#OutToLunch: Investing in the movie industry and its value chain could be the next big thing

By Denis Jjuuko

About 30 years ago, a Ugandan soap opera captured the imagination of the nation, turning hitherto unknown actors and actresses into household names. Some like Sam Bagenda who was quoted over the weekend, the public doesn’t even know their real names. Where he turns, he is known as Dr Bbosa after the character he portrayed so well in the famous series, That’s Life Mwattu.

Other series followed such as Bibaawo and Ekitobeero trying to capture the market created by the success of That’s Life Mwattu. Actors took to the stage and it seemed a new industry was born. But it seemed the success of Ugandan TV shows were always short lived.

Foreign soaps such as Sunset Beach, Generations, and Isidingo would always interrupt the flow, leaving Ugandan actors to only perform in poorly attended theatres. South American telenovelas and even Philippine ones have of recent been the rage.

But it seems there is a revival of the Ugandan TV soaps. You have probably heard the kids in the neighborhood singing Sanyu Sanyu nkwagala, a theme song for the Sanyu series on one of the pay TV channels. Or you have been incessantly called to remind you that the “TV has been cut off yet Sanyu Sanyu Nkwagala is about to start, please pay up.”

Sanyu revolves around a young fashion designer who marries into the extremely rich Kirunda family that runs the country’s biggest fashion enterprise. Kirunda, a cunning businessman or criminal depending on how you look at things is played by Abbey Mukiibi of the Kalisoliiso Crew. It is a well-crafted script and the production is good.

It isn’t only Sanyu that is keeping soap lovers captivated. There is also Ssuubi, a domestic worker working for the family of coffee mogul Kaaya. Kaaya is played by renown actor Andrew Benon Kibuuka of the Bakayimbira fame. It also features visual artist and former Buganda Kingdom minister Owek Nuwa Wamala Nnyanzi. And of course, Comedy Factory and its Mzigo Express. The production of Ssuubi or Mzigo Express is as good as Sanyu even though sometimes the casting could have been better.

There are several other Ugandan TV series and lovers can be hooked on TV the entire weekday evening. Of course, there are also some poorly done ones I have watched but there is no need to dwell on them.

Even though these series are featuring many known faces, there are many actors and actresses I am seeing for the very first time and they are good at what they are doing. Many are young and smart and the future for the industry seems to be bright.

Like I have argued before, the creative industry can employ millions of young people. There are 71 licensed TV stations in the country and hundreds of radio stations, most of which lack content. Audio dramas targeting mobile phone users could also be made. And of course, the internet opens many opportunities.

Many young people already earn a living creating content on YouTube and TikTok. X, formerly Twitter, recently started paying verified users (may not be yet possible in Uganda though). However, some of the creators on platforms like TikTok produce bizarre videos in a bid to bait followers to watch them. Many such creators lack the skills and talent to write creative scripts and of course acting them out. I don’t think they will stay in the industry for long.

So, there is a need to train more script writers and production crews if this is to work and most importantly create distribution channels and systems so the content can reach the target market.

The training doesn’t necessarily have to be through formal education where people get degrees and such certificates. Hands on training would create the numbers necessary today to get these young people quickly into work.

The emphasize must be on original content and not necessarily on recycling or even copying jokes like some standup comedians do. It also doesn’t have to be vulgar or tribal to sell either. What channels through which would this content be distributed? What synergies can be made?

In Nollywood, Nigeria’s highflying film industry, it is estimated that each movie employs approximately 100 people from pre-production to movie production to post production. Nearly 3,000 movies are produced annually in Nollywood, which translates into approximately 300,000 jobs a year. Generally, a million people work in Nollywood. According to Business Day, a Nigerian newspaper, Nollywood contributes 2.3% of the country’s GDP. Nigeria is Africa’s biggest economy.

Africa’s film and entertainment industry has the potential to create 20 million jobs and US$20 billion annually by 2025 according to UNESCO.

This won’t happen on its own. Deliberate efforts will be needed for the industry to thrive. If you are looking for where to invest, what about the movie industry and its value chain?

The writer is a communication and visibility consultant. djjuuko@gmail.com

Tags: Denis Jjuuko, Dr Bbosa, Out to Lunch, Philippine, Prime Time Communications, Sam Bagenda, South American telenovelas, Ugandan soap opera, Ugandan TV shows

Health

#OutToLunch: Unless we do something, we shall soon be sent to the villages to die

