MUSEVENI: Uganda is ready for takeoff

You have heard the Americans talking of four dimensional superiority which means being superior on land, in the air, at sea and in space.  Some countries have started space Armies.  How can Africa, for the second time in this Millennium, watch while other countries are building great strength to our disadvantage?  My appeal to the NRM Members, the other Ugandans and the other East Africans, is to scrutinize this point and we move.

• Once we grasp that the NRM insists on Patriotism to deal with our prosperity and Pan-Africanism to deal with both prosperity and the strategic security of Africa, we cannot forget to remember that that prosperity will not come, until our society undergoes social-economic transformation as alluded to earlier.  How will this come about?  It will come about as a consequence of everybody going to school, having good health and entering the money economy by the masses invading the enclave economy and entering the four sectors for wealth and for jobs.  The four sectors are:  commercial agriculture with ekibaro, away from the ancient culture of a non-money economy of okukolera ekida kyoonka, tic me ic keken; Industries, big and small – based on agro processing, minerals beneficiation, marine resources Industries, Forest products Industries and the new capacity of knowledge-based Industries of medicine, vaccines, motor vehicles fabrication etc.; services sector; and ICT.

Since 1986, the economy has recovered and expanded.  The colonial enclave has been restored after the destruction by Idi Amin.  Coffee production is now 7million bags; tea has surpassed, the 1970 level of 18 million kgs – it is now 60 million kgs; sugar production is now 540,000 metric tonnes; cement production is now 8 million metric tonnes; steel production is 600,000 metric tonnes; beer production now stands at 647,123,215 litres; soft drinks production stands at 1,174,793,583 litres; the textiles now stand at 20 million metres; etc., etc.  These are, mainly, industries that had collapsed during Amin’s time and subsequent chaotic times.  However, there are some Industries that are totally new such as the ones making matresses, the milk industry, the motor-cycle tyres, the leather Industry, the medicines Industry, the vaccines Industry, the fisheries, the sanitizers, the furniture, the motor fabrication, etc., etc.  It is important that we note the emergence of the knowledge economy-based on human intellect and skills and not based on agriculture or minerals (natural resources) directly.

The most inclusive effort we are making to change the structure of the Society, is abolishing the culture of subsistence farming.  In addition to the programmes of Wealth creation (OWC), Women Fund, Youth Fund etc., we have launched the Myooga Funding which creates capitalization arrangements for specialized areas – metal fabrication, wood-work, ceramics, hospitality, Leaders SACCO, etc.  This Fund will be Constituency – based – the all Constituency SACCO per activity, while the producers are organized at the Parish level.

The Manifesto details the achievements and the future plans. Here, having given this background, I will only conclude with two categories of points.  Category one, is why and how we were able to repair the economy.  The second category are the mass issues that we are continuing to address.

With category one, our recovery was and is quite organic – one thing leading to another.

• We started with sorting out the ideology of the management of society.  What was more important identity or interests (okukyenuura)?  The old politics was emphasizing identity – religion, tribes and gender – male chauvinism.  By rejecting sectarianism, the politics of identity, we have been able to unite more Ugandans.  That is why we get 60% to 76% votes in all the previous general elections.  The people are more united.  This has brought peace in politics in spite of some opportunists trying to create conflicts; it has created harmony among the communities.

• This political harmony, was re-inforced by a

good and strong Army that had been built on these correct ideological principles.  That Army has been able to guarantee peace throughout Uganda for the first time in 500 years.

• These two have helped the rich people that had run away to come back and new ones have been attracted.

• In so doing, the rich people have produced goods and services, thereby resolving the problem of shortages that had caused so much misery to our people.

• The rich people have also created jobs for 700,000 of our people in industries, 1,300,000 in services and 15,485 in ICT.

• Those rich people also helped us with the raising of taxes.  The goods and services they generated, are taxable.  Hence, while our tax collection in 1986 was only Ugx. 5bn per year, our taxes today stand at Ugx. 21,000 bn, this is 4,200 times bigger than 1986.

