JOHN NJOROGE: Who told you Richard Byarugaba is crying for the helm at Uganda’s “only” Provident Fund?

In 2019, I was privileged to be part of a team of 11 persons to organise the six global conferences hosted in Uganda. Among these, two were my primary goal: the main event, The Commonwealth Youth Ministers Meeting which I was Master of Ceremony and the Youth Business Forum which I was it’s primary Moderator. All where televised Live Globally on numerous media platforms. By Commonwealth ratings, these two meetings were the best ever held in the history of the Commonwealth youth gatherings globally. Personally, I did not reserve any monitory appreciation, rather I had the rare opportunity to rub shoulders and share contacts with some of the most successful business persons on earth, Dangote being my greatest highlight.

As host country, Uganda was obliged to foot some bills and our core team of 11 was tasked to hunt for funds. One of our primary targets was Uganda’s Provident Fund NSSF. So after several text messages, WhatsApp messenger messages, Short Message Texts and official emails, I secured an official meeting with Mr Byarugaba.

Richard is no stranger to me. A personal friend who has passion for similar things including dressing style, hair style, choice of cars (we are Jeep people), punctuality, loyalty and speaking our mind. This was officially so I was very careful not to mix personal sentiments. I followed all the official channels to secure this meeting to pitch our bid for UGX 200 million. My teammates were counting on me to help Kunogga that ka-money.

In return we were offering the Fund several speaking opportunities and booths to showcase how the Fund invests its savers monies and more pivotal, its newest drive to youth saving both employed and employed, for future returns.

We believed our offer was very generous and helpful to the Fund for its publicity and campaign drive. We had the National Broadcasting Cooperation [UBC], NBS TV, Zuckerberg’s Facebook, the then Biz Stone’s Twitter (my elder brother’s muzindalo although daddy waves his right ka-hand (wacha wacha wewee) with a snitch on his right chic about how we bounce on it) and a good pedigree of Ugandan bloggers under our units. Basically sufficient bait for Ka-Richard to jump on.

We went to his office twice on appointment. Each time very prepared with our well rehearsed script. We were bounced. And for the next appointments, our lingua mentally got diluted. This particular experience taught me to not people immediately the first time, they are ready for you. Wait and see if they still have their matter together. Yes we did have our concept together. Most of us had sex reciting the key points of this pitch to the disappointment of our prey.

From a team of 5 that was tasked to meet Richard, we met him only 3. My presence was because I was point man otherwise probably I would have fallen out. 3 weeks waiting and every update meeting I had only bilango to register. The other 2 teammates must have imagined this is a game of zalla.

On this day, we arrived late, Richard was early. He even called pressing. We arrived with loose pants. He was warm welcoming and offered us refreshments. We went about chatting on small small things, breaking the ice. He could clearly see we were wet. Then he blew the whistle and it was time to walk the talk. We did even better than we had actually prepared because we were more informal. After yapping for minutes, instead of responding to our submissions, he went comical on one of my teammates Elone. He started pronouncing her name as Ealoyinee. Asked her if this was a name from a pet her parents had or a monument in Kigezi.

Now Elone is a Mukiga like Richard. It didn’t go well. There were some smiles that could split rocks, laughs that could split elephants, teeth showing that could signify bloodshed. I was uneasy, I wanted to use the Toilet and the National Youth Leader with us was sweating and pulling his nose. I was finished, saw I thought.

Finally, Richard gave us a promise of UGX 5 million. He told us that is all he could give from the fund and he didn’t mind if we gave the Fund a speaking opportunity or not. This was just support.

We left fuming. We crossed to the nearby Cafe Mocca and had a big meal (what do you expect of Africans). I was disappointed in My Friend Richard and attempted to massage Elone with all the good words and touches (she is married but I was not even thinking). We retreated to my office in Kololo, then later Parliament and finally in Naguru.

That evening I put in a few browns and texted Richard. “But why? Tell me what was bad about the concept”. He wrote back, “come to my office tomorrow”.

I went and he told me 4 key loopholes why he could not risk savers money in our enterprise. He made sense. To this day, I appreciate his decision. The key loopholes were basically that 200 million of savers money was going to the drain with no investment for return because our concept was speculation not actual.

Friend, NSSF is liquid every minute and it’s money is sweat money. Its contributors give it up with the expectation of returns when they are unable to have gainful earnings. This is their fall back position. Anyone trusted with this responsibility to hold that money and give it back with a little on top must be honest, diligent and sensitive to these facts.

Outside of this, there are those idiots who look at the Provident fund as a piggy bank that can be raided. They include Banks that want NSSF to bank with them, real estate people, government itself and its ministries, religious organisations… they are all teeth out with saliva dripping. I can only imagine the number of individuals calling with proposals like mine for some “little dime” of which the Provident Fund gate keeper cannot guarantee return on investment.

Any sound financial brain, human in nature, sensitive in calling would love to be a part of helping to save for the future for others but this environment is just terrible. In my opinion, NSSF should never invest savers money in Uganda. But you dare it. You will be a political chopping board 🐗.

If I was Richard, by now, many more sound global institutions would be wanting my expertise. Why would I glue on such a job. The so called lobbyists must be charlatans who want him to stay there where they can keep taking advantage of his good nature and trust that somewhere along the line they will do the right thing. He has inherited many dead projects. The cost of cancelling those already signed contracts is as good as a death sentence.

Disclaimer : This is my personal opinion, thus not binding and is openly subject to all manner of scrutiny as the reader feels fit.