October 21, 2024 – Prime Time Communications

Out to Lunch

#OutToLunch: Incentives could further switch on West Nile for investment

#OutToLunch: Incentives could further switch on West Nile for investment By Denis Jjuuko On my first visit to Arua in West Nile, many years ago, my colleagues and I decided to unwind by visiting a nightclub or something similar to it. We were young and free. We had made the long trip from Kampala, rested a bit and decided to indulge in the night, enjoy some Lingala and whatever a bustling border town has got to offer. I had seen a huge electricity generator station by the roadside, a few minutes to Arua town but hadn’t paid much attention to it. I had also not done much research about the city’s night life. It was one of those days you jump into a car, drive to a town, get some accommodation and you are ready to go. A journey to discover the unknown. Some people call it adventure. In the nightclub, I noticed something strange. As a self-confessed nocturnal at the time, I had been a ‘happening’ boy by some lousy standards. I had also worked in journalism and the entertainment sector had been part of my beat. At university, I had enjoyed the exuberance of youth through clubbing. Nightclubs, therefore, were not strange to me. In Arua, at that nightclub, everyone had a torch. If you are considered old in Uganda, you remember the silver metallic ones with a red button on the side. Those were for the sophisticated ones. Those who lacked means had plastic ones. The only revelers who didn’t have either a plastic or silver metallic torch, were my colleagues and I. The majority of the people pulling all dance strokes on Lingala music were partly ‘giving us the eye.’ Like in most places, you could tell that people realize you are a foreigner. You don’t understand the rules. I became more cautious and decided not to indulge much and be more of a casual observer, with one eye on the exit door. Sooner than later, I realized why everyone who knew Arua well had a torch. At the peak of people’s enjoyment, electricity was switched off. The entire town went dark and quieter than a cemetery! Again, if you are considered old in Uganda, loadshedding is not something new to you. Electricity was always shared. If you had power today, you didn’t have it tomorrow. Rationing. But loadshedding in most parts of Uganda at the time meant power was switched off in the early evening around 6.00pm and switched back on around 10.00pm. In Arua, power was being switched off after 10.00pm. Strange loadshedding. Once power went off, the nightclub didn’t have a generator powerful enough to enable the rotating multicolor disco lights to be switched on. The nightclub’s standby generator was only big enough to power the sound system. That is why the revelers had torches. They switched them on. Some pressed the red button on the switches which made the torches provide a blinkering light. Others tied them on their waists. As they pulled those rare dancing strokes that are synonymous with Congolese across the border, they provided a spectacular experience akin to that of customized dazzling disco lights. What a spectacle! The ingenuity of the West Nilers. I have made hundreds of trips to Arua since that night and definitely power had become a bit reliable. But it is only the other week that West Nile was switched to the national electricity grid. It is a remarkable achievement or a shame that it has taken this long depending on how you look at it. The region has unbelievable potential given its location at the borders of both the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and South Sudan, some of Uganda’s biggest trading partners. Both countries are expansive and a big chunk of their populations rely on cities like Arua as the source of their goods and services. I learnt that some of those guys who were rivaling Congolese dancers in that nightclub were actually Congolese who cross the border to enjoy life. Anyway, both countries also suffer regular insecurity which means investors will always keep away apart from those exploiting the countries’ massive natural resources. But the investors could not set up businesses such as factories in Arua, to supply West Nile, DRC and South Sudan and beyond. They would rather set up in Kampala or Jinja where electricity was not such a big challenge. Yet if they set up in West Nile, they would be nearer to the market. Lack of electricity was always the challenge. Now that the problem is sorted, West Nile’s potential should now be fully exploited. West Nile is also very diverse with many different cultures, which can be a bedrock for non-animalized tourism. Even the alleged world’s smallest church is in West Nile! Nang Nang, perhaps the world’s tastiest fish is available in basketfuls. The River Nile cuts through the region, providing near perfect locations for riverside resorts and water sports. Land is still relatively affordable and fertile and some of the major towns are being connected by bituminous standard roads. Small planes can land in Arua. For those who love animals, Murchison National Park is partly in the region. Affordable trainable labour is in abundance. Electricity also means companies like Kiira Motors can now set up shop for electric buses. Or investors can think of electric vehicle chargers. An electric bus trip from Kampala to Arua would cut the cost by more than 50%. Major urban centres like Arua being border towns have populations with some bit of disposable income. But investors will need to be mobilized and incentivized so that they can set up shop. For those responsible for the country’s development, their work is now well cut out. Those selling torches, if they still existed, will have to pivot. The writer is a communication and visibility consultant. djjuuko@gmail.com

