Early in the year there was a frenzy in Uganda, when Kiira Motors unveiled its eye-catching solar bus prototype.

The story was covered widely in the global media, and the photographs were all over social media. There were even a few euphoric declarations about the dawn of a innovative green age in East Africa.

Now reality has caught up with the promise. CEO Paul Musasizi told Quartz in an interview that it will not be producing the solar buses commercially after all — “at least not for another decade”.

Instead of renewable clean energy, he said, the company would be producing regular diesel-engine pickup trucks.

To give credit to Kiira Motors, at least it never stops dreaming and trying. But the signs of trouble were all there from early on.

Ahead of the violence-marred presidential elections in February, President Yoweri Museveni launched the solar bus, called Kayoola, to much fanfare.

He used the occasion to give a futuristic coating to his 30-year rule, suggesting that despite criticism that his regime was too corruption-hobbled and had been overtaken by the times, a technology future still lay ahead for Uganda under his stewardship.

Musasizi, who heads a firm that had already carried out two failed high-profile vehicle launches, should have known it would end in tears.

First, innovation does not like a lot of sunlight. Even giant and phenomenally successful companies like Facebook and Google started quietly either in the darkness of a college room, a lonely lab, a garage or a poorly lit basement. By the time they hit the headlines, they had some legs under them.

Successful projects tend to be like weddings. The grander it is, and the bigger the headlines it makes, the more likely it is to fail.

That is because too many witnesses and eyeballs bring with them high expectations, and remove the flexibility needed to make stuff work. If you held a ground-breaking ceremony to build a three-storey 10-bedroom house the guests will expect you to deliver.

If you told no one about the house, except your wife and parents, then when unfavourable winds blow, you can happily scale it down to a three-room bungalow without losing face.

Former Kenya president Mwai Kibaki understood this well. He virtually didn’t publicly speak about, or commission, one of the most successful projects of his administration, the Thika Highway. He only showed up to cut the ribbon after it had been completed and in use for some weeks.

Then he invited East African leaders to the commissioning of the Lamu Port South Sudan-Ethiopia Transport (Lapsset) Corridor project. He also went and cut the tape on Kenya’s much-talked about technology hub, Konza City.

Both became giant mirages.

There are exceptions, though. I am told that Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame can be a nightmare when it comes to these things.

After he commissions a project, he will keep calling to check on how much progress has been made, and often speak in a stern, hectoring tone.

Still, the rule remains. When you see a project commissioned by a president in our part of the world accompanied by half the country’s traditional dancers, know that one of three things could happen: Either it won’t get built; or if it’s built it will be beyond budget; or it will not arrive on schedule.

Charles Onyango-Obbo is publisher of data visualiser Africapaedia and Rogue Chiefs. Twitter@cobbo3