Museveni warns sleepy ministers

President Museveni yesterday lashed out at under-performing ministers, who according to him, are sleepy and are the reason Uganda and Africa are underdeveloped.

Mr Museveni made the remarks while unveiling a $30m (about Shs110 billion) Industrial Skills Training and Production Centre in Uganda at KIBP in Namanve, Mukono District.

The President said the reason why most ministers may be failing on their charged mandate is because they are not sure of their responsibilities and therefore are dragging development and progress.
“Why should you be in government when you don’t understand it, why don’t you stay in your own house and mismanage your own home at least? But you say ‘I am a minister’, something I don’t understand,” Mr Museveni said.

He said such leaders attend to other things rather than delivering on their responsibilities.
“They (leaders) go to do what should not be done and they do other things and there are no results. This has been the problem in Africa,” Mr Museveni said.
“So you Africans have slept enough. You should wake up. I am very happy they (Chinese) have come and they have helped you wake up and you should use this facility very well,” he added.

He also lauded the Japanese government for their support for development projects in Uganda.
The said centre will, among other things, serve as a training, skilling and education centre and also industrial machinery purposed to grow and boost industrialisation, thus being the first of this kind in Uganda.

The State minister for Investment and Privatisation, Ms Evelyn Anite, said the government had not only done right by getting the grant from the Chinese people but that the government had invested heavily in the project.
“It (the grant) is enormous but the return on investment is also humongous. We must create jobs because it is urgent. We gave this plant 15 acres of land. We have invested in this by giving land and the security for the construction of the factory,” Ms Anite said.
“We think that we will be able to realise the thousands of jobs we want to realise for our youth. Just in Namanve, we are talking of 200,000 jobs for graduates and non-graduates,” she added.

Concept

The concept for the Industrial skills training and production Centre was written and advanced by the executive director of the Uganda Industrial Research Institute (UIRI), Prof Charles Kwesiga in August 2012.
It was later approved and ground-breaking for the said structure was done on January 26, 2018 and it was then completed in December last year.

The centre was then handed over the Chinese government, the constructors of the centre, handed over the facility to the government of Uganda on January 15, 2020.
The facility was then officially launched by President Museveni yesterday at the Kampala Industrial Business Park, (KIBP), Namanve.

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