Wandergliding: Gaddafi Mosque in Kampala

November 7^th, 2023

After hitting the bank for a second time in two days to get $700 USD, I headed back to the Uganda Wildlife Authority office for the third time. Sandra, the woman I spoke to the day before, was there and she told me to head over to the cashier’s booth. After about 25 minutes, I was finally able to pay my permit fee, only to find out that the network for the computers was down. Sandra didn’t know how long it might take so I decided to head to Acacia Mall for lunch and come back in a few hours. I had a nice lunch, worked on my blog and returned to pick up my permit. It only took four visits and about 3 hours of my time…but I finally got it!

The weather wasn’t great and the only thing I had planned after getting my gorilla permit was to visit the Gaddafi Mosque, also known the Uganda National Mosque. I had passed by it when visiting the Kabaka Palace on my first full day in Kampala and it is supposedly one of the highest viewpoints in the city. The main reason I wanted to go there was for the view from the minaret, but the low clouds in the morning didn’t seem promising for that. Thankfully it cleared up so I decided to get a boda boda and head to the mosque.

Mid afternoon traffic in Kampala:

How to transport a couch in Kampala:

After paying my entrance fee, I was introduced to my guide, Sarah. She is about 22 years old, with glasses and wearing typical Islamic clothes, a long dress with a hijab. Sarah was fantastic. She was informative, engaging and funny. She took a few pictures of me outside the builiding and then we headed into the mosque. It was quite impressive, although I think this is only the second mosque I’ve ever been to, the other one being the Blue Mosque in Istanbul in 1995. We were the only two people in the mosque, and that was pretty cool. It was a large, vacuous room with a dome in the middle with a large chandelier hanging from it and a super plush carpet.

Sarah asked me some questions about what I knew about Islam, and I think I did alright. She then talked about the history of the mosque. Construction began in 1972 but then stopped in 1976. In 2001, Gaddafi, who was good buddies with Idi Amin, funded the rebuilding of the mosque. The foundation from the 70s was deemed unsafe so they demolished it and began from scratch. It was completed in 2007 and can fit over 15,000 worshippers. Sarah explained where certain parts of the mosque were sourced, such as the stained glass (Italy) and the mahogany wood (Congo). She also translated some of the Arabic writings on the wall and read, or more like sang, the first few bits from a large copy of the Koran that was on a podium.

The Koran:

This is the carpet. Each worshipper kneels down between the columns:

Afterwards we exited the mosque and started the 200+ stairs up the minaret. The view of Kampala was fabulous. Sarah explained some of the different districts and what the main seven hills around the city were named and what they were about.

The spiraling staircase going up the minaret: