Mr President, your recent State-of-the Nation Address and your closing remarks at the reading of the 2009/10 Budget were a huge disappointment. They were replete with promises; your intentions to eliminate corruption, to develop alternative energy sources, to stop Kony from attacking Uganda again etc., rather than an account of what has been done during the year by the government you head.

It is one thing to show a man that he is in error and quite another thing to put him in possession of the truth. A state-of-the nation address for example is a creature of the Constitution. It is not a manifesto or an address delivered at the will or whim of a President as you would want Ugandans to believe; it is a constitutional requirement that gives the tax payer an opportunity to receive accountability from a President for whom so much has been sacrificed. You have everything at your disposal for execution of your duties: food, clothes, transport, security, medicine, institutions and the requisite financial and human resources for self and family.

Resources allocated to your government for the last 23 years you have been in power, more than triple those that came under the control of Obote and Amin who, combined, ruled a total of 18 years. Yet impeccable research shows the two achieved much more for Uganda than yourself. Your interest has been to superintend over a dual economy, with a few connected people luxuriously and strikingly rich as majority wallow in poverty. You are practicing economy only with the truth. Because if Uganda's economy was growing and expanding, household incomes would proportionately improve as would be savings and investments.

Mr President, being a good warrior doesn't necessarily make one a good planner/manager. Winning military battles, at times by accident, does not necessarily equip one with skills and capacity to manage an economy of a country. It requires completely different skills which you lack. Which is why your economic management has swung from primitive to communism, to mixed economy, to capitalism and now to the one in place which can not even be easily described.

Every time you are asked to account for the resources you receive, you jump to statistics, painting a rosy picture of a growing and expanding economy. There is no doubt that the country has made some progress. But the progress should be in the right direction. What many people call progress in Uganda today is often the exchange of one nuisance for another. Ugandans are no longer interested in such statistics, especially when the same are not in tandem with the qualitative and quantitative changes in their lives.

Uganda's economy today is as confusing as a cross-eyed ping-pong player, with only projected growth as per the 2009/10 budget; an economy where production is reportedly high but prices are ever escalating; where a flow of investment is allegedly high but employment rates keep sky rocketing; where according to you, there is an increase in exports/foreign exchange but the country keeps recording Balance of Payment deficit from time to time.

The currency depreciated by 34.7 per cent against the dollar from a monthly average of Shs1,645 in September 2008 to Shs 2,216 at May 2009, mainly due to deteriorating terms of trade and withdrawal from the economy by investors in government securities; an economy where government reported deliberate reduction of foreign aid has not lifted majority of Ugandans out of abject poverty. Many still go about without food, health care, school fees and amenities.

To an economist, your statistics and economic picture are erroneous. To those who know you very well, the entire economic portfolio of the country is fictitious, a deliberate concoction to hoodwink the masses and stave off calls for accountability. No wonder the budget for FY 2009/10 has projected the economy to grow by about 6.0 per cent lower than the average growth in the last five years. Services sector performance grew by 9.4 per cent in the FY 2008/09 compared to 10.2 per cent in 2007/2008 indicating a declining economy.

Yours is a song about economic dualism where roughly two per cent of the population, the so-called middle class, has so much money and have put up posh houses/buildings in the leafy suburbs of Kampala and other towns as the rest of the population lives hand to mouth. From an economic point of you, the uneven distributed income and cash at the disposal of a handful of Ugandans may indeed reflect economic growth.

However, that kind of growth can not be an indicator of economic development. The rich in Uganda repatriate and/or invest their money abroad, unfortunately for reasons other than business acumen. They do so because of a guilty conscience, considering the fact that their wealth is ill-gotten. You should not deceive Ugandans that this kind of scenario improves their lives.

Problems in Uganda would lessen if people would listen. With selfish and greedy rulers in power who have no sense of shame and put personal interest over and above national interests, development can only come miraculously. Mr President, your promise that the recently discovered oil in the Albertine Region will qualitatively change lives in Uganda is just that- a promise, which unfortunately will not surpass others previously made.

If Ugandans were to benefit from it, detailed agreements with the exploring/drilling companies would be public by now. Your call on institutions to work diligently and curb corruption remains just that- a call. It is difficult to inspire others to accomplish what you haven't been willing to try yourself.

In sum Mr President, there is urgent need to change players in the management of the economy, to embark on clear planning and policy formulation/implementation while employing core elements of good governance viz transparency, accountability and institutional development.

Otherwise Ugandans can rely on your promises only to their peril. Countries such as Botswana, South-Korea, Thailand and Indonesia were as poor as Uganda at independence but were able to take off in a short time. Why not Uganda ?

Mr Sabiiti is FDC Treasurer General