October 21, 2024

Out to Lunch

#OutToLunch: Financial literacy critical for farmers if Uganda is to increase coffee exports

#OutToLunch: Financial literacy critical for farmers if Uganda is to increase coffee exports By Denis Jjuuko Coffee farmers are in a good place these days. Their good fortune is not abating any time soon with fair average quality prices for Robusta still selling above the Shs13,000 mark a kilogram. In July, Uganda exported coffee worth more than USD210 million. If this trend continues, Uganda will earn a whopping USD2.5 billion by the end of the financial year. There has never been a better time to be a coffee farmer. But like all good things, there is a need to manage them. We recently heard a Member of Parliament from greater Masaka, a center of coffee growing in the country, crying out that prostitutes had invaded her area. The area is predominantly rural, where you would not easily expect to find them. The MP said that some coffee farmers, mainly men, had even lost their lives to these ‘invaders.’ The ladies of the night wanted some of this coffee money and they were keen on getting it willy-nilly. It isn’t just people peddling their flesh though responsible for some of these deaths, thieves had also attacked some people who had just sold their coffee. Although security agencies can easily deal with thieves, the challenge of how people manage their newly acquired wealth is always a challenge that needs to be addressed urgently. In Kalangala, at the onset of oil palm growing, farmers faced similar challenges. So this isn’t something that is new. When the campaign to grow coffee in Buganda started in 2016, the fair average quality price for Robusta was Shs5,000 on average. It was considered a good price prompting many people to heed the message being offered by the Kingdom of Buganda to grow coffee through their Mmwanyi Terimba campaign. The price is almost three times now, beating any commercial forecasts that may have been used to push the campaign. Although costs of inputs such as fertilizers and labour have increased over the last eight years, the money farmers are getting is still good. Many farmers are turning a profit. Even those who are not, when they sell their beans, they receive a substantial amount of money for their harvests. Many such farmers have improved their lives. Better houses are being built. Others are changing the types of roofs on their houses and others are expanding them. For many, school fees for their children won’t be a bother anymore (even though some parents have reportedly stopped their children from attending school so they work as labourers). Some have diversified their incomes, starting wholesale and retail shops. And like many Ugandans, some farmers have built rentals to earn that passive income. To ease their transport, they have bought bodas bodas and some pick up trucks. The infrastructure to dry the coffee has also improved. Even with all those investments, coffee farmers are largely still cash liquid. And many lack the skills to manage ‘huge’ sums of money. That is why the MP I mentioned earlier was appealing that prostitutes that had invaded her constituency be roughed up and sent back to the city, where they had come from. That would not solve the problem though. The farmer can simply jump on their newly acquired Bajaj and drive to the city a few kilometres away and “misbehave.” By the time they return to their farms, they would not have money to buy fertilizers and other inputs. The farms would then collapse. It is not one way though. Women with increased incomes could also, like men, abandon their roles of being mothers and wives leading to broken families. However, these may not be as many as men since men overwhelmingly own the means of production. Like all people experiencing a huge somewhat sudden surge in their incomes, there is a need to educate them on how to handle their newly acquired wealth. Financial literacy is largely lacking among some of the farmers yet there is no guarantee the prices will remain this high. The yields may also not always be high especially in these days of fluctuating weather patterns. Farmers need to manage their money better so that they can use the opportunity of these prices to create lasting wealth not just for themselves but also for the generations after them. The Uganda Coffee Development Authority could do this while partnering with other interested parties like the Kingdom of Buganda in the central region and financial institutions among others. The farmers can also collectively use the money to add value to coffee by owning milling plants, roasters or acquiring some of the assets in the coffee value chain. The writer is a communication and visibility consultant. djjuuko@gmail.com

