By Paul Mwirigi Muriungi, MD & Head of Strategy, COG EA Ltd
In 2022, when the first Rwenzori Marathon was held in Kasese, it did not look like a national project. There were about 800 runners, a few determined sponsors led by Tusker Lite, and a private organiser, Amos Wekesa, who believed that Ugandans would travel west for a race if the mountain was beautiful enough and the weekend was organised properly. Government was not the author of that first edition. The roads were ordinary, the hotels were not full, and World Athletics had never put a Ugandan marathon on its labelled calendar. It was a business experiment in a district that, in August, much like the rest of the year, used to go quiet.
Five years later, on 22 August 2026, that experiment filled Kasese. Between 8,000 and nearly 10,000 people ran the 42km, 21km, 10km or 5km, starting near the Equator by Queen Elizabeth National Park, climbing through Kilembe, and finishing under the Rwenzori. That range includes a Ptolemy called the Mountains of the Moon around the year 150, the same peaks that now sit inside a UNESCO park across Kasese, Bunyangabu, Kabarole, Ntoroko and Bundibugyo. Margherita Peak on Mount Stanley, at 5,109 metres, is still Uganda’s highest point, with the strange sight of glaciers on the equator. Runners who did not rush back to Kampala on Sunday could stay for the mountain, the gorillas, or a game drive. That extra night is where a race becomes tourism.
The business pages should care because the cash stayed in Uganda. Before the marathon, about 81 percent of rooms in Kasese were running below 40 percent occupancy in that season. On race weekend they hit 60 to 100 percent, booked months in advance. Local estimates put direct spending in the district at more than UGX 15 billion. Food stalls, bars and shops reported sales up 30 to 40 percent. From Kampala through Mubende to Kasese, traders sold out gonja, muchomo, rolex (not the watch) and the small things at petrol stations.
Boda-boda riders and special-hire drivers worked the hotel-to-start-line route. Young people picked up short jobs in security, catering, cleaning and the Saturday night Neon Rave. Uganda Development Bank put in UGX 20 million on a simple argument: tourism earns foreign exchange, and Kasese still does not have enough beds.
The race itself became more expensive to win, which is how you keep Ugandan talent at home. The prize pot rose from UGX 92 million in 2025 to UGX 252 million. The men’s and women’s marathon winners each took UGX 40 million, four times the UGX 10 million of the year before, with money paid down to sixth place. Leonard Chemonges, running for the Uganda Wildlife Authority club, won in 2 hours 13 minutes 25 seconds. Margaret Japchumba of Kenya won the women’s race. In 2024 Abel Chelangat won this same course in 2:14:59, was signed by Adidas, won the Porto Marathon in 2:10:01, then Rabat, then finished fifth at the world championships in Tokyo, then won Barcelona in 2:04:57. Last weekend every one of the top six men in Kasese ran faster than Chelangat’s 2024 time. Sports Minister Hon. Peter Ogwang, who was in Kasese both years, said what many coaches already know: Uganda has the runners; what it lacked was a serious race on Ugandan soil.
World Athletics now lists the Rwenzori Marathon as a Label road race, Uganda’s first, and one of only a handful in Africa among about 160 worldwide. The label is not permanent. It must be earned again every year, which is why the ministries suddenly matter in a way they did not in 2022. There are rules about roads, timing, medical cover and security that a private company cannot sign for itself.
That is the partnership, stated without the usual seminar language. Private money moved first. Government came in when the product was already on the road. The National Council of Sports pledged UGX 3.7 billion over four years, and Hon. Peter Ogwang tied the support to a target: Gold Label within five years. The Ministry of Tourism and the Uganda Tourism Board, with chief executive Juliana Kagwa, treated the weekend as destination business, a cultural night for more than 40 countries, a conference on Kasese’s visitor economy, and the old #ExploreUganda pitch that Ugandans from Kampala should spend their money in the west.
Works and the urban road programmes that tarmacked stretches of Kasese made a labelled course possible. Police and the army held the route. Health sent ambulances and a life-support unit and trained a doctor to the standard the federation demands. Local government opened the town. Foreign Affairs and the missions did the quiet work of selling Uganda: The High Commission in Pretoria brought South African runners and travel influencers, and High Commissioner Paul Amoru ran. The Uganda Red Cross has now covered five editions and pledges to support more.
World Athletics streamed the morning live. The world’s top 50 marathons, taken together, put about 5.2 billion dollars into the cities that host them. Uganda’s share of that market is still small, which is why Kagwa’s remark that the country has not scratched the surface of tourism belongs in the same paragraph as this race.
Rwanda built the Kigali Peace Marathon from the centre of government. Uganda built this one from a town at the foot of the mountain and only later brought in the state. Gulu is already planning a city marathon on 5 December. Other towns will try the same thing when they see the occupancy figures.
When a private organiser proves that Ugandans will travel, sleep, eat and spend in a district that used to be empty in August, the state’s job is not to invent a new brand; it is to clear the road, put police on the course, keep the hospital ready, tell the embassies to send runners, and write the cheque that takes the race from a Label event to a Gold one. A grand vision started the Rwenzori Marathon. Amos Wekesa’s stubbornness kept it alive. The partnership between organisers of the Rwenzori Marathon and several ministries is what can make a lasting impression in Uganda’s tourism accounts.
Indeed, it is a beautiful thing when the State backs what works!
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