President Yoweri Museveni has said that the National Resistance Movement (NRM) introduced mass education in order to ensure a big impact on human resource development.
The President made the remarks yesterday at the Miracle Centre Cathedral in Rubaga, Kampala when he met the youth of Project 86. The project unites the youth from all parts of Uganda born from the year 1986 onwards. The meeting was on the sidelines of the ceremony of flagging off food aid to South Sudan.
“The NRM Government introduced mass education in order to serve all wananchi. The current challenge is to ensure that there is quality among the masses,” he said. He reiterated that the availability of a trained mass would go a long way towards the development of the country. He cited India as one of the countries that used a similar approach towards addressing the human resource issue.
President Museveni said that the Government has registered success in three sectors within the Universal Primary Education (UPE) programme, namely reading, writing and numeracy. He revealed that the NRM Government has set the targets of promoting skills, professionalization and intellectualization. He said that the Government would continue with its goal of building classrooms, laboratories and libraries as part of the measures towards enhancing the needs of wananchi. He was happy that the student enrolment today at university level was 140,000 as compared to 5,000 in 1986.
Mr. Museveni expressed his pleasure over the students’ formation of a group that can talk about themselves and their wellbeing. He informed the youths that when NRM took power in 1986, there was a big challenge to the formal economy which had collapsed. He attributed the collapse to mismanagement and revealed that the first casualty was tax collection. He noted that the shortcoming culminated in a shortage of funds to build roads, schools and other infrastructure. He said that in 1986 the tax collected was only Shs 5 billion. He elaborated that the factories then had closed and people had no employment.
President Museveni told the youths that the NRM’s first task was to re formalize the economy to ensure that all imported goods that entered the country through the borders were well documented. He revealed that the Government created factories and attracted companies to invest in services such as hotels and several others adding that in 1996 some factories went into operation and the Government managed to increase its revenue collections. He revealed this progress led to the Government being able to fund defense and launch the UPE programme.
He strongly criticized characters in the mass media industry that have been spreading lies about the Government’s achievements. He assured them that NRM would address the situation by countering their lies that are being peddled.
President Museveni informed the youth that he has been trying to establish factories in the country but some people have been obstructing the realization of those assets. He said that this was a danger for Africa. He urged the youth to defend the establishment and sustenance of factories adding that the developed world in Europe and America is based on factories when Africa is based on manual labour. He said that the current trend of manual labour does not score good results saying that factories were the future of the world.
He reminded the youths that there were five employment sectors that should be utilized to promote themselves namely commercial agriculture, factories, services, ICT and the Public Service. President Museveni called on the youth to sensitize the people and ensure that they engage in commercial agriculture. He called on all the people living in rural areas to practice commercial farming as anti-dote against household poverty.
He called on the youth and other Ugandans at large to strive to add value to the agricultural products. He gave the example of cotton which has been fetching only US$1 per kilogram produced. He, however, noted that with the launching of the textile factory at Bugolobi in Kampala, the finished product would fetch up to US$15 per kilogram of cotton which product was hitherto being donated to the external processors. He reiterated that the processing of our agro-products would boost the national economy through the creation of more employment.
President Museveni pledged a donation of a bus and video cameras to facilitate the youth of Project 86 in their endeavors to generate income.
The leader of Miracle Centre, Pastor Robert Kayanja, revealed that plans were underway to host over 100,000 youths for a conference. He requested the President to address them and mentor them. He condemned people who allege that the NRM Government had done nothing for the people of Uganda.
The leader of Project 86 Mr. Cannery Mugume, revealed that Project 86 was not only about President Museveni but about the youth. He said that the youth group has attracted members from all parts of Uganda.
Several youths gave testimony of their achievement through the employment of the skills gained. They saluted the President for the UPE programme which they reported has been a big success.
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