What John Maynard Keynes wrote is that when a country is experiencing serious economic difficulties including unemployment the state should step in and increase spending to stimulate the economy, reduce unemployment which in turn create effective demand for goods and services and ultimately pull the economy out of the recession. Keynes advice was well received by politicians because it helped them deal with economic and social challenges that would have created political problems for them at the next elections. Governments have used Keynesian advice and it contributed significantly in tackling the economic depression of the 1930s and after WWII. Since the recession that began in 2007, governments around the world have intervened in national economies with stimulus packages.
In view of the deteriorating economic, social and ecological conditions in Uganda one would have expected the NRM government to fully embrace the Keynesian model and actively intervene in the economy especially as the country is preparing for multi-party elections early in 2011. As noted in a separate article the introduction of the five year development plan in April 2010 did not signal government determination to intervene in the economy. It appears this was a political game to hoodwink voters after which the plan will gather dust in the ministry of finance, planning and economic development.
Many questions have been raised as to why the NRM government is reluctant to intervene in the economy. There is a feeling in some Uganda quarters that NRM has calculated that by keeping Ugandans unemployed, hungry, poor, disorganized and dependent on government patronage chances of NRM doing well politically are better. Normally, it is middle income societies that demand their political, civil, cultural and development rights. So the absence of the middle class means the absence of voices demanding their rights which could be politically destabilizing and against the interests of the ruling NRM party.
I have conducted research in my home district of Rukungiri in southwest Uganda which is one of the poorest in the country. I found out that one of the reasons they would like elections to be conducted regularly is because the politicians give them some free things like sugar, salt, soap, local alcohol etc during political campaigns. These voters do not care about the party’s election agenda for the next five years. Therefore the party or candidate that has a lot of money will literally buy votes of the poor people who constitute a big voting bloc. Since the ruling NRM party has more money and institutional machinery than any other party to reach the poor voters, it has a better chance of doing well at the polls than the opposition parties. Also during the campaigns some youth are employed temporarily with a promise that when the party wins they will get regular jobs. These youths are used to harass the opposition candidates and their supporters.
For public consumption domestically and internationally, President Museveni recently stated that in Uganda there are enough jobs in the police and army and anyone who is unemployed should apply. He was sending a message that those who are unemployed have chosen to be so voluntarily. The President has stated on many other occasions that the unemployed in Uganda are the lazy ones. Therefore the government should not be blamed for not caring about unemployed Ugandans. Those who are aware of Uganda’s economic situation surely do not agree with the president’s view.
If the Rukungiri finding is applicable to other districts, (and I would urge Ugandans to check in their respective constituencies to see whether poor voters and unemployed youth behave the same way as those in Rukungiri), then one can conclude that by keeping Ugandans unemployed, poor, marginalized and politically vulnerable the NRM government and party score better politically than if they had intervened in the economy, created jobs and empowered voters who in turn would demand their rights including free and fair elections. This then would explain why the NRM government has neglected John Maynard Keynes development model of state intervention in national economies during hard times which has been readily accepted by other governments.