President Yoweri Museveni marked Uganda’s 62nd Independence Day anniversary in Busia, reflecting on the country’s journey from colonialism to economic growth. In his speech, Museveni emphasized the importance of African economic and political integration for prosperity and strategic security.
In 1962, only 9% of Ugandan homesteads were in the money economy, resulting in widespread poverty, poor housing, and limited access to education and healthcare. The politics of identity and tribalism led to instability and the Idi Amin coup in 1971. However, Museveni’s National Resistance Movement has worked to revive the economy through various phases, including minimum economic recovery, expanding the money economy, diversifying the economy, adding value to raw materials and promoting industrialization, and entering the knowledge economy.
Under Museveni’s leadership, Uganda has increased coffee production from 2 million to 9 million bags, boosted tea production from 3 million to 60 million kilograms, grown tourism revenue from $17.89 million to $1.510 billion, diversified exports including maize, milk, and cassava, and promoted industrialization and knowledge economy sectors like automobiles and pharmaceuticals.
Museveni announced plans to develop a Standard Gauge Railway to reduce transport costs, increase funding for government programs like PDM, Emyooga, and Grow, and promote economic integration through the East African Federation.
The President urged Ugandans to take advantage of government programs and join the money economy, emphasizing that development, wealth creation, and job creation are key to the country’s prosperity. He also stressed the importance of African integration, warning that without it, Africa risks stagnation and misery similar to Latin America.
The event was attended by visitors from the Central African Republic, Republic of Liberia, and the Republic of Kenya, highlighting the importance of regional cooperation.
SPEECH BY H.E YOWERI KAGUTA MUSEVENI PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF UGANDA
AT TH 62 ND INDEPENDENCE DAY
9 TH OCTOBER 2024
THE THREE HISTORICAL MISSIONS, THE 4
IDEOLOGICAL PRINCIPLES AND THE FIVE
PHASES OF RECOVERY AND ADVANCEMENT.
Your Excellencies the Visiting Heads of State,
Her Excellency the Vice-President and all the other State and political leaders of Uganda,
Their Excellencies the leaders of the visiting delegations.
Their Highnesses the Cultural leaders,
Their Lordships the Religious leaders,
The members of the Diplomatic Corp,
The Wanainchi of Uganda.
Muriyo mutye? mwebare munno ……………. Salamu
Kwa wote. I congratulate all Ugandans on this the 62nd Anniversary of Uganda’s Independence.
As I have told you many times, at Uganda’s independence, our economy was a typical, Colonial one, characterized by being an enclave (island development wise) economy of 3Cs and 3 Ts, as was being described by the colonialists themselves. The 3Cs Were: Coffee, Cotton and Copper and the 3Ts were: Tobacco, Tea and Tourism. These formed a small island of modernity and money economy, surrounded by a sea of no money, subsistence economic activities, under -development and poverty.
By 1962, only 9% of the homesteads were in the money economy, which means that a whole 91% were outside the money economy. Being outside the money economy meant: poor housing, no education for the Children, no clean water, poor nutrition, poor health and poverty.
On account of the wrong ideology of the politics of identity (tribes, religion, and gender-chauvinism), the country was divided and unstable. This instability caused the constitutional crisis of 1966 and the Idi Amin coup of 1971.When the ignorant Idi Amin came into Government, he expelled one element of our entrepreneurial class, the Asians and by 1986, when the NRM came to power, the small colonial enclave of the 3Cs and 3Ts, had collapsed.
Only coffee and tobacco were still limping on. The whole economy had been informalized into Magendo (smuggling), Kibaanda (foreign currency black market) and Kusamula (speculation). There were acute shortages of the so-called ‘essential commodities”. These were: sugar, salt, paraffin, soap, textiles, human and veterinary drugs, etc. All these were being smuggled into the country because all the factories and all the formal channels of importation, had collapsed.
Fortunately, having been in the resistance struggle since the 1960s, by this time, we had distilled the three historical missions, which we thought were the mission of the African freedom fighters. These were: prosperity, strategic security and using the brotherhood of the African people to achieve the two. The question was and is: ‘Did the Africans need and deserve prosperity and affluence just like other people in some few places in the world were enjoying by that time or not?’’