By Denis Jjuuko In the years when HIV/AIDS was wreaking havoc to the country, it was not uncommon to hear that somebody who is sick has been sent from the city to their village. Whenever you heard about it, tears simply rolled down. It was a metaphor for death. Everything has been tried and there is nothing else to do. Chronical illnesses leave many families in poverty and since there was nothing else the family could do, they decided to cut expenses, one of which was the transportation of a dead body. Transporters always charged a fortune. They understood that we may abandon people when they are alive but show immense love to them when dead! And that was before funeral management became a professional service. One could have thought that we had turned a corner from those devastating years of the 1980s and 1990s. That falling sick didn’t mean death but we seem to be slipping back to those dark days. At least two recent cases provide a reminder of where we are. It all started with a senior judge detailing the difficulties she faced when her now late husband was admitted and ended up describing the national referral hospital as “a monument” to the chagrin of its administrators. Before that dust could settle down, the country woke up to a crowd fundraiser for a heart transplant for one of Kampala’s highflyers who unfortunately died before the money could be raised, raising another spotlight on Uganda’s healthcare challenges. The two cases above were public figures hence the publicity they raised. People were bitter that we have neglected our healthcare by outsourcing it to private and foreign hospitals. If you have some money, you run to a private hospital in Kampala. If you have real money, you run to Nairobi or other foreign capitals outside the continent. The majority of Ugandans have no money to run to a private health facility in Kampala or any town in Uganda for that matter. They resort to witchdoctors, fake pastors and prayer to survive. And probably we are about to start seeing families sending back the sick to their villages to die like it was in the late 1980s and 1990s. We many times get obsessed with economic growth and transformation, rolling figures off our tongues. And as the national budget is being read this week, such numbers will be making headlines once again. If we really want to put money in people’s pockets, we must think about social services such as health and education. The cost of healthcare goes beyond what we pay to buy the drugs and pay for consultation fees. There are many lost hours when one falls sick. The sick person and the caretakers are unable to work and are spending money on transport and medicine. Given who we are, others are spending money to check on the sick. It deters economic growth. There is a need to improve our healthcare services as well as promoting health seeking behaviours among the population. If people are healthy, they will be able to attend school or get involved in productive work that leads to economic transformation. Although one of the cases mentioned above involved a heart transplant and many people called for establishment of such facilities, it is probably something that we can do in the future. The doctors who can do heart transplants and such high skilled procedures exist in Uganda but if we are still dying of malaria and such other diseases, our focus should be on primary healthcare services. Lower-level health centres should have well trained personnel who are motivated to work and given the tools they need to diagnose and treat people. The majority of our people seek services at such facilities but many times when you visit, you see despair. From people suffering from simple diseases such as malaria or women getting complications while giving birth. Many times, the health workers are very frustrated. They see their patients die who shouldn’t be dying. When such patients die, we convince ourselves that it was God’s plan. It wasn’t at all. We simply failed at the basics. One of the basics we have failed at as a country is health insurance for all. We know the cost of healthcare. We also know that the benefits of health insurance for all can offset the costs of healthcare but we do nothing about it. Unless we do something about healthcare for all of us, we shall return to the days of being sent to the village to die. The highly connected may laugh at this. But I have heard of some who have been sent back from Nairobi and India to die from here. The writer is a communication and visibility consultant. djjuuko@gmail.com

June 23, 2025

Out to Lunch

#OutToLunch: Canadian visas and what Africans must do to avoid humiliating rejection

By Denis Jjuuko I recently applied for a visa to Canada to attend a Rotary conference in Calgary and thereafter visit a few of their attractions like the Niagara Falls and return to Kampala. The application was rejected on grounds that I didn’t have enough assets and therefore I might not return. I thought that the visa officer had missed something, so I appealed and I attached some more assets. I thought no sane person would have such assets, get a visa to Canada, fly for 2-3 days, reach an airport and then disappear into mountains of snow! But the Canadian visa officer sent back my application rejected with the same reason. I believe they never read anything I attached. I don’t know anyone entrepreneurial like myself who would spend nearly Shs10m on an economy class air ticket to Calgary and then decide to disappear into thin air instead of returning home. I am also too old, lazy and highly educated to directly wash cars, clean airport bathrooms and such other menial demeaning jobs the majority of people who disappear in Canada do to survive. Some of my friends urged me to appeal again. I refused. I am not desperate to fly for a few days to Calgary or anywhere in north America, western Europe or anywhere anyway. I thought I could invest the money I would have spent in Canada on starting a new business venture whose profits could pay for the next Rotary convention in Taipei in 2026 or even donate it to charity. I actually donated some of it last week. Anyway, I hadn’t realized that I had become a statistic until I read a recent story by CNN that Africans lost nearly US$70m in 2024 in denied visas. That is a lot of money. If the US$70m is the annual average, in just a decade, the continent has lost US$700m. If you think of the interest that could have earned when compounded, it is in billions of dollars. Since the release of that report, many Africans have taken to social media platforms such as X to argue that the continent should become reciprocal. Charge westerners same rates they charge us and then give flimsy reasons to deny them access after all many that travel to Africa have no real assets to talk about. The argument is popular but lacks thorough thought. African countries actually are as discriminatory only that they do so to fellow Africans. Many people from the west can fly to any airport and access a visa on arrival with zero chance of rejection. Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, says in a popular TikTok video that he needs 35 visas to cover the continent while most Europeans don’t need any. Why doesn’t the African Union copy the European Union and ensure that there is no need for visas to travel anywhere in Africa by a citizen of any member state? That would spur a lot of growth when Africa becomes borderless like Europe is. Also, why do Africans go to the west? It is because we have failed to put in place facilities and create jobs that we need here. With all the coastline we have, why would anyone fly to resorts in Europe, America or the Middle East? Africans fly there because there is nothing at home to write about. We can sing about lions and gorillas but we can’t even build an airfield where planes could easily land. Ssese Islands or Buvuma can be as beautiful as Bali or Ibiza or Santorini. But the infrastructure is lacking. That is why even when the visas are nearly free for Americans and Europeans, Africa still struggles to attract tourists. You don’t want to fly into Entebbe and then drive on the Mityana-Kyenjojo section of the road to catch the elusive lions in Queen Elizabeth National Park. Hotels are too expensive and poorly done. You can spend a night in a European resort paying only EUR160 or less inclusive of an endless flow of meals, beers, champagnes and whiskeys. Here? Somebody charges US$1,000 a night for a hotel room with a floor made of uneven stone slates! Our universities still teach stuff that one can easily find online and hospitals are in a mess. Can we host international conferences like the one I had wanted to attend in Canada? Only a handful of countries in Africa can. But African countries have money for the shiniest military hardware and rigged elections. No ministers fail to get the latest Landcruiser to go launch a pit latrine built with funds from western donors. We must build the kind of countries that we love to see otherwise Canadians and other westerners will continue rejecting us without any care in the world. The writer is a communication and visibility consultant. djjuuko@gmail.com

