Deputy Speaker of Parliament Thomas Tayebwa has questioned whether Uganda is getting sufficient returns from the more than Shs3 trillion expected to be spent on elections, urging leaders to prioritise economic growth, industrialisation and improvements in citizens’ livelihoods.
Tayebwa said the country needed to critically examine its governance and electoral models and assess whether public expenditure on democratic processes was translating into tangible benefits for citizens.
“We know that around Shs3 trillion and above is going to be budgeted to go into elections,” Tayebwa said.
He made the remarks during the inaugural monthly government whips coordination meeting, where he called on legislators to focus on policies that accelerate Uganda’s economic transformation.
Tayebwa urged leaders to develop homegrown economic and governance approaches suited to Uganda’s circumstances rather than blindly adopting models from other countries.
He said the country needed to combine market forces with strategic government intervention, with policies judged by their ability to promote stability, economic growth and better living standards.
The Deputy Speaker identified the high cost of doing business as one of the barriers to economic expansion, questioning why transporting goods to the Kenyan port of Mombasa could cost more than travelling to Dubai.
He urged legislators to push for lower electricity costs and better operating conditions for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), saying economic policies should not concentrate exclusively on large industries.
“How do we also look at the SMEs? How do we work on those?” he asked.
Tayebwa also called for greater investment in value addition and industrialisation to enable Uganda to process more of its raw materials locally, create jobs and expand economic opportunities.
He said the private sector would be central to economic growth, requiring the government to address barriers that discourage investment and business expansion.
He further urged MPs to visit industrial facilities and other economic projects to understand successful interventions and identify lessons that could be replicated elsewhere.
Government Chief Whip Jane Ruth Aceng, who also addressed the meeting, criticised ministers for dismissing parliamentary committee reports instead of responding to the concerns raised, warning that the practice undermines legislative scrutiny of government programmes.
Aceng said some committee chairpersons were unhappy that reports prepared after two to three months of work were sometimes dismissed by ministers on the floor of Parliament without adequate consideration.
“Some of them are not happy with the way some of the ministers respond to the reports because, according to them, they get this information from the ministers, and some ministers try so hard to rubbish the reports on the floor,” Aceng said.
She appealed to the Deputy Speaker and parliamentary leadership to allocate sufficient time for debating committee reports, arguing that legislators needed opportunities to examine findings and resolve disagreements over the information presented.
“My humble appeal to you, in the very busy schedules and the very short time, is that we also want to have quality time to discuss the reports widely,” she said.
Aceng added that disputed information should be reviewed and corrected where necessary rather than dismissed outright.
“If there is a problem, then there is room to improve. When we revisit the information, we can assimilate the information and have the reports corrected,” she said.
The Chief Whip also criticised MPs for repeatedly raising questions focused on their constituencies instead of matters of national importance, saying this consumed valuable parliamentary time.
“We ask the same questions every day. The same questions, which require the same answers, and it takes a lot of time,” she said.
She urged government whips to encourage legislators to prioritise national issues during parliamentary proceedings while continuing to address constituency concerns through other engagements.
Aceng also called for better coordination of standing committee meetings, Central Executive Committee meetings and plenary sessions to avoid scheduling conflicts.
The meeting was expected to review the government’s first-quarter performance and discuss Sebenomics, the economic philosophy associated with President Yoweri Museveni, which Aceng said should inform planning and efforts to advance Uganda’s economic transformation.
She urged government whips to contribute more actively to the country’s economic transformation agenda beyond their role of mobilising government members in Parliament.