Mohammed Hamid (entrepreneur) should not be confused with Mohammed Hamid (terrorist).
| Mohammed Hamid | |
| Birth Place: | Wau, Sudan |
| Nationality: | Ugandan |
| Alma Mater: | Makerere University |
| Occupation: | Businessman, entrepreneur, investor |
| Years Active: | 1987 - present |
Mohammed Hamid (born 1976) is a Ugandan businessman. He is the owner and chairman of the executive board of directors for the Aya Group.[1]
In July 2015, he was reported by Forbes to be one of the richest Ugandans with a net worth of USD$200 Million but run bankrupt in April 2023 after liquidation of his company AYA investments Uganda Ltd started resulting from failure to clear accumulated debts from creditors, suppliers, utility bills and government taxes.[2] [3] [4]
Hamid was born in the Sudan circa 1976. In 1987, he traveled to Uganda for the first time to visit his elder brother, Mohammed El Hamid, who operated a commodity trading business called Pan Afric Impex. He fell in love with the country and stayed.The younger Mohammed worked with his elder brother until the early 1990s when he started his first company, Pan Afric Commodities, also a commodities trading business. In 1997, he bought a 15acres piece of land in Kawempe, a suburb of Kampala, where he relocated the machinery and started milling wheat. Later he bought more mills and started baking bread and confectioneries.[5]
Later, he started a trucking business, FIFI Transport Uganda Limited, later renamed Panafric Transport, which is a leading hauler in the East and Central African region", with a current fleet of hundreds of heavy duty Scania and MAN prime movers and semi trailers
.[6] One of his companies, Aya Investments, is the developer of the Pearl of Africa Hotel, launched in 2017 by President Yoweri Museveni. In 2018, Forbes listed Hamid among the 5 young African Millionaires to watch.[7]
In April 2023, Hamid run bankrupt after court court-appointed the director of insolvency and receivership at the Uganda Registration Services Bureau (URSB), the official receiver, and subsequently, the provisional liquidator after liquidation process of his company AYA Investments Uganda Ltd commenced, his hotel was subsequently renamed from Pearl of Africa Hotel to Win 5 Hotel .[8]
His bankruptcy resulted from Aya's failure to clear accumulated debts in excess of US$300 Million from creditors, supplier, accrued government taxes arrears, failure to pay utility bills and breach of insurance contracts.[9] [10] [11]