June 23, 2025

Out to Lunch

#OutToLunch: Farmers are willing to do the hard work, government must do the same

By Denis Jjuuko Agriculture has been for long touted as the answer to the poverty that is exhibited everywhere you turn in Uganda and in most parts of Africa. A recent study by Global Right Alert even confirmed that Uganda can get UShs10 trillion (nearly US$3 billion) annually from coffee. Our much-heralded oil revenue is estimated at about US$2 billion annually. When I read snippets of the report, I was at first tempted to ask where should we put our money? I quickly remembered that developing a country can’t be one directional. Extract the oil and get that cool US$2 billion every year and work on the coffee to get that US$3 billion too. Although many people have been focusing on coffee given the recent increment in quantity of production in central Uganda and elsewhere and the resulting high prices that have turned peasants into shilling millionaires, there is a lot that still needs to be done. The majority of farmers depend on unpredictable rainfall yet we are experiencing irregular seasons and changes to the climate. It is no longer guaranteed that it will rain during the months we all knew as rainy seasons. And sometimes when the rains come, it is very little or too much. No farmer wants to experience either. We still depend on the hand hoe to till the land to the extent that it is one of the most distributed items by candidates seeking support in the upcoming general elections. Although many farmers have small plots of land on which they grow food and cash crops, a hand hoe is 19th century stuff. Luckily, the Chinese have been kind enough to invent petrol powered ones that can help a farmer till the land faster and easily. The traditional hand hoe is a back breaking tool. One of the reasons many young people would rather sell the land, buy a boda boda, which they turn into a bed for daytime napping due to lack of passengers than spending the day in the garden. Inputs are expensive and fake. There is a need for the Uganda National Bureau of Standards to do their job to ensure only genuine fertilizers, pesticides and other inputs are on the market. It shouldn’t be very difficult to find who makes or import fake inputs. We can’t always blame everything on the impunity of some individuals with high political and military connections. If such people found a serious officer desirous of doing their job, they would back down. A certain government entity that owns a printery always refuses to print campaign posters of highly connected individuals on credit. The individuals usually curse the managers and promise to teach them a lesson but return with cash and pay. If they had found weak managers, they would abuse the system. A public officer who fails to reprimand the so-called Gamba Nogu (people with military and political connections) is just weak and wants to use the system to enrich themselves illegally in many cases. The other problem for Ugandan farmers is transportation. Some are able to grow significant amounts of produce but transport is a very big cost to bring the goods from the farmer to the market where the prices are not laughable. Agricultural produce can be rotting in a garden less than 100km to the market where there is a high demand. It was thus refreshing to read in newspapers last week that there is a project, at least for the northern region, that is working to change this narrative. With support from the Germans, the Ministry of Local Government is implementing the Rural Development and Food Security in Northern Uganda (RUDSEC) project. This newspaper reported that more than 1,300km of roads connecting farmers to markets will be rehabilitated and upgraded in Acholi, Lango and Teso regions. I regularly travel across the country and including these regions. Sometimes you find farmers with vegetables being sold at giveaway prices. One of the challenges they face is transport. The rundown Sahara or Isuzu can’t manage the roads many times. Yet we should know that an improved transport and market infrastructure would allow year-on-year accessibility. The cost of inputs would reduce because it wouldn’t take one so much to buy them. Ideally that should lead to increased inputs. Many farmers are willing to do the hard work to increase production. Entrepreneurs will set up the processing plants for value addition. The government should do its part too. Pay road contractors on time, make genuine inputs affordable, provide technical expertise and access to the market. Poverty would be history for many people. The writer is a communication and visibility consultant. djjuuko@gmail.com

June 23, 2025