Museveni: We are going to have showdown with “criminals” opposing UCDA rationalization

GOMBA, UGANDA | THE INDEPENDENT | President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni has said he is ready to have a showdown with people opposing the rationalization of the Uganda Coffee Development Authority-UCDA.

Speaking to Members of Parliament who belong to his ruling National Resistance Movement at his Kisozi farm, Museveni said his government has been working on defeating poverty in the country and he is not prepared to have anyone distract him.

“We are going to have a showdown; they are liars and criminals playing with fire. They will not like the counterattack,” Museveni said.

The President has spent this week writing missives explaining why his government was rationalizing government agencies and authorities. He said the government has been spending more money on them than it does to ministries yet the latter employs more people than the former. Several stakeholders including Members of Parliament mainly from the coffee-producing areas have vehemently opposed taking UCDA back to the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries-MAAIF.

They argue that doing so is going to negatively affect the budding coffee industry. But Museveni insists that Operation Wealth Creation headed by his brother Gen. Salim Saleh has done more work than the Uganda Coffee Development Authority, Diary Development Authority, Cotton Development Organization, and National Agricultural Advisory Services combined. For all four organizations, the President wants them to go back to MAAIF.

Museveni told the Caucus that since coming to power in 1986, his government has been working for the socio-economic transformation of Ugandans. “A country like Uganda is very rich, it has got a lot of national resources but the problem is that the population does not know how to use the national resources to live a good way; the modern way and that’s why we have been advising them that they need to move on two fronts. Number one, free education for all and number two, wealth creation for all,” he said.

Museveni explained that to achieve the desired socio-economic transformation, Ugandans need to get involved in the money economy through the four sectors of the economy which include, commercial agriculture, manufacturing, services and ICT. “Now if you go into one of those you join the money economy because part of the problem of Uganda here was that the majority of the people were outside the money economy, they were just working for food,” Museveni said. “We have been educating Ugandans about commercial agriculture with ekibalo. In this case, we insist that separate intensive agriculture where you go for the high-value enterprises from extensive agriculture where you get little money per acre but because you have done it on a big scale, you will end up getting good money.”

Museveni also revealed that through the government, he has been able to successfully preach the wealth creation gospel to many parts of the country like the cattle corridor. “In the cattle corridor we have done a good job, people have joined dairy farming but where we are now, many parts are mainly crop areas and this is where we have been fighting to get this concept of intensive agriculture where people with small land can get out of poverty. When I came here, of course, there were a lot of contradictory messages but eventually people listened to what I was telling them,” Museveni said.

The meeting was also attended by people the president considers successful farmers who have heeded his wealth creation call. Among them is Sarah Nalwanga, the coordinator of the Presidential poverty alleviation program in the Gomba and Sembabule districts. She informed the MPs that the President started the project in 2011 where he preached wealth creation through commercial agriculture. “People here had land but had nothing to eat since they did not know how to utilize their land. Since 2011, we have been giving out crop inputs, goats, poultry, dairy cows, coffee seedlings and banana tissues. I thank our farmers for following [the]advice on wealth creation,” she said.

Nalwanga also noted that in the nine villages of Gomba and Sembabule, so far over 1,800 households have benefited with 769 in coffee growing, 556 in dairy farming, 336 in goat rearing, and others in other enterprises. Earlier, the legislators and government officials had a field tour of several farms of successful wealth creators.

The field tour was led by Vice President Jessica Alupo and also attended by members of the NRM top organ, various ministers, and a delegation led by EALA Speaker Joseph Ntakirutimana who said that they were visiting as part of an oversight effort, aiming to learn from the President’s good farm practices and the experiences of local farmers.

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