Approximately 80 percent of Uganda’s 31 million inhabitants are involved in agricultural activities for both cash and food production. Uganda is abundantly blessed with fertile soils, ample rainfall and a number of vital natural resources which have helped its economy to remain relatively stable.

Despite this, a majority of Ugandans still cannot afford to have the required food rations of at least two meals a day a situation that causes fear and worry among local leaders as to whether Uganda has the capacity to avert the looming famine threat that has come on board in the recent times.

Last month, media reports indicated that once more, the people of eastern Uganda are crying of famine due to recurrent rain failure leading to prolonged drought that left most crops stunted with no hope of ever registering any harvests at the end of the season.
The outcry is loudest in the districts of Bulambuli, Mbale, Sironko, Iganga, Namutumba, Bugiri, Busia, Tororo and parts of Teso sub-region where Members of Parliament (MPs) there allege seven people have died of famine since May 2011.

Following these media reports, state minister for relief and disaster preparedness Mr. Musa Ecweru rushed in with a donation of food items with at least each of the 400 most affected households in Bulambuli district receiving 10kg to ensure there is continuity for the next few days.

While delivering these food rations, Mr. Ecweru said, “this is the little we can afford as of now, accept it so it pushes you for a while as government plans to provide a solution to emergent calamities of this nature.”

But the real question is can government enforce an appropriate measure to ensure food security and avoid leapfrogging into a famine threat that is looming at the moment as trucks with Kenyan number plates ferry bags of maize across the border barely a month of media reports that people are dying of famine in some parts of the country?

In Nabikhaso village in Bungokho sub-county in Mbale district its harvest season, trucks with Kenyan number plates have camped here and are daily being loaded with bags of maize to the embracement of a few local leaders who think, government would have taken up the initiative to buy this maize for storage as a means of averting the looming famine in case its outbreak impacted heavily on the communities involved in the sale of maize to Kenyan traders.

Mr. Robert Mabonga the area LCI chairperson said that at least five trucks carrying 700 tons of maize each are loaded meaning 3,500 tons of maize cross to Kenya daily and that for the past three weeks the Kenyan traders have camped in the village, they have been able to export 73,500 tons.

“Its harvest time and a kilogram of maize is being sold at Shs. 900 barely a month when a kilogramme went for Shs. 1,500 and Mize flour cost Shs. 2,500 before harvest time. Posho is now costing Shs. 1,800 and we have forgotten the suffering we went through before harvest and we are just selling off the produce like there is no tomorrow,” Mr. Mabonga said.
While addressing Mbale main Market venders at police children primary school recently, state minister for trade Mr. David Wakikona revealed that the government is in advanced stages of constructing silos to ensure food security in times of scarcity.

Mr. Wakikona explained that although the eastern region serves as a food basket to parts of Kenya, South Sudan and DR. Congo, there was need for government to set up measures to avoid excessive sale of food items across borders despite a free market economy Uganda operates.
“We have started building Silos for food security in the country and we are already setting up one in Ambachi in Gulu and another in Kabale municipality after which we intend to build one in Bugisu sub region,” Mr. Wakikona said.

Mr. Wakikona’s revelation is a positive move towards food security in the country but not in a liberalized economy of Uganda’s context where business transactions are determined by forces of demand and supply.

According to Mr. Charles Namansa, manager FINCA bank Mbale branch, the majority of Uganda’s population lives below the poverty line feeding on less than a dollar daily. This means they can only be bailed out from their poverty conditions through the sale of the produce at harvest time.

He says it is difficult to stop these farmers from selling their produce especially that Uganda is operating a free market economy but that putting across a regulation that prohibits them from selling food items to foreign traders without government approval could help control the extent at which the food.

“But despite a free market economy, government should design measures that will ensure food security in order to avert the looming famine threat. If the minister says plans are under way to build silos, then the budget estimates should include a close that caters for money meant to buy food stocks for storage. A strong regulatory system on indiscriminate of food sale can help Uganda avert the looming famine threat,” Mr. Namansa said.

Famine is currently a major concern especially that the inflation rates have more than doubled and the cost of living has gone high. There is fear that if famine broke out country wide, the government will not be in position to protect the population given its failure to handle the rising cost of living that has seen commodity prices hiked.

Andrew Mwenda one of the leading Ugandan journalists calls the Walk-to-Work campaign Besigye’s protests. Me thinks the protests in Uganda don’t have to be viewed as Besigye’s protests. They are people’s protests. In fact, Besigye, Mao, Otunnu, Mathias Mpuga and many others are doing what personally I would have done. Unfortunately, I have no following. I have often heard you argue that Besigye is like Amin which argument I think is utterly unfair and implausible.

