THE LAST WORD: By Andrew Mwenda Why East African governments need to involve local firms in big infrastructure projects The East African nations of Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania and Rwanda are involved in massive investments in infrastructure. They are contracting companies to build roads, railways, bridges, airports, seaports, dams, electricity lines, …

  THE LAST WORD: Andrew Mwenda The postcolonial state needs to transform not replicate existing social arrangements Lately, I have been thinking about the postcolonial state inAfrica, and this column reflects these growing thoughts. Why do our states and their political leaders fail to do the things we expect of …

 Danger of expecting leaders of poor African countries to govern like the rich Imagine a romantic relationship between a poor young guy and a demanding girlfriend. They live in a community with former school and classmates all of whom are rich kids living in posh neighborhoods, driving fancy cars, wearing …

THE LAST WORD: By Andrew M. Mwenda Why U.S. resistance to the proposed ban on second hand clothes is a danger to our future prosperity On August 17, Daily Monitor published an article titled “US envoy warns on ban of second hand clothes.”  The U.S. Ambassador to Uganda, Deborah Malac, …

THE LAST WORD: By Andrew M.Mwenda How do you govern a country that has average public spending per capita of $450 annually in Purchasing Power Parity (PPP)? Is it possible to govern it using the same strategies as a country whose public spending is $22,000 per person annually? Yet all …

On March 31 2016, the total value of all loans in Uganda’s commercial banking industry was Shs21.7 trillion of which Shs528 billion were non-performing loans (or “bad loans”) i.e. 2.64% of the total. Under the effective oversight of Bank of Uganda, especially its director for supervision; Justine Bagyenda (known in …

How corruption has disabled mechanisms through which the business community can fight for better tax laws THE LAST WORD: By Andrew M. Mwenda Uganda’s ratio of taxes to Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has remained almost stagnant for 19 years. In 1997, it was 11%. Since then it has risen to …

Slavery in America may have ended but the US state has reproduced it through mass incarceration of blacks and police violence in poor black communities due to its hidden economic gains  THE LAST WORD: By Andrew M. Mwenda Recent events in the United States; where police shot and killed two …

Why our country remains poor with high unemployment in spite of 28 years of huge expansion in GDP Last week, I spent an entire day at Uganda Bureau of Statistics crunching numbers with the staff on our GPD growth between 1986 and 2014. There is only one route for nations …

Why the story of Rwanda’s economic success keeps being juxtaposed with human rights abuses Last week I was in Kigali, Rwanda, after only two weeks of absence. Driving from the airport to the city, I found two new roundabouts near the new Convention Center complex. On my right was a …