It was glamour as US$320m (Shs1.2 trillion) Kingdom Kampala Mall owned by property mogul, Sudhir Ruparelia was officially opened to the public on Sunday.
The official unveiling of the building was preceded by prayers.
Sudhir’s Jyostna and son, Rajiv, who is the Managing Director of Crane Management Services Ltd opened the building.
Kingdom Kampala mall, which is now one of the marvels in the Kampala sky is located between three main roads; Nile Avenue, Yusuf Lule Road and Dewinton Road to the northeast of Central Business District of Kampala.
Addressing guests, who included top Kampala tycoons, Rajiv revealed that the building has been opened at “a strategic” time when Uganda’s oil sector is booming, noting that it will offer office space to the sector as well as others.
He described the “phase one of the building” as unique, noting that there are a few buildings like it in Uganda. He revealed the total built up area is 42,000 square meters.
He added that the facility has 22,000 square meters of let-table retail & office space, parking for up to 450 cars and sprinkler fire suppression system.
Further, the building has backup generators that can power the building for up to five days in case hydro power is off.
It also has 400 CCTVs to provide adequate security.
Inside the twelve floored multibillion and multipurpose complex is also a 200 bedroom 4 Star Hotel and a 16,000 square meter rentable space for leisure related kind of businesses.
When fully lit at night, it illuminates the surrounding areas like a gigantic Christmas tree.
Construction on Kingdom Kampala started off in 2006 after Saudi investor Prince Alwaleed bin Talal leased 15 acres (6.1 ha) of prime land in the center of Kampala from the government of Uganda for 99 years. Alwaleed’s company, Kingdom Holding, was supposed to build a five star hotel to be opened in 2009. In the aftermath of the 2008/2009 financial crisis, Kingdom Holding failed to mobilize financing to complete the Hotel, and in 2016 Ruparelia’s Crane Management Services (CMS), a subsidiary of Ruparelia Group, acquired the property and restarted construction work.
Sudhir, Uganda’s richest man and Chairman of the Ruparelia Group of Companies in a 2016 media interview revealed that he had “more than 300 titles [of land] in my closet and still counting.” This has since grown considering the fact that he has been opening more new buildings in Kampala and the surrounding areas.
For example, he has more than 14 buildings along Kampala Road.
He valued his titles at around US$1bn (roughly Shs3.7trillion) excluding the now defunct Crane Bank.
By Aloysious Kasoma
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Congratulations Sudhir
Congratulations Sudhir
Well Sudhir is a very hard working guy & very charitable person who is “for uganda by Uganda & Of Uganda”:I am related to him & closely knitted with ruparelias..god bless entire Rupsrelia Family:
Congratulations ! Gujaraties have eye & foresight that you have proved & that too out of India. Honesty & courage be with you & God bless for progress always.
Loving wishes
Janakbhai
Happy to see Mr.Ruparelia’s achievements and his contributions to participate in the development of Uganda. Congrats!
We are proud of you and we pray that you keep prospering and do as much possible for the community
Nilesh Thank you:This Sudhir is my nephew & with him if he (Ruparelia Family ) touches a brick of mud will change to gold & is so god gifted family, whereas people like me & you touch thousand pound will change to sand.I have known the entire family from Kasese:Now Sudhir has been a “Hero” of our family & of Uganda too which we all are proud:Thank you god bless them all.sodha regards
Just like Amit Kataria, I am glad to see that Uganda is being invested in and that the Asians are still a big part of the community. I haven’t been back to Uganda – Mbarara – since Idi Amin, Having settled in the US but am planning a trip soon to go visit the birth land. I applaud the decision to invest in Ugandan economy, the Jewel of Africa.
I am proud to witness Uganda is progressing at steady pace with government’s sensible and friendly choices, I am a Ugandan born and have been visiting Kampala for the last few years offering my Charity work and supporting three schools in the village of Nangwa near Mukono on Jinja road, hoping to be in Kampala in two months time for the same purpose and importantly to meet fellow Lion members of Kampala Lions Club, have established links with Lion.Israel.
Its nice to see that in spite of difficult and unpredictable vision sometimes, you have chosen to continue to develop what could have been a star of Africa had it not been for Idi Amin.
Kudos to the current leadership for having the foresight and creating the right conditions so that entrepreneurs like Jyostna and Rajiv feel comfortable in investing and thus improving economic well being of all Ugandan’s
When I came to Kampala there was only one hotel in town and nice Indian restaurant and we meet one Indian business man his name is Bhiku bhai Patel he has nice house we visit him and went to swaminarayan temple he is taking care of temple and I came to Kampala we had big business company call Uganda machinery and we have gining factory at conpay I will back to Kampala and I was happy open hotel restaurant in mall and congratulations to all your family’s
EX-UGANDAN SEEING THE BIRTH PLACE DEVELOPING MAKES ME PROUD. ASIAN INDIAN HAVE RETURNED AND CONTRIBUTIONS.
I COULDNOT COME BACK AS WORKING IN EUROPE AND CHILDREN TOO WORKING IN COOPERATE MULTINATIONAL FEILD. CAN NOT COME TO UGANDA.
THUS WE FAILED TO RESETTLED IN MBARARA / KAMPALA.
Amitbhai in response to your comment I would like to say that Amin’s reign of “Terror” put us all off Uganda.I have had been to Makindye (1972)a national research counci “A vicious torture centre”& have had seen dead bodies in thousand rotting at back of lorries mostly langi/acholis awaiting dropping in river.in fact app 300.000 people were slaughtered by Amin & his army:Sudhir is 1% of expelled Asian having gone to uganda but today there are well educated Ugandan Asians children now in their 40s very well educated,in pharmacies,medicine,doctors are millionaires in Uk :just imagine if these young Asians were in uganda then Uganda today would have been Switzerland of Africa We don’t regret at all not returning to uganda having seen how badly Asians were looted & treated:It was a god “Blessing “ we left uganda✝️✝️✝️🕉🕉🕉 thank you sodha regards
It is a question of who you can feed and how much. Once you can do that you have a free hand in business and politics.
Need I say more.
Amitbhai there is & there should be no regrets on we Indians not returning to uganda :Main reason is “fierce of being looted again” at same angle of Amin 1972 ,we were expelled/looted by Amin.we found 3 months hard Uk to settle without no monies but we are thankful to her majesty queen of Uk as the Uk government well comed us “Hands Wide Open” Helped is a lot as Uk Government knee very well that those Indians from uganda are hard working & would be an Assets to Uk Government:Not only that Amin expulsion warned Asians in neighbouring countries Africa to be aware that if it happened in uganda it can happen in any part of Africa.Amitbhai so no regrets of returning back as we fill now a lot safer where we are today:Regards sodha