I am a firm believer in social democracy which aims at promoting social justice and social welfare. In the wake of the walk-to-work protests, Minister Matia Kasaija confessed that when it comes to privatisation, the government overdid it.  A functional state cannot privatise and liberalise the provision of all services. Professor Robert Rotberg who happens to be an expert on state weakness; state failure and state collapse argues that “nation-states fail because they can no longer deliver political goods to their people”.

Many Ugandans are largely concerned with bread and butter issues and not the economic growth Museveni and some other commentators often tout. How many Ugandans have been transformed by the impressive economic growth? From my basic economics, I know economic growth doesn’t necessarily translate into economic development. It is like using per capita income figures as a yardstick for standards of living.

Ugandans are yearning for equitable distribution of the national cake and nothing more.

Like Mwenda, the president often boasts of collecting huge sums of taxes. In whose benefit are they collected if the health care system has collapsed; if there are virtually no jobs created for our graduates; if the peasants’ children can no longer ably attain higher education and if by mistake their parents sell their property to have their children study, they cannot get jobs because of patronage and clientelism?

In fact, those of us who have had an opportunity to study and can analyse get annoyed when the President says they now collect trillions of shillings in taxes because we see no value for that money on the ground. The money is concentrated in few hands.

I would also like to surmise that the removal of term limits in our constitution and the continued stay in office by Museveni promotes impunity. There are people who are working with him and do all sorts of funny stuff but get away with it because they are his right hand men. Ofwono Opondo the other day killed a petty thief suspect in broad day light. Nothing has ever been done to him. We have people who default taxes and run to him; we have people whose businesses are bailed out by taxpayers’ money, etc. I am sure, if we had a new leadership, we would have new faces in public offices and those that have misused and abused public offices would be brought to book.

I have often heard Mwenda say Besigye was asked on TV what solution he had for the current fuel and commodity price hikes and he waffled and gave no solution. Granted, some of us can propose solutions if the leadership can listen. For instance, assuming the government waived taxes on fuel, would the state collapse? In whose behalf are the taxes?

Two, if Kagame has been able to fight corruption, why can’t Museveni do so? Many people affected by this crisis are the unemployed and I am convinced the money squandered by government could create jobs for our graduates. It is vital to note that people suffering from unemployment are the educated. Those that are not educated are happily employed as shoe shiners, barbers, wheelbarrow pushers, fruit vendors, boda-boda cyclists, houseboys and maids and some of them make some profit,

Of course, you wouldn’t expect a Vincent Nuwagaba to do any of the above jobs. I would want to access white collar jobs on merit just like the sons and daughters of politicians and other top executives do.

Therefore, some of us warmly welcomed the on-going campaign and we shall not relent in demanding accountability. At least, we are aware that we are citizens not subjects. We are also aware that our leaders are not our masters but our servants. We are also aware that elections per se are not the only legitimate means of changing leadership. If leaders are not comporting themselves in the best interest of the citizens, citizens must be empowered to withdraw the social contract.

Do you know that if 1.8trillion was distributed to unemployed graduates assuming the number is 100,000 each would get 18million to start life for him/herself? If it was invested in creating jobs, how many jobs could it have created? If that money was invested in higher education, the government would sponsor 10,000 students annually for ten years.

The problem we have is that some people erroneously take themselves to be the Alpha and Omega of ideas which is precarious. Personally, I will be satisfied with the president if he accounts for Ugandan taxpayers’ money. I believe that while the opposition politicians may aim at ouster of the regime, their scheme has been given credence by the insensitivity and intransigence of the ruling party. If the government addressed the issues raised, the opposition would be disarmed. Incidentally, now the problem is no longer commodity and fuel prices but a plethora of issues.

Finally, Mwenda, has often stated that in the recent election Museveni won “clean and square”. This puzzles me. You have acknowledged that Museveni used about shillings 1 trillion from taxpayers and part of that money from his friends. Is that what you call winning clean and square? So, now Andrew, believes we should be under a plutocracy instead of democracy? Okay, let’s assume he won “clean and square”, did we give him a licence to abuse taxpayers’ money at his whims? Uganda has enough to satisfy all our appetite but not enough to satisfy our greed. I hate, I despise and I abhor greed. Anybody who is greedy should excuse himself from public offices.