President Yoweri Museveni on Thursday painted a bright future for Uganda's economy, which he said is on the right track .
"Uganda's economy is moving forward, mistakes by some actors notwithstanding. Given our correct position, we are unstoppable as everything is in place,"Museveni said.
The president was on Thursday delivering his state of the nation address to parliament at Kololo Independence grounds.
The state of the nation address is meant for the president to give an account of the progress of the country in terms of economic, political and social affairs in the past one year and forecast what is to come in the upcoming year.
Speaking during the televised address attended by MPs mostly from the ruling NRM party, diplomatic corps, accounting officers, religious and traditional leaders among other stakeholders, Museveni said the economy has been able to grow multiple times from $1.5 billion in 1986 to now $ 55 billion by the forex exchange method and $180.29 bn by the PPP method.
Uganda is now in the lower middle-income status.
The president, however, took a swipe at foreigners for interfering in Uganda's internal affairs but said they will not succeed.
"The foreigners interfering in our internal affairs, are not a threat at all."
Museveni boasted that since 1986, his NRM government was able diagnose Uganda's problems leading to accelerated growth of the economy.
" NRM has correct philosophical ideological and positions. That is why the economy is growing in spite of the betrayal by the parasites. With the crushing of the corruption, Uganda, given our overall correct positions, is unstoppable. Everything else is in place."
Integration
The president said these achievement will all be in vain if the East African region and African don't integrate to create a market for each other's goods and services.
"When wealth creators get serious with production, when they increase the production of goods and services, the internal market is no longer enough. We need the East African market, we need the African market and we need the global market."
According to Museveni, since the recovery of the economy, Uganda's sugar production has moved to 600,000 metric tonnes per year, yet the internal market can only consume 380,000 metric tonnes while 5.3 billion litres of milk are produced per year and only 800 million litres are consumed locally.
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The president said cement production has reached 6.4 million metric tonnes and yet internal demand is only 2.4 million tonnes, noting that this is where the issue of integration comes in because it supports Uganda's development.
Who will buy all this surplus? The answer for all these questions is that, it is, mainly, East and Central Africa that are buying the surplus. The COMESA area is buying goods and services worth $2.157 billion from Uganda. Therefore, the NRM was right to distil the principles of patriotism and Pan- Africanism and to oppose groups that were pushing for parochialism in Uganda and Euro- centrism globally. After the careful analysis, we realized that our prosperity, first and foremost, needed patriotism and Pan-Africanism," Museveni said.
" We access other markets in addition, but let us secure these two levels first. This is why we worked so hard to revive the EAC and consolidate COMESA."
