Tag Archives: media

Uganda’s development needs a different approach

There are things that we shall keep in the media until solutions are found. One of the senior officials at the United Nations in New York replied to a question that conferences on the same subjects will continue to be organized until solutions are found. I agreed with him then, I agree with him now. And that is what I intend to do with Uganda until solutions to the questions raised are found. Ugandans and other readers are urged to make constructive comments on what we write in order to reorient Uganda’s development path. The purpose of development is to end poverty. Economic growth rates while necessary are meaningless unless they lead to poverty reduction. Poverty can only end by addressing dimensions that create it: illiteracy, disease, poor diet, poor housing and clothing, low productivity and value addition etc. Buildings, referenda and constitutions are necessary but not sufficient. Pass or fail depends on how much poverty has been reduced. You may have sufficient revenue and skilled people and yet fail to reduce poverty because of the way resources are used. Why has Uganda with adequate resources and skilled human power failed to address these dimensions that have kept over fifty percent of Ugandans absolutely poor? Here are the principle reasons.

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Donors have no basis to continue praising Uganda as a success story

Since the 1990s, Uganda under the leadership of President Museveni has been described by donors, foreign media and the United Nations as a ‘success story’ and a Washington Consensus ‘star performer’. When the National Resistance Movement (NRM) government came to power in 1986, Uganda had suffered fifteen years of political instability and economic collapse. There was excess capacity of idle labor, land and industries. The latter were performing at twenty percent of installed capacity. What Uganda needed was political stability and some foreign currency with which to import spare parts and inputs like hoes to rehabilitate the economy.

The government restored security in the southern half of the country and development partners provided funds after an agreement was signed with the International Monetary Fund in May 1987 making Uganda a ‘shock therapist’. With the blessing of good weather, excess capacity, resilient and hardworking people, the economy recorded rapid growth reaching 10 percent in mid-1990s albeit from a low base, inflation was tamed by reducing money in circulation, raising interest rates, balancing the budget largely by dismissing civil servants, introducing fees, eliminating some schools or classes and reducing teachers, charging fees for health services and reducing or eliminating subsidies. Because of these reforms, Uganda became a star performer and a successful ‘adjusting’ country.

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