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President Museveni Issues A 3rd Statement On Rationalization Of Government Agencies And Authorities

President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni has issued a 3rd Statement on Rationalisation of Government Agencies and Authorities.

In order to conclude the debate on the rationalization of the parasitic Agencies and Authorities, let us remember the following core points:

  1. Rationalization means doing away with the irrationalities and only doing things that are rational and wastage eradication.
  2. In order to do that, remember the difference between the narrow colonial and neo-colonial enclave economy of Uganda of the 3Cs and 3Ts (coffee, cotton, copper, tea, tobacco and Tourism) and the broad- based, vertically and horizontally integrated economy of Uganda under the NRM that aims at covering the whole spectrum of Uganda’s huge potential.

When it comes to Agriculture, this broad spectrum NRM led economy, will not confine itself to coffee, cotton, tea and tobacco. The NRM will and is, indeed, already promoting the following cash agricultural products:

Coffee,Tobacco, Bananas, Maize, Fruits, Cocoa, Cassava, Irish Potatoes, Sorghum, sweet Potatoes, Oil seeds, Palm Oil, Millet, Upland Rice, Sugarcane, Vegtables, onions, Beans, Peas, Cashew nuts, Macademia, Dairy Cattle, Beef Cattle, Poultry, Piggery, Goats and sheep, Fisheries, Flowers, Avocadoes, Tea and Cotton.

We are already producing all these at different scales. This is what has enabled us to weather the storm of the economic collapse in the World caused by the Corona Pandemic and the War in Ukraine.

Indeed, our inflation rate, at 3% or less, is among the lowest in the World. While other People in the World are rioting for no food or high food prices, our problem here is low food prices. Why? It is because of this broad – spectrum capacity of Uganda that we, the indigenous freedom fighters of this area, recognized from the beginning.

In our early writings, we pointed out that products like coffee, tea, tobacco, cocoa, etc. are useful businesswise globally, but they are not foods (emere). They are stimulants. Can you survive on stimulants for a month? That is why I always praise Vicky Sekitoleko who shared my vision and we promoted maize, beans, milk etc., together. We had a deal for beans with Cuba, which, even today, should be pursued to help our Cuban brothers and sisters.

We tarmacked Mityana- Mubende Road with barter trade with the Yugoslavs using soya beans. If Uganda has this broad- spectrum capacity, should we, then, have an Agency or Authority for each activity- 30 or so? Remember, agencies have none technical elements: – board members, CEO, Personal Secretaries, human resource, etc. That is why we say that rationally, on the issue of regulation, quality and safety, there are two ways.

Way number one, is for the technical People (Scientists) dealing with quality, safety, to be grouped in a standards Department of the Ministry with, probably, each activity having a desk or a sub-unit. In this way, you will have safety and quality control, without the baggage of Board members and the other Army of administrators.

The second way, could be, after careful study, to have an Omni-bus Food and Drug Authority for all the ingestible.  At the worst, you could look at an Authority for all Foods and Beverages and a separate one for drugs. Then the Country would end up with 3 quality control Authorities: UNBS for Industrial Products; One for Foods and Beverages; and one for drugs for humans, livestock and crops.

  • In order to achieve the NRM target of socio- economic transformation, we insist on the mass- line as opposed to the parasitic elite line of colonialism and neo- colonialism. It is clear that groups like NAADS, UCDA, DDA, etc. are incapable of understanding the mass-line of prosperity for all. That is why they failed until I had to bring in OWC, which also started developing problems and we are now using PDM, Emyooga, the ghetto youth projects, State House interventions, etc.

It is, therefore, criminal for these Agencies to interfere with our mandate as the elected leaders of the Country to propose adjustments to achieve the goals of socio-economic transformation.

My social-media lady, Precious Kamwine, told me of one person who wondered why, as a supervisor, I had allowed NAADS to fail. Indeed, as the ultimate supervisor, after the Saleh study of 2017, I saw that we had to do away with the Agencies. That is what supervisors do. You determine what works when.

  • It is wrong to say that the Ministries cannot perform. Coming to crops and livestock, the following are the tasks:
  • Developing the seeds and breeding stock where the Research Institutions are doing a good job; hence, the good seeds and breeding stock we have.
  • Seed multiplication is a function the private sector, the religious groups, Government Farms can do.
  • Extension work will be done because the Government Scientists are now better paid and are increasing in number up to the sub-county. I have heard of the treachery by some of these Government Scientists who are saying that now that they have good pay, they are going to go for early retirement. Down with the traitors. Anybody who asks for early retirement, will not get that improved package. Shame on all of them.

I fought to improve your pay so that you work for your People in your field and not to facilitate your desertion and betrayal. If you want to retire, you will go with your old miserable pay and we shall employ younger People that are ready to work full term.

  • On the side of regulation, it is more correct to use the Departmental structure because it is country-wide and will cover all the crops, unlike UCDA that deals with only coffee or DDA that only deals with milk. It is true that there was negligence on tea and vanilla by the concerned People, but also by the processors.

BAT used to regulate the number of tobacco growers because they knew the limited market. The same should have been done for vanilla. I am relieved to know that the demand for tea is still big and that the only problem is the agro-practices including not using fertilisers. All said and done, it is better to have a good formula and work to implement it rather than having a defective formula.

The activity-specific Agencies that we have  been having in a broad spectrum economy, is a defective formula and not serious. The ministries and Departments have a wider structure to handle production in an integrated way: seeds and breeding stock development; seeds and breeding stocks multiplication; regulation; diseases and pests control; value addition, etc., etc.

Who defeated the cassava mosaic? Who defeated kajuunde (the banana wilt)? Who defeated the coffee wilt? Who has been defeating the livestock diseases like CBPP? It is that Ministry. That is how agricultural production has expanded greatly. They have mistakes but they are doing good work and they will be made to improve.

  • Finally, the scandal of the money spent on these Agencies. By 2016/2017 these Agencies were taking Ug.sh. 2.2trillion. This was almost equal to what the Ministries were getting which was Ug.sh. 2.6 trillion.
  • Some of the breeding is done by us the citizens. Who reared the Ankole cattle that are a global hit? It is us. One of President Rwamaphosa’s Ankole bulls went for Ug.sh. 370 million (USD 100,000).

End this circus.

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