This standoff must stop, rationalization will go on- Museveni

President Museveni  has insisted the ongoing rationalization process will continue, despite critics.

Speaking during the thanksgiving for Energy Minister, Ruth Nankabirwa in Luweero, Museveni further justified his move to rationalise what he referred to as parasitic government authorities and agencies.

“Those groups by 2016 were employing 3,905 people and those people were using Shs2.2 trillion. The Ministries were 18,000 people and the army I don’t want to give you the number but a big one. But I can tell you that when the army was smallest in 1991 we had 41,000 soldiers. By this time in 2016, they were more than that. All these (Ministries and the army) were using Shs2.6 trillion,” Museveni noted.

“Now the third category of public servants were being paid under the local government, those are the government teachers, health workers, local government administrators, those at that time were 192,000. Those were using Shs 3.5 trillion. Imagine 3,000 people using almost the same amount of the money as all the other thousands of people.”

The move to scrap a number of government agencies and authorities has been met with resistance , especially from Members of the Parliament and the public.

For example, several cases have been made for the stay of the Uganda Coffee Development Authority, many say is responsible for the increase in the coffee exports for Uganda.

In 2023/24, Uganda exported 6.13 million bags of coffee, worth US\$1.144 billion which was a 6.33% increase in volume and 35.29% increase in value compared to the previous financial year.

However, President Museveni has insisted that the contribution of UCDA to Uganda’s coffee sector is inflated, noting that many other players have equally contributed to the growth.

Speaking on Saturday, President Museveni said that by rationalisation, the government will be

able to save more money that would be channeled to other developmental programmes.

“Therefore, this standoff must stop. If you want your country to develop, the people you elect must work with the Head of government. We cannot have this permanent paralysis situation,” he urged.

“Another problem is URA. That one is part of the authorities actually. They are paid a lot of money. The theory is that if you bribe them with a lot of money, they work better; but they don’t. The more money you pay them, the more corrupt they become. That war we are also fighting.”