Kenya–Uganda border

Uganda once reached the Rift Valley

In 1886 and 1890 Britain and Germany split East Africa between them. Their dividing line ran from the coast to Lake Victoria and then across the lake along the 1st parallel south, so all of today's Kenya–Uganda border area fell in Britain's sphere.^[1] Britain then built its territories piece by piece. It declared a protectorate over the Kingdom of Buganda in 1894, and in 1895 it created an East Africa Protectorate covering Kenya from the Indian Ocean only as far as the Rift Valley, a short way west of Nairobi.^[1] Britain gradually extended its protectorate to the lands around Buganda, and the name Uganda came into general use for the whole area.^[1]

A railway from Mombasa reached Kisumu on Lake Victoria in 1901.^[1] On 1 April 1902 Britain's Foreign Office moved Uganda's Eastern Province, which stretched from today's border east to the far side of the Rift Valley, to the East Africa Protectorate.^[1] That province's western edge is the Kenya–Uganda border today.^[1]

In 1926 a British decree, an Order in Council, moved Uganda's Rudolf Province, now Turkana in Kenya, to Kenya too.^[1] The same order described the whole boundary from Lake Victoria north to Mount Zulia, where it met the Sudan. That description is still the basis of the line.^[1]

Islands, rivers and a mountain

In Lake Victoria the 1926 line hops north between islands. It passes the westernmost points of Pyramid, Ilemba, Kiringiti and Mageta islands, follows the western shores of Sumba Island, and reaches land at the mouth of the Sio River.^[1]

On land it follows the Sio, Sango, Alupe and Malaba rivers toward Mount Elgon.^[1] Between the Sango and the Alupe the country is fairly densely settled, so Ugandan survey teams set pillars there in 1927 and 1933 to make the line easy to see.^[1]

Mount Elgon was treated differently later. The 1926 order ran the line to the mountain's highest point. A letter from Kenya's Colonial Secretary to Uganda's Chief Secretary on 7 March 1936 changed that: the border now goes to Elgon's second-highest summit, at about 14,140 feet (4,310 m), and then north to where the Suam River leaves the crater.^[1]

“Commencing in the waters of Lake Victoria on a parallel 1° south latitude, at a point due south of the westernmost point of Pyramid Island; thence the boundary follows a straight line due north to that point…”^[1]

Herders and the northern line

North of Mount Elgon the line follows the Suam (Turkwel) River, then hills, ridges and the foot of the Turkana escarpment.^[1] Kenya had run the affairs of the Pokot, pastoralists who lived in this area, since 1914. In 1922 Uganda agreed that Kenya should keep doing so, and that the Pokot could graze their herds in Uganda. Some Pokot settled on the Ugandan side, and in 1927 Uganda cancelled the grazing rights.^[1]

In 1932 the two colonies agreed that Karasuk, a Kenyan area west of the Suam, would be run by Uganda's neighbouring Karamoja District. That created an administrative line east of the international one.^[1] The border itself was marked with 180 pillars for about 280 miles (450 km) north to the Sudan tripoint in 1959–60.^[1] Uganda became independent on 9 October 1962 and Kenya on 12 December 1963, and Karasuk went back to Kenyan administration in September 1970.^[1]

Migingo

Migingo is a rocky islet in Lake Victoria, described as about an acre or about half an acre in size, close to the water boundary.^[3][4] It was little more than a rock until the lake level fell in the early 1990s. By 2011 more than 1,000 people lived there, about 80 percent of them Kenyan.^[3] ISS analysts traced the row to declining fish stocks and international demand for Nile perch rather than the rock itself.^[3]

Around 2004 Uganda posted police and marines on the island and raised its flag. In early 2009 Uganda asked Kenyans on the island to buy permits, and a diplomatic row followed.^[3] Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni said the island was in Kenya but the waters around it were Ugandan.^[3] A joint survey began on 2 June 2009, guided by the 1926 Order in Council, but the two teams disagreed. Kenyan surveyors working alone found Migingo about 510 m east of the border, on the Kenyan side.^[3] Ugandan surveyors have argued that Ugingo, an islet about 200 m (660 feet) east of Migingo, is really the Pyramid Island named in the 1926 order, which would put Migingo in Uganda by a few metres.^[4]

The dispute is still open. In December 2025 Kenya's President William Ruto said “Migingo is part of Kenya” and that Kenya would use diplomatic means to stop its fishermen being harassed.^[5]

Crossings

Busia and Malaba both have one-stop border posts. The first one-stop operations between the two countries began at Malaba railway station. Presidents Uhuru Kenyatta and Yoweri Museveni opened a one-stop post at Busia on 24 February 2018. Busia handles transit to and from Rwanda, Burundi, the DR Congo and South Sudan, and more informal cross-border traders than any other East African Community crossing.^[2]