Why we have to address our third position in the EAC stakes

There has been an interesting pause for reflection in recent weeks on the state and performance of the Ugandan economy. There is a lot to work with already in the public domain. 

The young population believes the game is rigged against them. After a dip in emigration in the last decade, flights are full of formal labour exports to the western world, the middle east, and the south. 

One of the unstated segments of this industry are the armies of contractors Uganda sent to service the US and allied war efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan. While the nkuba kyeyo population is dominated by young and [now even older workers] from Central Uganda, the war effort cast a wider net. 

By some estimates up to 500,000 Ugandans joined this effort, mostly as guards but some operated gunners and other equipment.

Interestingly, many served more than one deployment. The same applies to domestic servants who serve fixed term contracts return home then process fresh visas.

Some countries wary of distorting their local population demographics limit tours to two in a five-year period. But these are soon replaced by demand from other manpower poor countries, the European Union. Young graduates are now being hired by UK firms on similar terms to fill gaps in these markets.

In short, in the battle of minds and legs, the economy is shedding its most valuable human resource. The 2024/2025 budget cycle has now also brought to the fore, another economic discussion. Who will be able to remain on the land? 

Long treated as a redundant resource even though Uganda is mineral rich, has excellent climate but has only done a fraction of the work to turn it into a mineral processor, or viable tourist destination.

It is interesting to note that the big human resource trained by our tourism programs is now heading to Tanzania to invest and work, hampered by persistent low bookings. Many hotel establishments operate to launder money or park “redundant cash”. 

The traders are unhappy. Pushed to the fringes of retail, they are resisting high rents, high taxes exacerbated by and high costs of doing business.

Our young people are highly skilled, artisans, we have; creative arts we have. It is not an accident that the most coveted political constituency now for both government and the opposition are the performers. What the State has failed to supply is reasonable infrastructure and opportunities to grow these talents. 

You have to cross to Tanzania, a recent middle-income country to understand this. High grade performance, tons of content even though Tanzania only had nationwide television broadcasting outside Tanzania on air in 1999.

In the current term, the government seems to have learnt a thing or two from wanton use of violence, and the kiboko squad is no more. But the damage from violent elections will take generations to erase. 

The People’s President, a two-hour film documenting the excesses of the Ugandan state in the 2021 elections, made it to the Oscars. I sat down in a living room somewhere in the United States. My host who turned 50 on Monday asked me to watch it, while he went to work at Google. I asked that we watch it together.

At the end of the film, he asked me, that’s how my father died in 1981. His mother lives in Uganda, but his two brothers emigrated to the UK. One, a half brother is now dead a victim of the London inner city. In recent years we have buried his grandfather, an insurance mogul, whose empire long collapsed ago. 

These are the questions we should be asking each other, when will Ugandans own the state they live in. A discussion about less exports of capital. A discussion about how much less to extort from Ugandans in taxes. 

Lastly, a discussion about how to bring everyone to the table, how do you tax my three cows, and I have enough left to feed them and buy medicine for them?  If we fail to have these discussions we shall perish as a nation. We are running in a distant third to our neighbours, Uganda and Kenya. Third grade doesn’t cut it.

Mr Ssemogerere is an Attorney-At-Law and an Advocate. 
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