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@observer Wed, 27 Mar 2024 03:09:42
EPRC marks 30 years of impactful policy research
In three decades, the Makerere University-based Economic Policy Research Centre (EPRC) has been at the forefront of generating policy-oriented research and analysis to guide decision-making on socio-economic development in Uganda, writes YUDAYA NANGONZI.
At its 30th anniversary dinner held at Serena Hotel gardens last week, EPRC reflected on its journey of collaboration and societal impact as well as presenting accolades and certificates to its active and fallen partners.
Established in 1993 as an autonomous not-for-profit organization, the EPRC aimed to build national capacity to support the policymaking work of government.
Speaking as chief guest at the anniversary gala, the UN Resident Coordinator in Uganda, Susan Ngongi Namondo, applauded EPRC for leaving an indelible mark on the landscape of research. She was gratified with the fact that the center has maintained its independence regardless of its strong support from the government.
“EPRC has produced high-quality publications that have benefited all of us. This is commendable because most of the evidence that we depend on to support the different projects of Uganda’s development agenda resonates from their findings,” Namondo said.
She emphasized that EPRC’s future success will largely depend on it being able to adapt to the evolving environment within which it operates today. Government supports at least 70% of the EPRC budget while other resources are sourced from donors.
Reflecting on the journey thus far, EPRC’s director of research, Ibrahim Kasirye, who represented the executive director expressed profound gratitude to the countless researchers, and partners who have contributed to the organization’s success.
“Over the last three decades, our timely evidence-based and user-responsive research has contributed to informing various government policy, regulatory and programming processes and actions geared towards delivering its commitments to sustained economic growth and transformation,” Kasirye said.
“We have learned from our experiences to design better-focused strategic plans, seize research and financing opportunities, and strengthen governance and financial systems as well as, leadership and in-house research capacities.”
In its first decade, 1993-2002, EPRC researched Poverty Reduction and Structural Adjustments. It focused on the efficient implementation of structural adjustment programmes, considering prudent macroeconomic policies, private sector investment, and modernisation of agriculture.
This research was followed by another from 2003 to 2012 on how the country could attain the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), focusing on the effects of structural adjustment programmes on poverty, social protection, employment, and growth; service delivery in education and agriculture; public expenditure tracking, among others.
In the third decade, 2013 -to date, the center supported the government in its goal of stimulating inclusive renewed growth, particularly for the youth and women. Kasirye explained that this involved addressing the constraints on domestic revenue mobilisation and public finance management amidst declining donor support; renewed focus on social protection; service delivery mechanisms; and labour markets with a focus on addressing poverty inequality and food insecurity.
“Unlike the previous decades, we emphasized evidence to boost private sector development and competitiveness through research on agro-industrialisation; micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs); productive employment; access to financial services; informality, and domestic and external trade,” he said.
RESEARCH IMPACTS
In collaboration with the Finance Ministry, the center developed an Agro- industrialisation agenda for Uganda and a Public Investment Management Strategy for the Agro-industry.
“We have conducted extensive analytical work on poverty trends, pro-poor growth, poverty-inequality- growth nexus, and chronic poverty which have greatly informed the design, implementation, and review of Poverty Reduction Strategies, and the regular monitoring of poverty trends in Uganda,” Kasirye noted.
The EPRC findings have also supported the peace restoration process in Northern Uganda and conducted research that enabled the rescinding of a government decision in 2014/15 FY to impose value-added tax on agricultural inputs, among others.
They also spearheaded the development of the National Fertiliser Policy, Strategy, and Regulations; and offered technical support and oversight towards the development of the Agricultural Finance Policy and Strategy, National Industrial Development Policy, and the National Tea Development Policy. The center also extensively contributed to the review of the Sugarcane Policy 2010 and the Sugar Act 2020.
In his remarks, Prof William Bazeyo, who represented the chairman Board of directors at EPRC, commended the board’s executive director, Dr Sarah Ssewanyana, in absentia for a job well done. Ssewanyana lost a child last week and the burial coincided with the 30th celebration dinner.