October 21, 2024

Out to Lunch

#OutToLunch: Irrigation, desilting could solve Ntoroko and Kasese flooding

#OutToLunch: Irrigation, desilting could solve Ntoroko and Kasese flooding By Denis Jjuuko Some parts of Uganda have started experiencing harsh weather events. Flooding is one of them. In the last few weeks, rivers Nyamwamba in Kasese and Semiliki in Ntoroko have burst their banks leading to flooding. The latest incident in Ntoroko displaced more than 24,000 people, submerged 11 schools thereby affecting more than 4,000 learners. Ntoroko leaders say that this is the worst flooding in more than 50 years. The flooding took place in late August after torrential rains in the nearby Democratic Republic of Congo. The rains in Ntoroko are expected between September and November and the place is already flooded! What will happen when the Ntoroko rains start falling? More people will be displaced. Ntoroko is such a low-lying area surrounded by the Rwenzori Mountain ranges, River Semiliki and Lake Albert. Rains in the DRC lead to rising water levels in Lake Albert and River Semiliki hence flooding that not only destroys people’s houses but also entire livelihoods. The people of Ntoroko have three major economic activities — farming, fishing and cattle keeping. The floods affect all those activities. Food gardens and pastures get submerged while roads are cut off. The people then start relying on donated food to survive while living in internally displaced people’s camps. The flooding in Ntoroko is not out of the blue. Given its terrain, flooding is always expected and has intensified since 2019. Nyamwamba in Kasese has been causing havoc for a long time. Some people who claim to know these things say that both Semiliki and Nyamwamba are so silted that the only result is flooding. Although I was in Ntoroko a week ago, I didn’t manage to visit Semiliki but for Nyamwamba, they have a point. Nyamwamba carries big boulders from the mountains into its path. Previously, after it had rained, tractors would remove these boulders so that whenever it rained again in the mountains, there would be space for water and other boulders. Probably this explains why facilities such as Kilembe hospital and residences were built so close to River Nyamwamba. The river was never a threat. People knew what to do. When I was in Kilembe last year, many boulders were not being removed from the river’s path. Given the neglect, Nyamwamba had to find its way. The end result is people losing their lives and properties. Some people will blame it on climate change. The real reason is that we forgot the basics — something as mundane as having a tractor removing the boulders from the river’s path! Most of the disasters affecting our people can be solved. In Ntoroko, flooding is always followed by a prolonged severe drought from December until the next rains around March. The price of a cow during this period falls by 90% if a farmer is lucky to find a buyer. The main reason is because of lack of water and pasture. In a place that was flooding a month or so before. With schools submerged, children are likely to abandon their education and resort to other activities like fishing immature fish. The girls will be married off before they even experience their first menstrual cycle. I heard that those who aren’t being married off are instead being booked by parents and guardians eager to earn a small fee that wouldn’t even enable them to buy a scraggy cow. How difficult is it to dig up valley dams? How difficult is it to create an irrigation scheme so that livelihoods are not lost during the dry season? This would also ensure that kids are kept in school instead of fishing in dangerously rising waters or becoming mothers and wives before age. Money spent on infrastructure like roads, schools and health facilities is always lost due to flooding. Yet there are sustainable measures that the government can put in place to solve these challenges. Some of these measures can be implemented by the communities themselves. Others through entrepreneurship. People who own thousands of heads of cattle need technical advice to find sustainable solutions. And we can also learn from Egypt, a desert that supplies our markets with fruits that we have failed to grow. If you buy oranges from supermarkets, they are probably imported from Egypt that gets its water from the Nile for irrigation. They built the delta barrage that has saved them from flooding while using that water for irrigating their crops. And the delta barrage was constructed nearly 200 years ago. In the 21st century, we should be solving some of these challenges. The writer is a communication and visibility consultant. djjuuko@gmail.com

