By Daniel Bakalangude. mulungidaniels@gmail.com.
This year’s May 1st International Labour Day celebrations were held at Kololo Independence grounds under the theme: “Mitigating the impact of COVID-19: Enhancing Productive Employment for Improved Livelihoods through the Parish Development Model.”
President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni told workers and employers that the theme highlights the key role of the Parish Development Model in eliminating subsistence agriculture, which accounts for the poverty in 39% of Uganda’s households. “Subsistence agriculture is unproductive because it holds people in working for the stomach only – “ekida kyonka”.
Mr Museveni said the Parish Development Model is aimed at producing for the market, adding that it would enhance job creation, increase production, improve incomes and speed the vision of transforming Uganda from a peasant to a modern, industrial and prosperous society by 2040.
He said:” Government will support a SACCO in each of the 10,595 parishes in the country with Ushs 100m, putting emphasis on the rural areas engaged in agriculture.
The President said under the arrangement members can borrow from the parish SACCO to support their productive and income-generating activities.
“This will create a pool of funds near the households – at each parish
in Uganda. It will solve the problem of limited access to credit for the
households and increase production of agricultural commodities for the domestic and export market.
Mr Museveni said Uganda’s exports will need access to bigger markets at the regional
and continental level, but added that is why economic integration of Africa’s market of 1.2 billion is important, and that barriers on the free movement of goods and people must be removed.
The Ugandan leader said the East African Community, which started with three countries namely Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania), has since been joined by Rwanda,
Burundi, South Sudan and most recently, the Democratic Republic
of Congo.
“The joining of DRC has increased the East African Community Market from 177 million people to 270 million People. It will further strengthen collaboration with our brothers and sisters in Congo,” .said Mr Museveni.
He said:” the DRC is one of Uganda’s strategic trade partners. Uganda earned close to US$418 million in trade with the DRC, despite the poor road network and insecurity in Eastern Congo.”
Museveni, who has been in power since January 26, 1986, said in order to increase the volume of trade between Uganda and the DRC, Uganda has embarked on the construction of the regional connectivity roads in DRC that include Mpondwe and Beni (80km); ) Bunagana to Goma (89km) and Beni to Butembo (54km).
The President said the quality of Uganda’s labour force has improved and that the earlier interventions in health and education have improved Uganda’s human development indices.
He said the NRM Government has put in place the necessary economic and social infrastructure to ensure labour productivity and that the patriotic fighters of the NRA have enabled Ugandans to enjoy unprecedented peace, stability and security.
Electricity generation has increased ten-fold from 150MW in Financial year 198619/87 to 1,250MW in 2020. The generation capacity is expected
to increase from the current 1250MW to 2000MW by the end of this year.
Mr Museveni said in order to ensure power remains cheap, especially for industrial consumers, electricity to Industrial Parks like Namanve must be delivered direct without going through third parties, that normally increase the cost of power.
But Workers were disappointed that the President did not give them a befitting Labour Day message. Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta announced a 12% salary increment while Tanzanian President Ms Samia Suluhu raised salaries by 23$.
President Museveni instead told workers that if they found bread to be expensive beyond their reach they could eat cassava ■
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The Author is a Journalist, Social Critic and Human Rights Activist
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