Mbale Municipality is located in eastern Uganda in Mbale District. Mbale is the location of the district headquarters and is the central town and commercial centre. It is located 245 kilometres from Kampala and about 50 kilometres from Uganda’s border with Kenya.
With support from Cities alliance and UN-Habitat, the Government of Uganda piloted the Social Tenure Domain Model (STDM) in Mbale municipality. Implementation involved many stakeholders including the central government, municipal government and civil society organisations representing the urban poor in Uganda including ACTogether, Slum Dwellers International and the National Slum Dwellers Federation of Uganda. The STDM was linked to earlier work by the government-led Transforming Settlements of the Urban Poor in Uganda (TSUPU) program which was launched in 2010 in partnership with the Government of Uganda and the Cities Alliance.