October 21, 2024

Out to Lunch

#OutToLunch: Karuma bridge should be rebuilt with tourism in mind

#OutToLunch: Karuma bridge should be rebuilt with tourism in mind By Denis Jjuuko As you read this, the main bridge to northern Uganda has been closed to pave way for repairs. The authority responsible says that they need three months of zero disturbances from vehicular traffic. For some time, the bridge has only been accessible by small vehicles with trucks and buses diverted to other routes. Originally constructed in 1963, the Karuma bridge has since outlived its purpose. It is too narrow for today’s traffic to the region and neighboring South Sudan and Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Access to the bridge is through winding corners, which could explain why some vehicles have in the past plunged into the river killing many people. The long-term plan for Karuma should be a replacement bridge like what happened in Jinja over the same River Nile. However, Karuma should be different. Recently, King Mswati III of Eswatini was in the country and stopped by the Jinja Nile bridge to take in the beauty of the majestic river and some photos. The bridge design doesn’t seem to have been fully planned for tourism. There was supposed to be a small restaurant on the bridge, a very small car parking area and what looks like a pathway people could stand. Nothing really much. The restaurant has never been opened and hardly anyone stops to take in photos or view the imposing Nile. Like Karuma, the meanest soldiers are usually seen patrolling the bridges. Photography is not even easily permitted. I don’t know if this is to protect them from terrorists but any serious terrorist doesn’t need some photo taken on a smartphone to blow up a bridge. The Jinja bridge is a landmark structure that could have brought in a lot of money if we had not, as usual, missed the chance. Some thinking was needed to turn it into a tourist attraction and not just as a bridge that eases traffic. In many global cities that attract thousands of tourists, such bridges are planned with an eye on tourism. High-altitude walking ways that provide sightseeing are common. Towers with telescopes from which people could view the Nile snaking into Kayunga and beyond would have created magic. Right now, all we offer for anyone who wants to explore the Nile in Jinja is largely a canoe that takes you to the point that is marked the Source of the River Nile. There is no proper marina, accessing the canoes is through a jungle of wooden dilapidated curio shops that make the entire place look like a slum. I don’t know how many tourists want to experience that. Imagine ziplining on the Nile in Jinja for those who love adventure or sightseeing through a cable car. People would be lining up from all over the world to experience this. A proper restaurant that enables you to experience the Nile. I believe many young people would be proposing marriage here. Karuma is even more beautiful than Jinja and could offer more. Imagine walking over a glass bridge that gives you a 360-degree view of the water falls? Imagine a sightseeing elevator that enables you to see River Nile cutting through the thick vegetation of the Murchison Falls National Park? And maybe even catch a few animals in the distance. The Karuma 600MW power dam would even add more attractions to this area and most importantly the electricity required to power cable cars and sightseeing towers and elevators. We know that we now generate more electricity than we consume. It is stuff like these that will enable us consume that electricity while creating millions of sustainable jobs. We are struggling to build another bridge at Katonga on the highway to Masaka, Tanzania, Rwanda and DRC. The NRM claims to have fond memories of Katonga given the battle that eventually led them to capture power in 1986. They went around at one stage and installed an ugly billboard that featured the late Muamar Gaddafi of Libya. Tired of its ugliness and lack of imagination, the termites ate it away! Then the Katonga bridge collapsed. It has been a few years of a temporary bridge since. What about building an iconic bridge with a museum that tells that Katonga battle? Add in the legends of River Katonga from the Baganda who have lived there for hundreds of years and you have a sellable product to international tourists. The guys at the Uganda National Roads Authority and other ministries and agencies particularly responsible for tourism need to work together to see how they can make bridges attract tourists. Money should not be a problem. They can ask Bank of Uganda to issue a bridge bond. It would be oversubscribed. The writer is a communication and visibility consultant. djjuuko@gmail.com