“EPRC has had executive directors but at the most difficult time of COVID-19, Dr Sarah stood strong. At one time, there was no money from the Finance ministry but she managed to raise resources from partners to run the institution.”
CORDIAL RELATIONS WITH MAKERERE
Meanwhile, Makerere University Deputy Vice Chancellor in charge of Finance and Administration, Prof Henry Alinaitwe, noted that EPRC has maintained a cordial relationship with the university for the past 30 years.
Annually, EPRC, in collaboration with the College of Business and Management Sciences awards the best performing MA Economics students with a cash prize and a two- year professional career development opportunity that allows the awardee to have a six-month rotational training in each of the four EPRC research departments.
“Some of the beneficiaries have gone on to secure employment in international and credible organisations. EPRC also provides a three-month renewable internship opportunity to both undergraduate and postgraduate students of Makerere University,” Alinaitwe said.
This is in addition to granting students free access to all EPRC staff, research findings, and publications to complement their research. Going forward, he proposed that the two institutions can jointly produce policy analyses and peer-reviewed publications as well as mobilise funding for collaborative research leading to enhanced credibility and better policymaking.
FUTURE PLANS
To make its research and policy work more influential, the EPRC looks forwards to aggressive resource mobilisation to ensure the continuity of its mandate besides having a bigger home or office premise.
There are also plans to consider a paradigm shift from focusing predominantly on economic dimensions of policy to a blend of socioeconomic and political economy.
“We shall reposition the trade and regional integration department to continue undertaking research at the local level, but with a focus on informing and influencing the continental and global trade policies and development programmes,” reads the plans.
The EPRC intends to re-purpose its stakeholder engagements to focus on building the trust of citizens to own government policies and programmes. On broadening and improving capacity building, EPRC proposes developing a sustainable post-doctoral training programme targeting fresh PhDs to prepare them for the job market and the policy world.
This will be attached with re-instituting its international fellowship programme to attract international scholars to work with EPRC, to cross- fertilize ideas, skills, methodologies, and technologies in doing research.
As the UN’s Namondo stated, the center is also keen on maintaining its independence as a non-profit policy think tank in Uganda.
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@observer Wed, 27 Mar 2024 03:51:15
Reviving Ajai reserve: UWA translocates 226 kobs to Madi-Okollo district
The Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) has initiated efforts to replenish the Ajai Wildlife Reserve, translocating 226 kobs from Kabwoya Wildlife Reserve, located in the south-western Albertine region along Lake Albert in Hoima district.
Kabwoya, known for its large kob population, faces potential threats from regional oil exploration activities, prompting UWA to relocate some kobs to other conservation areas for their protection.
Prior to this move, UWA transferred 200 kobs from Kabwoya to Kidepo national park in May 2023. On March 22, during the final batch movement of 26 kobs, UWA Communications director Bashir Hangi announced future plans to relocate buffaloes and white rhinos to Ajai.
“We have finalized plans to bring 50 buffaloes from Murchison national park to Ajai starting next week, and next year, we will move white rhinos from Ziwa sanctuary in Nakasongola,” Hangi stated.
Designated a wildlife reserve in 1965, Ajai’s animal life has dwindled over decades due to poaching, leading to the extinction of species like the white rhino. Records show that Ajai was home to around 60 white rhinos until their disappearance by the 1980s.
In light of this, UWA officials and local leaders have cautioned surrounding communities against poaching the newly introduced kobs.
“The return of these animals benefits your future. Please protect them, or face legal consequences,” warned Sam Mwandha, UWA’s executive director, addressing the community during the arrival of the last kob batch from Kabwoya.
