By the dawn of 1900 the entire Africa had been engulfed by the colonial masters save for Ethiopia which had set foot firm to resist being colonized. Just like how some people praise foreign donations today, the then franchised communities of Africa thought embracing colonialism was the way to go, yet it was totally a wrong perception.
At that time Uganda was mainly engaged in barter trade rotating around artisans and agriculturalists. This catered for subsistence food etc and typically there wasn’t money economy, the colonialists used this gap to introduce their small enclave economy but remained minimal and unhelpful to the local person, it only served interests of the masters.
By 1962 as Uganda witnessed the exit of the British colonial Masters we only boasted of a small island of an enclave economy comprised of the 3 C’s and the 3T’s that is Coffee, Cotton and Copper the Tea, Tobbaco and Tourism respectively. The 3Ts and C’s soldiered on and by 1969 it was growing at the rate of 11%.
With the unvisionary leadership of the then, the stretch up to 1986 saw a total collapse of the economy and Uganda remained with coffee and tobbaco to talk about meaning as a country we were heading for a dooms day and night, the future was steadily darkening
At the dawn of 1986 as President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni took power, Ugandas nerves of life and growth started taking shape. The economy was liberalised and government fully restructured with the guidance of the IMF and World Bank and other stake holders. Today one can only chose to either join prosperity or remain in absolute poverty of which government will never allow any one to lag behind because improving house hold incomes is key priority for all as gallant Ugandans
Therefore under the wise leadership and guidance of President Museveni,the introduction of various development programs notably Emyooga and PDM will propel every Ugandan out of poverty.
Emyooga program at the constituency level cuts across a wide spectrum of business minded Ugandans targeting 18 SACCO’S from Boda boda operators to Welders to Performing Artistes and many others, these are daily earners and many success stories are so far being registered across Uganda
The Parish Development Model as it takes centre stage the active poor will never remain the same, village enterprises touch the very grass root person with the zeal to develop. What does this mean? With 38% of active poor Ugandans introduced into the money economy and basing on the fact that Ugandans are hardworking the future is already bright and the sky is the limit
To this, fellow Ugandans especially leaders should continue to preach the gospel of development to the people in their areas of jurisdiction so that together we can achieve tangible prosperity without leaving any one behind
For God and My Country
The writer is Deputy Resident City Commissioner Fort Portal City North Division
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