October 21, 2024

Out to Lunch

#OutToLunch: A mere change of guards won’t transform Kampala city

#OutToLunch: A mere change of guards won’t transform Kampala city By Denis Jjuuko If you have been to Kampala, you may have seen cows strolling on the streets. Sometimes, you may have seen them chilling on the pedestrian overpass on the Kampala Northern Bypass. Cows, apparently, know how to scale the stairs. Makeshift markets are set up on the streets every day, selling all sorts of things including foodstuffs leaving garbage everywhere. Boda Bodas, the notorious motorcycle taxis in Kampala, move at high speeds from all sorts of directions. Kampala is one of the cities you look left, right, left, right and left again several times before crossing a one-way street! You simply don’t know where a boda boda will come from. And they will hull insults at you should you look at them sternly. If you are unlucky, like my friend, you will knock one or two around Mulago as you drive to your office. If it is not cows suddenly trying to cross the road, it is a stray dog sniffing a rotting piece of meat a mile away. At signalized traffic junctions, when lights turn red, they instead rev up their motorbikes. The traffic police look on haplessly. Passengers have no helmets. Riders hung the helmet somewhere at the front of the bike. The national referral hospital ends up with many broken limbs and crushed skulls. Government prefers to treat them than preventing the accidents! Living in a third world can be strange. Uganda’s economy is mainly based in Kampala and makes losses of approximately US$800m or Shs3 trillion a year in gross domestic product according to the World Bank. KCCA itself carries this unwanted statistic on its website. The reason is traffic congestion. Kiira Motors has buses that can solve this problem easily. But we fear to annoy the taxiprenuers and their backers. We can’t inform and support them to transition. We can’t ban street parking on Kampala Road to create a bus lane. We are happy to collect a paltry Shs2,000 an hour while losing Shs3 trillion. We are that strange. Anyway, perhaps aware of how bad Kampala is managed, the president decided to do something by sacking the Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) executive director and her deputy. The news didn’t surprise anyone who has ever been to Uganda’s capital. Some of her workers, the ladies who try to clean the streets, threw a party and this time sweated under the midday sun celebrating her sacking. They claim she hadn’t paid them for months. The official reason for her sacking is the collapse of the Kiteezi garbage landfill that killed dozens of people in August. Yet it isn’t just Kiteezi. The roads, if you can call them that, are deeply potholed sending motorists to garages on a daily to replace suspension parts and other stuff. The air pollution is responsible for the ever-increasing respiratory diseases. Thieves surround you at midday and beat the hell out of you so they can take your fourth-hand Chinese phone. They know nobody will do anything to them. In the endless traffic jams, guys majestically walk looking at who is driving with windows down or checking who forgot to central lock the car doors. They open and take a phone or handbag. They don’t even run. They majestically walk. They know nobody will do anything to them. Others start removing side mirrors, car emblems and anything removable from the car. They even show it to you and inform you that they have taken it but you can buy it back from Kisekka Market an hour or so later. If the thieves who remove the parts are unknown, what about the shops that sell the stolen parts? They remain untouchable. They even pay a trading license to sell stolen car parts. What a city to live in! But the problems of Kampala can’t be just blamed on the executive team alone tasked to manage the city. Sometimes I sympathize with them. If you go to City Hall (somebody called it City Hole), you will see falling ceilings in some offices or those which have fully fallen off. You will see paper files everywhere on desks of officers (watch the hand over clips of the sacked officers). Yet on social media you will read about Kampala being a smart city. Whatever that means. You can’t have a smart city when desks of officers are full of paper files. You won’t have smooth roads when the officer responsible sits under a falling ceiling. Anyway, Kampala died. It needs to resurrect. Government must put in the money while hiring technical people who have the skills and mettle to run a sprawling emerging city. The Kampalans must adhere to living in the city. Some force may be required. If your cows are seen walking along Acacia Avenue, they should be slaughtered and meat distributed to people there. The herders will find suitable pasture in Nakasongola. If they know nothing will be done, they will continue keeping them in the city. A functional capital city is possible but the national government must do its job. A mere change of guards won’t do. All government agencies must be deliberate about Kampala’s transformation. The writer is a communication and visibility consultant. djjuuko@gmail.com

