By William Kituuka Kiwanuka
The theme for 2022: “DIGNITY FOR ALL IN PRACTICE”.
The major reasons why many people remain in poverty are in a majority of cases a creation by those in political power, the way the scarce resources are divided among the people, and the disparities slowly but steadily grow the class of the poor who are impoverished the more with time, hence growing the poverty group.
Today in Uganda, many people live in persistent poverty which reflects in denial of dignity.
Inequalities in opportunity and income are sharply on the rise year after year, and the gap between the rich and poor grows wider with time.
It is true that poverty is greatly a result of politically generated decisions that disempower the poor and marginalized and eventually violate their fundamental rights.
In Uganda, it is true that political instability in the past from 1966 to 1987 had a great role in recruiting many people into poverty as many lacked gainful employment, others lost the investments they had made to war, and many lost the bread winners as a result of death during the wars. These factors played a big role not forgetting the poor economic performance during the time which generated merger resources available for development and enhancement of better living.
From 1987, it is true that there have been areas in Uganda where there has been rebellion. Those within those areas were in most cases confined to poverty conditions from vert poor housing more so the grass thatched houses which could be touched anytime, poor medical services, poor nutrition just to mention some.
The overall picture since 1987 in Uganda has been how to allocate the scarce resources to enhance development and welfare of the masses. This area has had its own shortcomings with the leaders among other things challenged by corruption which some categorize as institutionalized, then the patronage scheme which has many recruited into positions which are not really necessary, but possibly as favors and, the same scheme is used to ensure that the NRM Government retains power, and of course that is at a great cost to the taxpayer.
It is not possible to seriously address poverty in Uganda under the NRM leadership given the major objective as retaining power which of course now is at a very big cost which among other things ensuring that there is security on alert to manage any uprisings as well as equipment which include teargas.
However good the plans one may have in Uganda to see people out of poverty, the resources needed to implement such plans call for budget provisions which more often than not have shortcomings say as a result of failure to realize budgeted resources among others.
It is also true that players at the grassroots who can greatly contribute to mobilization both financial resources and the people into better production and hence productivity are constrained when resources that would help them are cut off by powers that be or confiscated.
In Uganda, looks like the country has to have the big army of the poor for a longer time and of course as it keeps growing with time.
Indeed a sad story.
“Lived poverty remains high despite Uganda’s poverty-alleviation initiatives”.
Makanga Ronald Kakumba 28 Jun 2022 Uganda
“Uganda remains one of the poorest countries in the world. In 2019/2020, 12.3 million people (30.1% of the population) lived below the poverty line of U.S. $1.77 per person per day (Uganda Bureau of Statistics, 2021).
The number of Ugandans who are not poor but vulnerable increased as well, as did the number of those who shift in and out of poverty. The proportions of people who are not poor but vulnerable to poverty increased by 10 percentage points, from 33% in 1992/1993 to 43% in 2016/2017 (World Bank Group, 2016). Between 2015 and 2019, 8.4% of households moved out of poverty, while 10.2% slipped into poverty (Uganda Bureau of Statistics, 2020). And the COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated the problem, causing 300,000 more Ugandans to slide back into poverty (Uganda Bureau of Statistics, 2020, 2021; Independent News, 2021)”.
Makanga Ronald Kakumba is a research associate for Hatchile Consult Ltd., Afrobarometer’s national partner in Uganda.
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