A country’s independence day is always a time for celebration and reflection. In 1962 Uganda became and independent nation, free from British colonization. The theme for Uganda’s birthday celebration this year was unity. RELATIVTY OnLine’s Ugandan correspondent Arinaitwe Rugyendo takes inside the reason’s why unity is badly needed in the country known as the Pearl of Africa and reveals that despite the tremendous gains made, a country ravaged and left for dead by extension still has a long way to go. Straight and to the point, Rugyendo once again takes inside the heart of his country.

On 9^th October, 1962, Uganda was officially declared an independent state form Britain and an irreversible course of self-determination was set into motion.

This means that the country, just like the rest of Africa that was going independent, would determine its destiny economically, socially and politically.

Politically, Uganda has had the largest collection of presidents in Africa, with no meaningful democratic elections until 1996, when the first ever and truly democratic elections were held in the country ushering in a president who earlier ruled unconstitutionally for ten years. President Yoweri Museveni has since been winning successive elections, putting his total years he has been in power at 23 years!

But before Museveni presented himself before an electorate in 1996, the previous 20 years had had 8 presidents six of whom either grabbed power militarily or were helped to the throne by the invisible hand of the former colonial masters. One of the presidents, Prof. Yusuf Lule, actually ruled only for 68 days before being deposed by the military.

The other one, President Idi Amin, largely known to the rest of the world as the mass murderer who butchered his own people to retain power, had to be driven out forcefully by a combined force of Ugandan exiles and the Tanzanian army in 1979. He died in his comfortable flat in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where the Saudi King had offered him protection and security.

For decades, Uganda’s economy suffered from devastating economic policies and instability, leaving Uganda as one of the world’s poorest countries. Yet at the time of independence, Uganda had the same Gross Domestic Product as that of South Korea or even surpassed it. Today, the two countries are miles apart.

It is only at 47 years that the country has commenced economic reforms and growth has been robust. In 2008, Uganda recorded 7% growth despite the global downturn and regional instability.

Uganda has substantial natural resources, including fertile soils, regular rainfall, and sizable mineral deposits of copper and cobalt. The country has largely untapped reserves of both crude oil and natural gas.

Agriculture is the most important sector of the economy, employing over 80% of the work force, with coffee accounting for the bulk of export revenues. In the 1950s the British Colonial regime encouraged some 500,000 subsistence farmers to join co-operatives.

Since 1986, the government (with the support of foreign countries and international agencies) has acted to rehabilitate an economy devastated during the regime of Idi Amin and the subsequent civil war.

Inflation ran at 240% in 1987 and 42% in June 1992, and was 5.1% in 2003. It is now project at about 14%.

Between 1990 and 2001, the economy grew because of continued investment in the rehabilitation of infrastructure, improved incentives for production and exports, reduced inflation, gradually improved domestic security, and the return of exiled Indian-Ugandan entrepreneurs between 1990 and 2001.

So, this month, 9^th October, it will be that day once again on Uganda’s political calendar when the country will be celebrating 47 years of self-rule.

At this age, people have achieved so much and are beginning to settle down. The problem with Uganda is that as it settles down, some of the ills, such as underlying ethnic tensions continue to bedevil the country’s attempt to fully unify and achieve big-time development.

By 1986, Uganda had only 30 districts. 23 years later, these have multiplied to over 80 and we are still counting. And as long as any ethnic grouping, however small, asks for a district status in exchange for votes for the incumbent president, it will get one. This has of course exerted more pressure on the government as small district units become administratively difficult to run and maintain by the central government whose budget is partly funded by western donors.

On September 11, these tensions raised to the surface as security forces battled young rioters on the streets of Kampala City over the government’s move to block the king of one of the dominant ancient kingdoms that made up a republic called Uganda at independence from visiting a township in his area of ‘jurisdiction.’

Over 20 people were killed during the riots that rocked the city and its suburbs. Soon thereafter, about 1000 rioters were arrested for torching shops, private cars, burning up police stations and vandalizing business infrastructure. They have all since been charged with terrorism.

The Buganda Kingdom has been ethnically clamoring for ‘independence’ from Uganda in a move many Ugandans say is an attempt to disintegrate Uganda on ethnic grounds and one which is seriously retarding the country’s progress towards unity and federation with the rest of Africa.

Such moves are seen not only to appear to be internally generated, but also engineered by foreign countries who do not want to see Africa progress from unified position.

That is the characteristic that cuts across many countries of Africa- the lack of real independence. Because they are poor, they still have to depend on their former masters for handouts. Not even trends like digitization, liberalization, globalization and technological concentration have helped redress this situation.

The West still dictates to our military. The British and U.S embassies in Kampala-Uganda plus the residences of their respective ambassadors are heavily fortified and the link roads thereto completely blocked from public usage except themselves, their staff and their dogs.

No wonder during the celebrations to mark 47 years, all speeches will be delivered in English, half our budget will still be funded by foreigners and from mobile phones, to cars, to clothes to the fanfare and the military parade, everything of our lives will still reflect total foreign dominance!

The future of Africa-though promising… is still distantly bleak!