October 21, 2024

Out to Lunch

#OutToLunch: What Africa must do in the next 60 years of independence

#OutToLunch: What Africa must do in the next 60 years of independence By Denis Jjuuko Many African countries have clocked 60 years since they became independent from the colonizers. Last week, Uganda marked its 62nd anniversary. The anniversary came at a critical time when a government agency revealed that at least Shs25 billion or approximately US$6.7m is lost to corruption daily. I think the richest countries in the world are in Africa. Imagine losing US$6.7m a day and we still exist. The figure may not even be accurate. Government agencies tend to be conservative when revealing these things. Anyway, the majority of African leaders spend half their time blaming colonialists and western powers while accepting every invitation to the White House, 10 Downing Street and the Elysée Palace. Their public relations handlers and influencers even brag about such invitations. Photos in the White House are shared with glee. On return, they tell us the reason why we are poor is because of western powers and vow to fight and defeat them. The African masses, eager to attend the rallies, so that they can get their once in a year doze of protein from the meat being served, clap, clench their fist and vow to fight back. In the presidential mansions, the Africans tell their western counterparts, that whatever they said was just “managing politics.” They seek for another invitation to Washington, London and Paris. How can Africans manage the next 60 years of their independence? At least by not spending half their time blaming the westerners. Africa was not the only colonized continent. The British, for example, colonized many parts of Asia and Middle East. How did some countries in Asia and the Gulf managed to develop, some in a little time than Africa? Take the example of the United Arab Emirates, it only became independent in 1971, a decade after most African countries had become independent. They were a barren desert. Today, Africans go there for honeymoon, medical treatment, university education and some even invest in properties there. The simplistic story is that UAE had oil. But it isn’t the only one with oil. Libya, Sudan, Nigeria, and Angola among others have oil. The countries mentioned above also have access to the sea just like the UAE. However, the African countries had even more favorable weather than the harshness of the Dubai or Abu Dhabi deserts. But today, Africa almost has no single city that is at the level of Dubai. South African cities are deteriorating at the speed of a rocket. If the British, French and Americans sabotage Africa like African leaders and intellectuals always claim, how come they didn’t do that to the Asians and countries like UAE? They were still interested in oil in UAE. They were still interested in access to the sea as they are today. If African leaders wished to develop their countries, I believe they would without anyone in the west stopping them. Does the west, for example, stop any African city from finding solutions to their garbage problem? I believe many western powers would actually want their businesses to invest in solving the garbage issue so that they can make money out of it. Does a western power tell a procurement officer to give a contract to the most incompetent company to construct a road? Most road projects, for example, in Uganda are so small for any western power to get utterly interested. I mean, if you are constructing a 21km four lane northern bypass worth a few million dollars, why would the west be so interested in stopping it? The other day, I saw a road agency happy to report that they will construct 6km a year of an expressway. Imagine just 6km a year of a four-lane road! Now, imagine if the country had more ambitious projects, how long would they take to achieve them? African leaders are these days summoned to every Asian capital for some African Summit. The other day I saw poor Indonesia summoning them and they all went or sent their deputies. What is in Jakarta that Africans can’t do? Ok, if they go there, what do they learn? How has Indonesia managed to ‘develop’ that it can now summon African presidents to go for a summit? And when they return what can they do so the countries can develop? In the next 60 years, Africa must be deliberate to write a new chapter. The colonialism and neocolonialism rhetoric has run its course. There are 1.4 billion people in Africa. They need to see a continent that works for them, not one that talks about issues of the past 60 years. it is time to create an enabling environment that enables Africans to thrive. The writer is a communication and visibility consultant. djjuuko@gmail.com

October 21, 2024