• With this money, we are able to support defence, health, Education, infrastructure and support the Wealth Funds (OWC), Women Fund, Youth Fund, Emyooga, etc.

Hence, Uganda is now unstoppable.  Even without including the Oil in the kibaro, Uganda is on the verge of becoming a middle income country.  Our GDP per capita now is US$ 910.  If it was not for Covid, it would have been US$ 920.  To become a lower middle income country, you need US$ 1,039 per capita.  With this enhanced tax collection, even though we are still collecting 12% of GDP in tax while others go up to 18%, we shall solve even the question of poverty among the 19% of our people still below the poverty line and also the problem of the 68% of our homesteads that are still working for ekida kyoonka – tic me ic keken (subsistence farming).  The only problem we have, which we are already correcting, is engabula (distributing the food).  We must poko marom (distribute fairly) and not poko-guna (distributing bringing to yourself).  We must increase the money for the wealth Funds before we spend money on administrative costs and salaries.  This proper kugabula, apart from addressing defence, infrastructure, health, Education, paying Government Scientists well, through the Wealth Funds, it will help us to fully monetize and modernize our economy by eliminating the bakolera ekida kyoonka and convert all of them into commercial actors.

The second category, the residual mass issues, are, of course, topped by the issue of the Abakolera ekida kyoonka which we have exhaustively discussed in the preceding pages.

Then the Manifesto brings us the issue of school fees.  My concept of free education in Primary and Secondary Schools, has never been accepted by the Local elite.  They keep bringing back school charges, claiming that parents must also contribute.  The question is:  “can they afford?”  If they cannot, afford, then what happens?  Who loses?  It is the Country.  The children in the Primary schools are 10,766,994 million. Why is it that the students in the Secondary Schools are only 2 million?  The ones in Tertiary Colleges are 314,518.  Where did the others go?  They are back in the Villages.  Therefore, the U.Shs 1.2 trillion we are spending on UPE and the U.Shs. 754.5bn we are spending on USE is not providing free education.  It is providing subsidized education for those who can top up.  This issue must be resolved with the advice of the Village Assemblies.  If many parents cannot afford, it must be free education and not subsidized education.

The issue of land evictions from mailo-land and even from Public land.  Anybody who evicts a lawful tenant admitted to the land by either the owner or his agent, the bona fide occupant that was on that land by 1983 or before, the ones who bought or inherited from the two above or being evicted from a customary kibanja on public land for any reason other than the non-payment of the nominal rent, commits a nullity.  We do not accept that unfairness.  The Manifesto gives quite a bit of attention to this and proposes measures, including the cancellation of such titles.  The solution is to resolve this historical distortion by putting aside good money, paying off the landlords and giving ownership to the bibanja people.  I have done this in Ankole in the areas of Ishaka, Kashaari, Isingiro, Kakigaane (Rwampara) and the Kirema area in Nakaseke.  All the political leaders should defend the tenants on this.  I want to salute the Hon. Judith Nabakooba for fighting for the people of Wabinyira, Serinya, etc.

There is the issue of the environment of people cultivating without contouring on hillsides, cultivating on the River Banks, cultivating on Lake shores, cutting forests, etc.  Although we have never used rough methods, I want to advise our People to observe all these environmental issues.  We shall enforce these laws with dialogue and understanding.

Finally, the tarmac roads, from corner to corner of the Country, have been constructed.  However, there is now a problem of the murram roads in the rural areas, especially in the rainy season.  Yet, we have first class road equipment that we bought from Japan.  All they need is adequate fuel.  We have provided Ugx. 146bn to provide this fuel.  Each road must be graded, murramed and compacted.  Such a road will be motorable; even in times of the rainy season, the roads will remain passable. We, recently, drove on the murram road from Pacilo,through the factory area, crossed River Unyama, drove though the sugar-cane plantations, all the way to River Aswa.  This was a distance of 15.1kms.  We had a long convoy of vehicles, but nobody’s vehicle got stuck. Yet, it was at the height of flooding.  Therefore, the rural roads are maintainable.  We need to budget properly.

Uganda is ready for takeoff.

Monday, November 2, 2020