Uganda Just Restarted the Trade Order. Kampala Vendors Are Back on the Move.

Kampala street vendor pushing wheeled stall away from cleared walkway as KCCA enforcement officer watches — Illustration by HotKiosk

Uganda's Cabinet has restarted the Trade Order. Street vendors are being moved off Kampala walkways and into formal markets. If you run a shop, a stall, or a kiosk in Uganda, your block, your customer base, and your rent picture all just changed.

What Just Happened

On April 27, 2026, Uganda's Cabinet voted to resume nationwide enforcement of the Trade Order. The decision came after a four-day pause that started when public anger over evictions forced a temporary stop.

Local Government Minister Raphael Magyezi said the order is "non-negotiable" and must be sustained. Implementation, he said, will continue as planned. The only adjustments cover places of worship and a wider community sensitisation push.

The Trade Order is not a new law. It is a renewed enforcement of existing urban management rules. The aim, according to the Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA), is to clear walkways, road reserves, and unauthorised public spaces. Vendors are being told to move into gazetted markets and designated trading zones.

The enforcement started on February 19, 2026, and spread quickly to Wakiso and at least 10 secondary cities. By late April, the Federation of Uganda Traders Association (FUTA), led by chairman John Kabanda, had pushed back hard. Permanent Secretary Ben Kumumanya met FUTA at the Ministry of Local Government to seek a "more humane" approach. That meeting produced the four-day suspension. Cabinet ended it on April 27.

The Numbers KCCA Is Using

KCCA says it has opened 2,520 workspaces inside nine public and private markets to absorb evicted vendors. As of April 30, 1,663 of those workspaces were occupied. 857 were still empty.

Between February 19 and April 27, KCCA issued 22,909 new business licences worth Shs 5.07 billion. According to KCCA's own figures, that is a 146 percent jump compared with the same period before December 2025, when it issued 15,628 licences worth Shs 3.9 billion. KCCA frames the surge as proof that the Trade Order is pushing informal traders into the formal system.

"Trade order is non-negotiable and must be sustained." Cabinet position, April 27, 2026, as relayed by Minister Raphael Magyezi.

FUTA disagrees with the framing. The federation, which says it represents more than 400,000 traders, argues that many vendors have not been given clear relocation plans. They say the alternative markets are too far from the customer base, and that some traders are being licensed under duress, not by choice.

What It Costs a Vendor or Shop Owner Now

The Trade Order changes four things on the ground at once. None of them are theoretical. They start to hit this week.

1. Foot traffic on city streets is thinner

Vendors used to pull customers into a block before those customers ever reached a shop. With the walkways cleared, that pull is gone. If your shop sits on a downtown street that used to have hawkers outside, expect fewer walk-ins. The Observer Uganda and other Kampala outlets have reported emptier central streets since February.

2. Customers may move with the vendors

Some customers will follow vendors to the new markets. Others will not bother. A shop owner inside one of the nine designated markets gets more foot traffic. A shop owner stuck in the old downtown loses it. Where you sit matters more than it did six months ago.

3. Licence pressure is now real

KCCA is using the eCitie portal and field inspections to push trading licences. The licence cost depends on your business class and location, set out on the KCCA trading licence rates page. If you have been trading without one, the door is closing.

4. Rent moves both ways

Rents in the new markets may rise as more vendors look for stalls. Rents in old downtown blocks that lost their hawker traffic may soften. Landlords on both sides will adjust over the next 8 to 12 weeks.

The 9 Markets Vendors Are Being Pushed Into

According to KCCA's own list, the 2,520 alternative workspaces sit across these nine markets:

Busega
Nakawa
Luzira
Wandegeya
City Abattoir
New Ntinda
Usafi
Kamwokya
Nateete

If you are a wholesaler, this is your new pick-up map. Your supplier list may need updating. If you sell to street vendors directly, your customers are no longer where they used to be. Trace them to one of these markets and talk to your contact there before the end of May.

FUTA's main complaint about this list is distance. The new markets sit outside the central business district, and many serve a different customer profile than vendors used to draw from. "We serve travellers and people working around the city," one evicted trader told NTV Uganda. That customer is harder to reach from Busega or Luzira.

5 Things to Do This Week

Sort your paperwork. Get your KCCA trading licence current. Check the licence rates page or visit the eCitie portal. If your business class is unclear, ask the city division office in writing so the answer is on record. Inspectors are active.
Visit one of the nine markets in person. Pick the one closest to your current customer base. Ask about stall rent, available workspaces, and whether your category is allowed. Get the price in writing.
Talk to your wholesaler this week. If your stock used to flow through downtown vendors, ask where the wholesaler is sending stock now. The answer may shift your reorder schedule. Some wholesalers have begun delivering directly to the new markets.
Keep a 30-day price log. Note the price you pay your supplier and the price you sell at every Friday for the next month. Trade Order shifts the supply chain. Without a written log, you will not catch the moment your margin starts shrinking.
Join an association. FUTA, the Kampala City Traders Association, and sector-specific groups are now the main channel for talking to government. A single trader gets ignored. A registered association gets a meeting. You can find FUTA via futa-ug.com.

The Pan-African Pattern

Uganda's Trade Order is not a one-off. Across the continent, governments are stepping back into trade chains and pushing informal sellers into formal systems. Each country uses a different lever, but the direction is the same.

In Kenya, the Trade Cabinet Secretary just launched a plan to use the Kenya National Trading Corporation as a price stabiliser and to build out 19 county aggregation parks. Read our coverage in Kenya's KNTC plan.

In Zimbabwe, President Mnangagwa fast-tracked a new Wholesale and Retail Sector Policy in April, with an 81-day inspection roadshow that has been hitting tuckshops since March. See Zimbabwe's tuckshop policy.

In Malawi, the Revenue Authority switched on real-time electronic invoicing on May 1, and shops in six cities closed in protest. See Malawi's EIS rollout.

The shared thread is paperwork. Governments want visibility into who is trading, what is moving, and how much tax is owed. The informal model is closing. The formal model is more expensive on day one, but it is the only model that lets a shop grow past survival.

Why This Matters

If you run a shop, a stall, or a kiosk in Uganda, the Trade Order is now part of your weekly operations. It is no longer a story to read about. It decides where your customers walk, whether your supplier comes to your door, and whether your business is on the right side of an inspection.

For shop owners outside Uganda, the same pattern is coming to your country if it has not arrived already. Get the paperwork tight, get into an association, and keep a written price log. The shops that survive this wave will be the ones that did the boring admin work before they were forced to.

Conclusion

Uganda's Cabinet has decided. The Trade Order is back, and KCCA is not slowing down. 2,520 new market workspaces are open, more than two-thirds are filled, and over 22,000 licences have been issued in 10 weeks. The vendors who used to be on your street are now in nine markets across the city. Your move is to find them, talk to them, and tighten your own paperwork before the inspector finds you instead.