SOROTI – President Yoweri Museveni who is on country tour on wealth and job creation sensitisation drive on Friday 14 held a meeting with Teso sub-region leaders at Soroti University grounds.
Addressing the leaders, Mr. Museveni said that wondered why most Africans suffer poverty yet their continent is rich itself.
“Even when Africa is wealthy in terms of natural resources, there is a lot of poverty around us. This is largely because our people have failed to transition from traditional lifestyles and adapt to the demands of modern times,” said the president.
Like other tours, he emphasized subsistence farming is the main factor why Africans particularly Ugandans are stuck in poverty.
“For instance, 65 percent of our people are still stuck in subsistence agriculture. In the past, this was okay but with advances in economies, it is no longer tenable since it cannot earn them enough income to meet the needs of modernity.”
Mr. Museveni tasked leaders to educate the locals and transform them to adopt commercial agriculture.
“It is, therefore, the duty of every leader to teach our people how to practice commercial agriculture. Leaders should show the people the way because you are a socio-political doctor. You diagnose the challenges your people face and offer solutions,” said Mr. Museveni.
“Take this message and demonstrate its practicability to our people in the villages. Also, caution them against land fragmentation. Let us only share proceeds from the land, not the land itself,” the president asked leaders.
It should be remembered that Mr. Museveni who was this week in Karamoja region on the same mission described leaders whose areas still depend on subsistence farming as a mockery of leadership.
Mr. Museveni during his radio address at Morulinga State Lodge in Napak District said “To have subsistence farmers in your area continuously and you call yourself a leader, you are a mockery of leadership,”
He said, “Political parties are a means to an end; they cannot be an end in themselves.”
Uganda, being an agricultural country, Museveni asked leaders to make efforts to transform people into modern ways of farming, which will improve their well-being.
“The end is to transform the people: the family, the area, the country and Africa. Transform them how? By making everybody join the modernity of the four sectors: commercial agriculture with cura; industries; services; and ICT,” educated the president.
