Uganda’s exports are agricultural products. Coffee, tea, fish, and cotton are among its top exports.
Obviously, Uganda’s richest people make a significant contribution to the growth of the country’s economy. These businessmen have made their wealth by investing in different sectors. Today, we walk you through the top ten richest Ugandans including their net worth.
Top 10 Richest People in Uganda
1. Sudhir Ruparelia – Richest man in Uganda
Sudhir Ruparelia. Photo credit – CNN
Sudhir Ruparelia is the richest person in Uganda. Mr. Ruparelia, who was born in 1956, is an Indian-born Ugandan business mogul and investor. He is the chairman and principal stakeholder of the Ruparelia Group’s firms. Banking, insurance, education, radio, real estate, floriculture, hotels, and resorts are among his key investments. His net worth was about $1.2 billion as of 2019.
Also, Ruparelia was the wealthiest person in Uganda in 2019, according to Forbes. Unfortunately, Crane Bank, which is Ruparelia Group’s largest affiliate, faced a major fall in capital in 2016. Subsequently, the Bank of Uganda, which governs all banks in the country, took control of Crane Bank in October that year.
In 2007, the Uganda Pentecostal University gave Ruparelia an honorary Doctor of Laws degree in business. This came as a recognition of his contribution to the country’s economic progress. In addition, the president of Nepal, Bidhya Devi Bhandari, named Ruparelia as honorary Consul of the Republic of Nepal to Uganda in February 2020.
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2. Mohammed Hamid
Mohammed Hamid is another prominent Ugandan entrepreneur and businessman. The Ugandan Businessman was the second richest African under 40 in 2015, according to Forbes, following Tanzanian multimillionaire, Mohammed Dewji. With a net worth of over $1 billion, he is the second richest man in Uganda today.
He is the founder and chairman of the Aya Group’s executive board of directors. Born in 1976, Hamid is one of the youngest richest people in Uganda. In 1987, he flew to Uganda for the first time to see his older brother, Mohammed El Hamid, who ran Pan Afric Impex, a commodity trading company.
He became enamored with the country and decided to stay. Mohammed, the younger, worked with his elder brother until the early 1990s when he founded Pan Afric Commodities, a commodities trading firm. Later, he founded FIFI Transport Uganda Limited, which later became Panafric Transport.
The company is now a leading transporter in East and Central Africa. The company has a fleet of hundreds of heavy-duty Scania and MAN movers and trailers. One of his enterprises, Aya Investments, developed the Pearl of Africa Hotel, which President Yoweri Museveni opened in 2017.
3. Amos Nzeyi
Amos Nzeyi is a well-known Ugandan entrepreneur, businessman, and manufacturer. Nzeyi’s net worth as of 2021 was about $1 billion, making him the third richest person in Uganda. He is the current chairman of Crown Beverages Limited’s board of directors. Crown is a blue-chip beverage firm that produces premium carbonated soft beverages such as Pepsi, Mirinda, Mountain Dew, Sting, Evervess, and Nivana Mineral Water.
Moreover, businessman Nzeyi owns a stake at Crown Beverages Limited, Hot Loaf Bakery, White Horse Inn, National Bank of Commerce, and Nandos Restaurant. Businessman Nzeyi serves as the Honorary Consul for Mauritius in Kampala, Uganda. Following the appointment of Dr. Amos Nzeyi as Honorary Consul, the Consulate of Mauritius became the first representative of Mauritius in Uganda in 2018.
He is also the Uganda Manufacturers Association’s chairman. In May 2015, he was re-elected to a second and final two-year term. He was a previous member of the Uganda Development Bank’s board of directors.
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4. Hamis Kiggundu
Hamis Kiggundu, who is known by many as Ham, is a Ugandan business magnate with investments in different sectors. He is also a philanthropist, real estate developer, lawyer, and author. Born in 1984, Kiggundu is currently the Chief Executive Officer of the Ham Group of Companies.
Moreover, he is the author of Reason as the World Masterpiece and Success and Failure Based on Reason and Reality books. According to Forbes, the Ugandan business tycoon had a net worth of approximately $870 million in 2021. That makes him one of the richest people in Uganda.
Kiggundu was honored with an award in 2018 for his book, Success and Failure Based on Reason and Reality. The book has also been voted as the best book of the year in the area of Business Motivation.
5. Karim Hirji
Karim Hirji is a Ugandan entrepreneur, hotel owner, and businessman. Hirji is the fifth richest person in Uganda with an estimated net worth of almost $800 million. The Ugandan business magnate began trading textiles and alcoholic beverages from a store on Luwum Street in Kampala.
Afterward, it grew into Dembe Enterprise, which eventually advanced to become the Dembe Group of Companies. A radio station, an automobile dealership, a finance and insurance firm, an amusement park, and the Imperial Hotels Group are all part of this conglomerate.
Besides, Hirji was a renowned car racing driver in the 1970s. Then, he started selling textiles and alcoholic beverages in Kampala in the early 1990s.
