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Uganda’s Political Economy

First seminar on Radio Uganda Boston

This is Eric Kashambuzi in New York, United States of America.

Fellow Ugandans at home and abroad, friends and well-wishers welcome to this first seminar on Uganda’s political economy. The seminars will be apolitical.

We thank Radio Uganda Boston for launching this new program of seminars on the interaction between political decisions and economic change and vice versa.

This political economy 101 is primarily designed for the general public. However, professionals are welcome to participate and enrich the debates. During the seminars to be conducted once a month initially we shall show how political decisions affect economic change and vice versa.

I will lead the seminars which are intended to be interactive and in response to popular demand.

We therefore encourage all of you to participate and make your voices heard as we seek a new political economy model suitable for Uganda in the next 50 years and beyond.

The governance formula including merits and demerits of military and civilian governments suitable for Uganda will be part of this discussion. Military regimes or regimes led by military leaders have so far proved unsuitable.

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Has achievement of sound economic fundamentals benefited Uganda?

Although I have written a lot about Uganda’s economy, I continue to get requests from readers to write more and elaborate on issues that remain unclear to some. In doing so there is a risk of repetition. As I have observed before, I am not writing for professional economists but the general public that wish to understand some economic concepts and how they impact on their quality of life. This brings me to the notion of economic growth. In any economy economic growth is necessary but it can have meaning only if it contributes to tackling poverty and improving the standard of living of the population. Thus, economic growth in Uganda or elsewhere is not an end in itself although NRM has treated it as such. As a minimum, growth must meet the basic needs of education, healthcare, food, clothing and housing. So are sound economic fundamentals.

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Has achievement of sound economic fundamentals benefited Uganda?

Although I have written a lot about Uganda’s economy, I continue to get requests from readers to write more and elaborate on issues that remain unclear to some. In doing so there is a risk of repetition. As I have observed before, I am not writing for professional economists but the general public that wish to understand some economic concepts and how they impact on their quality of life. This brings me to the notion of economic growth. In any economy economic growth is necessary but it can have meaning only if it contributes to tackling poverty and improving the standard of living of the population. Thus, economic growth in Uganda or elsewhere is not an end in itself although NRM has treated it as such. As a minimum, growth must meet the basic needs of education, healthcare, food, clothing and housing. So are sound economic fundamentals.

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Immigrants and population growth in Buganda

Uganda’s ‘explosive’ population growth has become the single most important development challenge to date. It has been reported in major newspapers in Uganda and at international conferences. Seminars have been conducted on the subject and more are planned. The population topic has attracted people from many disciplines, many of them with insufficient knowledge, experience or data to handle the subject professionally.

The causes of Uganda’s problems – poverty, unemployment, environmental degradation, crime, violence, food insecurity, urban congestion and slums, poor quality education and health care, lack of adequate savings and investments etc – are being blamed largely on Uganda’s high fertility rate. Development partners and experts are increasingly concerned about the future of Uganda if the fertility rate is not checked. One reporter in Observer magazine (Uganda) of August 8, 2010 suggested that “Uganda must start aggressively [using force] promoting and funding family planning services” reminiscent of what happened in India and China. Some readers have supported the suggestion without indicating how it should be done and on what groups.

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Corruption, poverty and the 1848 French Revolution

Lessons for Uganda

King Charles X was overthrown in large part because he wanted to reintroduce the ‘divine right of French kings’, indemnify French nobles at state expense for property lost in the 1789 Revolution and impose press censorship. On July 26, 1830 Charles attempted to remove the legislature and to abolish all freedoms to discuss royal authority. The king had become too much even for the poor, tired and revolutionary-weary Frenchmen. He had to go. For three days – July 27, 28, and 29, 1830 – the French people rose up and served notice that the royal services of Charles X were no longer required. He abdicated and departed for England on July 30.

Democracy became the buzz word in France. The middle class that had long complained about the abuses of political power by the aristocracy felt that its moment had come to take charge of France’s public affairs. In the discussions that ensued, some French wanted a republic, others a monarchy. In the end they opted for a restricted monarchy and Louis Philippe, a member of the Orlean’s family and cousin to the Bourbons became the “Citizen King” or “The July Monarch” (G. Roche 1993).

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Demystifying Bahima’s origin, race and civilization

Bahima’s history has been shrouded in mystery for a long time. The mystery stems from John Hanning Speke who wrote in 1863 that Wahuma (Bahima) were white people, more civilized than black people or Negroes and entered Uganda from Ethiopia occupied by a ruling white race. Other Europeans added that Bahima were more intelligent with superior qualities and born to rule. Colonial explorers, missionaries and administrators like Samuel Baker, John Roscoe and Harry Johnston in Uganda shared these views (G. Prunier 1995).

Because of racial prejudices against blacks or Negroes Europeans concluded that the civilizations they found in Uganda were developed by white people. They gave credit to Bahima simply because they resemble whites physically such as sharp, narrow, pointed and long noses. Bahima have hidden their true history of precarious nomadic life and absence of material wealth to take advantage of these attributes so that they continue to dominate other Ugandans. Before attempting to demystify the myth let us understand this:

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Why patriotic Congolese have misgivings about decentralization

The Congolese people that want to keep the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) as one country have expressed misgivings about the idea of decentralization. While they are not totally against decentralization as such, they reason that decentralization presupposes the existence of a strong central state with viable institutions. In any state a certain amount of centralization is essential for the effective functioning of a large entity, be it a corporation or a state. On the other hand, over-centralization produces undesirable outcomes such as inefficiency and red tape. When this occurs decentralization is recommended in which minor decisions are made on lower levels of administration.

Since its creation as a state in 1885 in the wake of the Berlin Conference on the partition of Africa among European countries without waging war against one another, no efforts were made neither by king Leopold II who owned Congo Free State as a private property until 1907, nor by the Belgian government that assumed colonial responsibility for Congo from 1908 to 1960 when the country became independent as the Democratic Republic of the Congo, nor since independence as Zaire and now again as DRC since 1997.

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