By 1960, the affluence was only in Western Europe, North America and Japan. The rest of the world was in poverty. Our answer to that question was: ‘yes, the Africans needed and deserved prosperity and affluence, just like those mentioned above had achieved.” Then, the next question was: ‘where, then, does prosperity come from?” ‘can it come from begging from outside?’’ The answer was: ‘’No. Prosperity and affluence can only come from Producing a good or a service with ekibaro (ensuring maximum returns) and selling those items sustainably’’. Then, the next question was: ‘who will buy the goods or the services you produce?’’
This is when our search for prosperity and affluence brought us into collision with the prevailing pseudo-ideology of that time in Uganda and many parts of the world. This was the ideology and the politics of highlighting the importance of identity of tribes, religion and gender -chauvinism. We discovered that in the case of Uganda, people of the same tribe or locality, tend to produce similar products and, therefore, cannot easily buy from one another. Therefore, it was clear that, in the case of Uganda, once a zone produced goods and services, the next assistance to the effort of wealth and affluence creation, would come from other zones of Uganda, most probably other tribes of Uganda, in the form of buying what was produced. That is how Uganda as a country, became very crucial for the wealth creation of the different zones. All the zones (tribes, religions etc.), needed Uganda for their prosperity and affluence. That is how we distilled the 1 Ideological principle of the NRM: Patriotism. Love Uganda. Why? It is because you need it, for your prosperity.
However, soon we discovered that even Uganda was not enough. We needed East Africa and we needed Africa for a bigger market. Hence, our second principle of Pan-Africanism. Love Africa. Why? It is because you need it, for your prosperity. We, then, realized that you cannot produce modern goods and services if you do not promote social-economic transformation from the pre-capitalist modes of social organizations. Hence, our third ideological principle of social-economic transformation.
The final ideological principle we distilled was democracy, so that the people are able to hold their leaders accountable for their actions or inactions.
The second historical mission we distilled, was Strategic security. Can Uganda, acting alone, ensure its strategic Security? Or do we need regional and continental efforts? We have analyzed this issue in different documents and our views on this are well known.
You must be following the developments in the world where some actors are aiming at achieving what they call four -dimensional superiority: Superiority in land forces; Superiority in the air; Superiority at sea; and Superiority in space. Where does that leave Africa? Can Uganda, acting alone, even when it becomes a developed country, be present decisively in these 4 dimensions? However, the African Pan-Africanists have been telling you that an East African Federation or any comparable political integration unit in other parts of Africa, can. These Pan-Africanists have been: W.B. Dubois, Marcus Garvey, Sylvester Williams, Kwame Nkrumah, Sekou Toure, Keita Modibo, Julius Nyerere, Louis Rwagasore, Amani Abeid Karume, Kenneth Kaunda, etc.
The third historical mission that we distilled was the similarity and linkages among the now 1.5bn people of Africa. You always hear stories of the parasites of how Africans are divided among tribes that are always fighting one another, etc, etc. The NRM, being the force of wealth creators, right from the beginning, held in contempt these positions. In reality, the now 1.5 bn people of Africa, belong to four linguistic groups: the Niger -Congo (the Bantus and the Kwa); the Nilo-Saharan; the Afro-Asiatic (Arabic, Tigrinya, Amharic); and the Khoisan. Besides, you find linkages among these groups, like I was amazed to find that the Somali word for cow is: Saa. the Bantu dialects of this area, call cow-dung: Saa!! yet, the Somali language would be a part of the Nilo-Saharan, while the Bantu dialects belong to the Niger -Congo. Above all, our ancestors at the coast of East Africa, developed for us, the neutral, non-tribal Swahili language, that can easily unite East and Central Africa, if not beyond. It is, therefore, feasible to use the similarities and linkages among the 1.5 bn Africans on the continent to achieve powerful economic and, in some cases, even political integration to ensure our prosperity and guarantee our strategic security.
With the four ideological principles and the three historical missions identified, we have been able to achieve progress in five phases. These phases were: the minimum economic recovery to bring back the small colonial (enclave) Island of the 3Cs and the 3Ts; expanding the small island of the money economy; diversifying the economy; adding value to the raw- materials and promoting industrialization; and entering the knowledge economy.