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6. Alykhan Karmali
Alykhan Karmali is among the richest people in Uganda born to immigrants. According to Forbes, he has a net worth of $700 million. Mr. Karmali is a philanthropist, businessman, industrialist, and entrepreneur. He serves as the managing director of Mukwano Industries Uganda Limited, a Mukwano Group member firm.
Karmali also sat on the board of directors of Exim Bank (Uganda), a commercial bank in which Karmali’s Mukwano Group owns a 36.5 percent stake. He has made significant investments in industry and banking, and he owns 36.5 percent of Exim Bank Uganda.
Alykhan’s paternal grandfather, Ali Mohamed Karmali, was an entrepreneur of Indian heritage who immigrated to Uganda in 1904. Then, before moving to Mbarara in Uganda’s Western Region, he worked as a store assistant in Jinja.
7. Patrick Bitature
Patrick Bitature is the seventh richest man in Uganda. He is an entrepreneur, businessman, and author. With a net worth of about $670 million as of 2021, he is one of Uganda’s richest natives. The business magnate hails from the Kabarole region. Mr. Bitature is the CEO of the Simba Group of Companies, which is a conglomerate with holdings in telecommunications, energy, travel, real estate, leisure, media, and mining.
In addition, Bitature became chancellor of Uganda Technology and Management University (UTAMU) in September 2021. This is a private university in Kampala, Uganda’s capital city. His term began on September 17, 2021, and will end in 2025. He took over from Dr. Kalonzo Musyoka, the former Vice President of Kenya, who served as the university’s founding chancellor for two terms, from 2013 to 2021.
Bitature established the Simba Telecom Limited company in 1998. Then, MTN Uganda, which had just debuted in the nation, became a franchisee of the firm. Simba Telecom has risen to become Uganda’s top MTN airtime seller, with gross sales exceeding US$80 million in 2010. Mr. Bitature has over the years built other businesses within the Simba Group of Companies. Some of his businesses have subsidiaries not just in Uganda but also in Kenya, and Tanzania.
8. Charles Magezi Mbire
Charles Magezi Mbire is an entrepreneur, businessman, and industrialist. As of January 2012, he was said to be the richest native Ugandan, with a net worth of more than $200 million. He was worth $ 500 million by 2021. Mbire was born in 1959 in Mparo, Rukiga District, which is located southwest of Uganda.
The entrepreneur studied business and economics at Essex University in England, where he received an honors Bachelor of Science degree. Mbire then moved on to Leicester University in the United Kingdom where he earned a Master of Business Administration degree.
In 2010, he was chairman of the Uganda Securities Exchange. He was also a member of the Presidential Investor Roundtable. This is an elite group of executives that advise Uganda’s President on how to improve the country’s competitiveness and economic climate. Mr. Mbire has made his wealth by investing in diverse sectors. These include pharmaceuticals, finance, telecommunications, agribusiness, real estate, and energy.
9. Lalani
Sikander Lalani is a Ugandan entrepreneur, industrialist, and former histopathologist. With a net worth of approximately $300 million, he is one of the richest people in Uganda. Lalani is the chairman and CEO of Roofings Group, which is Uganda’s largest maker of construction steel materials.
He was born in Kampala’s Nsambya Hospital on November 4, 1944. Then, in the 1960s, he trained as a histopathologist and worked for two years at the University College Hospital in London, England. In the 1970s, he quit medicine to operate a retail electronics company in Kigali, Rwanda, specializing in Philips products.
Afterward, he became a Goodyear tyre distributor in Rwanda. His Japanese acquaintances, who used to supply him with electronics, suggested the idea of making metallic roofing materials.
He successfully sought a $1 million loan from the World Bank with the help of the Rwanda Development Bank. He opened a plant in Kigali in 1978 to produce roofing materials. When genocide erupted in Rwanda in 1994, he fled to Tanzania. Later on, Lalani relocated to Uganda due to Tanzania’s burdensome bureaucracy.
10. Bob Kabonero
Bob Kabonero is a Ugandan businessman and entrepreneur. Born in Uganda in 1965, he is the youngest of three children in the family. Richard Kabonero, Uganda’s ambassador to Tanzania, is his older brother. Bob Kabonero graduated from Oxford Brookes University in Oxford, England, with a bachelor’s degree in business administration and retail management.
The Pyramids Casino and Kampala Casino are two of his business ventures. He also owns a logistics firm, an import products firm, and the Ugandan Europcar franchise. Mr. Kabonero is the chairman of Park Hospitality Limited, which developed the Kampala Radisson Blue Hotel in collaboration with the Carlson Rezidor Hotel Group.
Conclusion
These Ugandan business tycoons continue to look for more business opportunities in Uganda and neighboring countries. As their businesses thrive, their net wealth will continue to increase. Besides, it is worth noting that other business tycoons and entrepreneurs are also working tirelessly to take their businesses to greater heights and make more wealth. So, in one year’s time, the list of the top ten richest people in Uganda will most likely have some new faces.
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