Today is marked and celebrated worldwide as International Labour Day in recognition of the important contribution workers make to development. The theme of this year’s national celebrations to be held in Hoima District is: “Strengthening Uganda’s Competitiveness for Sustainable Job Creation and Inclusive Growth.”
Although a public holiday, for millions of Ugandan workers and peasants it will not be a day to celebrate the dignity and significance of labour. It will be just another day to toil long hours for peanuts since Uganda’s ruling clique insists that Uganda’s workers do not deserve minimum wage because minimum wage would somehow chase away foreign investors who are accorded preferential treatment by the regime at the expense of bona fide citizens.
Whenever Labour Day comes, I recall May 1, 1970, the day 46 years ago on which a historic event took place and, for me, it will always remain a day on which the workers of Uganda stood tall and shoulder to shoulder to welcome with pride and great joy the beginnings of the economic emancipation of Uganda.
On May 1, 1970, and unknown to most members of his cabinet, president Milton Obote promulgated to a capacity-filled and jubilant crowd at Kampala’s Nakivubo stadium the famous “Nakivubo Pronouncements” formally known as “Document No.4 on the move to the Left.”
In a nutshell, Obote announced that with effect from May 1, 1970, government assumed, on behalf of wananchi, control of 84 commercial enterprises in Uganda, including oil companies, Kilembe mines, banks, insurance companies, manufacturing industries, estates, plantations and Uganda Transport Company.
The owners of the 84 nationalised enterprises would be compensated from profits earned within a period of 15 years.
That bold decision of government was naturally received with hostility locally by wealthy Ugandans and elsewhere by some foreign countries. The attempt to emancipate Uganda economically was sabotaged by a military coup on January 25, 1971.
I was a witness to the events of that historic day, having graduated a few weeks previously from the University of East Africa at Makerere, the last class of a great regional institution.
I was at Nakivubo stadium on May 1, 1970, in two capacities; as a worker and on duty as a member of staff of UTV which broadcast live and recorded the historic events of the day for posterity. I was then a senior producer at UTV working under Mr Aggrey Awori, who was director of UTV. In my long career in the public service of Uganda, Mr Awori is among a few resourceful, dedicated, well organised and inspiring people I have worked with.
The “Nakivubo Pronouncements” were about putting ownership of the means of production and the resources of Uganda squarely into the hands of Ugandans. Workers of Uganda have an important role to play in our efforts to protect and manage the national assets and resources of Uganda, but they can only play this role effectively if they are empowered. Empowering workers was a cardinal goal of the two UPC administrations of the 1960s and 1980s.
When he gave testimony in 1990 before a commission of inquiry into violations of human rights (1962-1986) chaired by Justice Arthur Oder, Mzee Paulo Muwanga (RIP) lamented that Ugandans were celebrating the rise to power of NRA without any idea of what awaits them in the future. He warned and forecast that by the time the NRM regime’s rule comes to an end, “the country will have lost all its possessions and national assets, the political class will be divided, one against the other and Uganda will be in ruins!”
Under the two UPC administrations, labour was accorded the highest importance which it richly deserves by having a separate ministry of Labour headed by a full and senior cabinet minister. Under the NRM regime the Labour portfolio has been downgraded to a mere directorate in the Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development!
The irony could not be more cynical, glaring and mind-boggling! Two majorities of our beleaguered country lumped together in a minor ministry which does not belong to the category called “core ministry” for budgetary purposes. Women are numerically the majority sex while the workers of Uganda comprise almost 90 per cent of the population of the pearl of Africa, of whom 80 per cent are employed in that financially starved sector called agriculture. It is unacceptable and a slap in the face of the silent majority of wananchi.
Workers and women of Uganda unite! You have nothing to lose, but your chains! Wake up, join hands, march together and demand your inalienable rights, such as gender equality and a minimum wage!
NSSF was established by the first UPC government in 1967 and placed under the line ministry of Labour where workers’ hard-earned savings were kept in absolute safety and invested wisely.
NSSF was, however, arbitrarily transferred in 2004 for dubious reasons to ministry of Finance and the fund has tragically become a cash cow and ATM for the some corrupt officials. The ongoing power struggle in the management of NSSF attests to this tragedy over what in Ugandan parlance is called eating!
On this auspicious day when Ugandans celebrate the dignity of labour, the leadership of the National Organisation of Trade Unions must speak truth to power, without fear or favour and reiterate the legitimate demands which the workers of Uganda have made every year for three decades to no avail.
The NRM regime must urgently address the burning problems of the workers of Uganda and stop the unethical practice of treating workers with contempt as if the principal producers of Uganda’s wealth do not matter! Wealth created by workers must not be routinely plundered and siphoned off with impunity by corrupt officials.
Aluta continua!
Mr Acemah is a political scientist, consultant and a retired career diplomat. hacemah@gmail.com
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