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@observer Wed, 27 Mar 2024 05:46:50
Mpuuga to Bobi: You are clueless; I’m coming to reform NUP
Cracks within the National Unity Platform (NUP), Uganda’s largest opposition political party, have grown wider after Mathias Mpuuga, its deputy president, hit back at those calling for his resignation over alleged abuse of taxpayers’ funds, arguing that the leadership of the party is clueless about how to galvanise its supporters ahead of the 2026 general elections.
Mpuuga has been in the eye of the storm after a social media campaign, under the hashtag #UgandanParliamentaryExhibition, released a trove of documents that pointed to him receiving a service award of Shs 500 million, which his party leaders interpreted as extravagance at a time when many poor Ugandans are struggling to put meals on the table.
The party then wrote to the speaker of parliament, Anita Among, requesting for the withdrawal of Mpuuga’s appointment as parliamentary commissioner.
In a press conference held at the parliamentary commission’s boardroom, a defiant Mpuuga said in the coming days he will lay out his plans of reforming NUP to rid it of what he called obscurantism, nepotism, corruption, greed, abuse of office, extortion, blackmail, defamation, slander and lack of internal democracy.
He then launched a salvo at Robert Kyagulanyi Ssentamu aka Bobi Wine, the president of NUP, for hiding behind accountability to portray him [Mpuuga] as “a terrible human being” as a way of character-assassinating him.
Mpuuga said that the public has failed to buy into Kyagulanyi’s smear campaign, adding that many in the party leadership feel the approach
the party has taken to portray him as corrupt is proof that the leadership only had a score to settle with him. He said that he has no intention of leaving NUP because he is a founding member of the party, and that he is not there on anyone’s invitation.
“I reassure the entire NUP leadership, membership, supporters, and the general public that NUP is my party and I harbour no intentions whatsoever of leaving; I am going nowhere; rather, I will in the coming days embark on a process of instituting internal party reforms to make it a credible and competent government in waiting,” Mpuuga said.
He added: “The largest opposition party [NUP] looks clueless and unable to guide its bruised cadreship. I’m going nowhere.”
TEST OF POWER
Mpuuga’s resolve to stay and fight within the party offers the first real test of a power struggle within the party. While there have been murmurs of a toxic relationship between Mpuuga and Kyagulanyi, the expose from the social media campaign has triggered a spark for a full-blown power struggle, with the battle lines now clearly drawn out.
The timing of this internal fight comes less than two years before Uganda goes to the polls, with the onlookers waiting to see whether the party will emerge out of this rabble scarred or stronger.
Talk of the ruling party bankrolling moles to operate within the opposition camps is as old as the country’s multiparty system, and it is one allegation that Mpuuga will have to shake off in the coming months if his message is to be bought.
On the other hand, Kyagulanyi’s ways of purging officials who harbour bigger leadership roles in the party could be misconstrued as a big-man mentality of stifling any room for questioning decisions passed by the party.
STILL DEFIANT
Mpuuga assured the ‘comrades in the struggle’ that his commitment has never waned. He promised he will never be part of any form of corruption, and no one will invite him into it.
“When we find ourselves disagreeable on anything in our midst, we must find mechanisms for mature resolution, which is different from grandstanding and desire to settle political scores at the expense of the reputations of comrades with whom we struggle to offer the country better leadership,” he said.
“Ugandans must be encouraged at all times to question the decisions of their leaders, especially those in higher offices, and make critical decisions on their behalf. In the current circumstances, it is also not difficult to tell that the objective was never on accountability, because no one provides financial accountability at press conferences and on social media.”
Mpuuga noted that he is appalled that instead of NUP focusing on the issues that matter such as President Museveni’s candid creation of a dynasty by appointing his son Muhoozi Kainerugaba as the chief of defense forces (CDF), and the renewal of the term of the Electoral Commission commissioners who bungled and fidgeted with the last election, they are busy engaging in minor issues.
Reached out for a coment, David Lewis Rubongoya, the party secretary general who is also being accused by many Mpuuga supporters of being one of those fermenting chaos in NUP, said he has watched Mpuuga’s address but wouldn’t want to respond before the leadership team meets.
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