The minister of defense and veterans affairs who is also a Member of Parliament for Bunyangabu District Hon. Adolf Mwesige said the issues of kidnap and killings that were rampant in the districts of Kampala and Wakiso for the last six months are acts performed by people who are testing credibility of the government. The Minister and Member of Parliament was hosted on 31st August 2019 during ToroDev’s supported weekly program ‘Orukurato’ that is aired every Saturday 8:00-10:00Pm and hosted by Mr. Kasigazi William on Hits Fm to respond to the Security issues in the Country where people are being kidnapped, killed and no reports have come up from government about the culprits and what is being done to curb the situation.
Hon. Adolf said, as government they have trained and deployed over 10,000 Local Defence Unit (LDUs) personnel in the Districts of Kampala and Wakiso to take charge of the security issues in these areas where they will identify the criminals and forward them to government for prosecution. The LDUs will be rolled in all the districts of Uganda to manage security and other related issues so that people can live in peace without fear of their lives and property. He further said Government will also support their work by doing community meetings across regions to get views and information from the public on these culprits such that a solution can be sought and anyone found guilty of committing a crime will be punished according to the existing laws of the Country.
In relation to the above Hon. Adolf said he recently held a security meeting in his Constituency and found out that the police supposed to keep law and order are not enough, some have negative attitude to work and others connive with culprits to steal and do other acts which put peoples’ lives at risk. He said the president under the constitution allowed merging of LDU’s and Uganda Peoples Defence Forces (UPDF) in fighting crime where police personnel manpower is not enough and we have started practicing it.
Hon. Adolf Mwesige -Minister of Defence and Veterans Affairs & Member of Parliament Bunyangabu District
The minister while sharing particularly from his Constituency said, Bunyangabu District under AGRI-LED program will receive fifty seven billion shillings (57b) and this money will focus on reducing unemployment among other things. He said as a district they have planned to have Agro-processing industries, Industrial parks, construction of a museum and cultural heritage, food mixer for animal feeds, etc. He further said the district has farmers who produce 60 lorries of bananas every week, grow tomatoes, pineapples, rice among others and all these can be used for example to make tomato sauce, juice, cakes and many other products when it comes to value addition using products from our farmers. The farmers in Kakoga parish in Bunyangabu district have been supported with a machine for cleaning and packaging rice and he is lobbying to get them a tractor to help them in their cultivation.
Hon. Adolf while speaking on road networks said, a Security road from Rugendabara via Kasese district and connecting to Kicwamba in Kabarole district will be constructed, Karugutu –Kanara road will have tarmac and a road crossing lake Albert in Ntoroko district connecting to Democratic Republic of Congo will be worked on under the AGRI-LED program and the government has started giving districts money for preliminary work and we hope in five years ahead all these we are talking about will be in place.
‘’We expect to attract investors when we have put in place these things we are talking about especially the tourism component and our people will get jobs hence reducing on the unemployment problem and improving income levels for our people’’, Said Hon. Adolf Mwesige.
Meanwhile, Fort Portal Municipality speaker Hon. Gilbert Kayondo who was co-hosted alongside Hon. Adolf said youth unemployment is rampant in the country inspite of government program like Youth Livelihood program (YLP), Uganda women entrepreneurship program(UWEP), operation wealth creation (OWC), etc meant to help people get employment and improve their income status. Hon Kayondo further said the beneficiaries of these programs are not the right beneficiaries earmarked by the programs and most youth are not mobilized and sensitized to access and use the funds from government. He requested the Minister to work with local leaders to mobilize and sensitize the youth on the enterprises they select and also build their capacity to use these funds effectively. Hon. Kayondo in addition requested government to think of creating industries such that the youth can be employed to reduce the unemployment problem in the Country.
Due to limited time listeners were not given the opportunity to call and engage with their leaders as the practice has been.
We thank all our development partners for the support that has kept our people engaged and informed.