We were able to revive the production of tea that had sank to 3million kgs from 23 million kgs of 1970, bring back tourism, bring back cotton production and we are working on reviving and up-grading the production of copper. We did not only revive the production of these products but expanded them as follows: Coffee from 2 million bags to now 9 million bags; tea from 3 million kgs to 60 million kgs; tourism from US$ 17.89 million of 1970 to US$ 1,510 million of the pre-covid time. We have diversified, going away from the colonial deception of having what they called ‘‘cash crops and non-cash- crops”. We told our people that anything that is used by society on a large scale, can be a cash product. Hence, maize, milk, cassava, beef, bananas, fruits, forest products, etc, are now cash products. These products deal with import substitution and expanding our exports.
We realized that the big problem of Africa and the other colonies, has been the issue of producing only raw- materials. This has been a disaster for Africa. Uganda may get US$2.5 per Kg for bean coffee. The same Kilogram roasted, turned into coffee powder and packed outside, may fetch US$40. As a consequence of this, from the global coffee value of USD 460bn, the coffee-growing countries of the world are sharing only USD 25bn and Africa, only USD 2.5bn.
Germany, a non-coffee growing country, earns USD 65bn, more than all the coffee growing Countries of the World. This is how the colonies and the neo-colonies, have been donating money, jobs and development energies to Europe and North America. Therefore, we have been deliberately, taking steps to end this betrayal by African leaders to Africa.
In spite of the opposition, we have succeeded in some items such as: milk, textiles, tin, cement, wood- products, maize, gold, cassava etc. We shall cover the entire spectrum of the raw- materials. Our next target is coffee, copper and iron- ore. We are developing a complete vertically integrated program for these items.
Finally, we have entered the knowledge economy of automobiles, vaccines, pharmaceuticals, computer assembling and eventually manufacturing.
In all this, we had to first of all, tackle the mistake of allowing big sections of our population to remain outside the money economy- Bakolera Ekidda Kyoonka (working only for the stomach). According to the latest census data, finally 67% of our people are in the money economy. It is 33% that are still outside the money economy.
On account of these measures, it is estimated that by the end of June 2025, the end of this financial year, the economy of Uganda will be USD 57.5 bn by the exchange rate method and USD 163.3bn by the method even before we start getting our oil out of the ground. With the vigorous implementation of all the phases mentioned above, we shall grow the GDP to USD 500 billions. This brings me now to the following crucial words I have been putting forward to you recently. These are: Development (enkurakulana); wealth (obugagga); Service provision (health, education, security, crime management, etc – obuwereza); jobs (emirimo). I have been telling you that development (roads, the railway, electricity, piped water, hospitals, schools, etc) is for everybody to use to create wealth (obugagga) for your family and in the process create jobs for yourself and for other Ugandans. Public service jobs are only 470,000. The majority of the jobs, therefore, must be in the private sector. Already, manufacturing is employing 1.121million people, services 5.076 million people, etc. This is just the beginning. This is the general message of the NRM.
Regarding the immediate plans for boosting the economy, I must mention the issue of the railways-the old metre gauge, that is being repaired and the new Standard Gauge Railway that will go from Malaba to Kampala and Kasese, as well as going from Tororo to Lira-Gulu-Nimule. With our Petroleum resources, we are going to fund all this.
The importance of the railway, is to lower transport costs. This makes it easier for businesses to make profits. We are already handling electricity. With low costs of production, Uganda becomes more attractive to business operators- they make profits more easily.
Therefore, the people of the East, rise up and take advantage of the Government programs of PDM, Emyooga, Grow, etc, to join the money economy. The government has arranged for the rest—Peace, infrastructure, the markets, etc.
I cannot end this address, without, again, emphasizing the importance of the African economic and political integration in whatever we are doing in regard to the two historical missions: prosperity for the African people and strategic security. All patriots and Pan-Africanists in Uganda, should link up with our brothers and sisters in Africa to work for the Economic integration of the whole of Africa and the economic and political integration of East Africa, leading to the political Federation of East Africa. That is what will be the insurance and guarantee for Africa’s prosperity and strategic security. Otherwise, we are building a Latin America in Africa and the sort of stagnation and misery you see in Latin America, is already visible here.
We are most pleased to have the visitors from Central African Republic, Republic of Liberia and The Republic of Kenya.
Thank you for coming to join us. We are always ready for the Pan-African effort of integrating Africa economically and, in some cases, politically.
I thank everybody.
Yoweri Kaguta Museveni
PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF UGANDA
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