Last year, President Museveni came in the 12th position as one of the best Presidents, scoring higher than many powerful leaders globally, including the former Prime Minister of Singapore Lee Kuan Yew and Park Chung-hee former President of South Korea between 1963 and 1979.
President Museveni’s significant contribution to Uganda’s economic growth is said to be a record 2.42% with a shrinkage of only 0.78% since he came to power in 1986, according to a report.
While making assessment on Museveni’s contribution, the report highlighted the infrastructure development at its peak now with 5,350km total of paved roads compared to 987km of 1986. The general quality of life and standard of living has improved tremendously together with an increase in incomes despite the increase in the population growth.
Other sectors highlighted include the employment sector with a national employment rate reducing from 11% to 8%, access to electricity grid has increased to 22% in 2017 from 14% in 2013 and access to water has also risen from 68% to78% during the same period. Revenue collections per annum has also increased, for instance in 2005/06 the total revenue collected was sh2.23 trillion compared to the estimated sh20 trillion to be collected in the next financial year.
To be gruesomely honest, none of this would have been possible if it wasn’t for the peace, stability, and freedom that citizens in Uganda enjoy. We as a country have even gone a notch higher to support war ravaged neighbours like Somalia, Burundi, Sudan, among others.
The robust peace and security under President Museveni is to be credited for the prevailing economic growth, restoration of freedom of speech, press freedom, freedom of worship relative democracy, effective foreign policy, education and tourism.
President Museveni is still celebrated as a visionary and a new breed of leader after ousting Idi Amin (1971–79) and Milton Obote (1980–85) before capturing power in the 80s. During Museveni’s presidency, Uganda has experienced relative peace and significant success in battling HIV/AIDS.
The NRM came to power promising to restore peace, security and respect for human rights. Indeed, this was part of the NRM’s ten-point programme, as Museveni noted in his swearing in speech:
“The second point on our programme is security of person and property. Every person in Uganda must [have absolute] security to live wherever he wants. Any individual, any group who threatens the security of our people must be smashed without mercy. The people of Uganda should die only from natural causes which are beyond our control, but not from fellow human beings who continue to walk the length and breadth of our land,” he said.
These and many more are some of the reasons that President Museveni was awarded with the African Leadership Peace Award early this week at the Royal Geographical Society in London.
Peace, will always prevail.