Amiral Karmali was the founder of East Africa’s Mukwano Group- an industrial conglomerate that manufactures cooking oils, fats, toilet soaps, and cosmetics to industrial plastics and detergents. He is the managing director of Mukwano Industries Uganda Limited, a member of the Mukwano Group. The group has annual revenues of over $230 million and most of the company’s products are market leaders. Karmali is also one of Uganda’s biggest landlords; he owns 17,000 acres of land in Uganda’s Masindi district. He also served as a non-executive director of Exim Bank0- a commercial bank in which the Mukwano Group maintains 36.5 percent shareholding. Karmali’s grandfather was an entrepreneur of Indian descent who migrated to Uganda circa 1904, late he settled in Bukundula, where in partnership with Asian families, he did a roaring trade in cotton and coffee. Apparently, Karmali’s grandfather had so many friends that he was nicknamed “Mukwano Gwa Bangi” ( Friend of Many). The family then used the name Mukwando and named the family business after it. Alykhan began to lead the family business in 1995.
Alykhan Karmali Networth
- Net Worth: $800 million
Background
Amirali Karmali was born circa 1930, in Bukandula Village, in present-day Gomba District, in the Buganda Region of Uganda to Ali Mohamed Karmali. Ali Mohamed Karmali had emigrated to East Africa in 1904, worked for some time in Mbarara and later settled in Bukandula. In Bukandula, he created a lucrative business, buying cotton and coffee from local farmers, while selling them household items and farm implements. He had very friendly demeanor and nick-named “Mukwano gwa Bangi” (Friend of Many), in the Luganda language. The family moved to Fort Portal, Kabarole District, where the young Karmali acquired a second hand truck and began transporting produce to Kampala. Later Amirali relocated to Kampala, Uganda’s capital city
Mukwano Group of Companies
When Idi Amin Dada, expelled Ugandan Asians in 1972, Amirali Karmali remained in Uganda. In 1986, he founded Mukwano Industries Limited, the flagship company of the Mukwano business empire. As of 2001, the conglomerate operated 46 different businesses, including expansion of the confectionery business to produce chewing gum, lollipops and chocolate. The pretax annual revenue that year was estimated at US$300 million.
Other considerations
In 2011, Amirali Karmali was awarded the Order of the Nile (Class One) Medal, in recognition of his distinct performance in production and enterprise development. The award was bestowed as part of the Labor Day celebrations.
Personal life
He was the father to Alykhan Karmali as well as photographer, Roshan Karmali. He died at his home in the neighborhood called Kololo, in Kampala, on the evening of Wednesday 10 July 2019, at the age of 89 years. He was laid to rest in a cemetery on Archer Road, Kololo, Kampala, on 13 July 2019
