Watch Museveni: Uganda is now Targeting an Economy of US$ 500 Billion in the near future US500 News News

President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni on Thursday met and held discussions with a group from Standard Chartered Bank Uganda and UK at State House, Entebbe.

During the assembly, President Museveni and the delegation individuals mentioned how neatly initiatives will also be financed in Uganda.

The President thanked the financial institution for supporting the infrastructure in the nation however asked them to additionally put emphasis on the factor of wealth advent as a result of it’s going to extend manufacturing.

“If you make a road or Standard Gauge Railway but do not have enough to transport, then you will still have problems and you can even be overtaken by social issues like unemployment. So there should be a step on the infrastructure side but also a step on the wealth creation side,” he mentioned.

“On the wealth creation side, there are the four sectors which include commercial agriculture which we are handling ourselves, but there’s manufacturing now where we have a lot of raw materials, but they are not transformed into finished products. We need more in that area so that when there’s infrastructure, there are ready goods to move along on it. So, if you do the infrastructure and also do some manufacturing using our raw materials, that will quickly expand the economy.”

President Museveni additionally knowledgeable the delegation that Uganda is now concentrated on an economic system of USD 500 billion in the near future.

“The raw materials, the energy as well as some of the infrastructures are already there but what is not there adequately is the manufacturing and the dedicated Ugandans are there but they don’t have capital,” he mentioned.

“In the projects you are talking about, I think the immediate ones should be the Umeme buy-out, SGR and irrigation because we want to stabilise agriculture and Industries.”

On the different hand, President Museveni instructed his visitors that Uganda’s economic system plays neatly as a result of the National Resistance Movement govt controlled to review and handle the issues brought about via philosophical, ideological and strategic errors.

“There’s no chance that we have ever made any of those mistakes; we are very sure of what we are doing, and we are lucky that we are part of this very powerful part of the world; Africa where the problem has only been leadership both in the past with our kings, during colonialism and post-independence,” he stressed out.

“Our economy cannot do badly because we have got a lot of natural resources. We philosophically resolved the issue of understanding the role of the private sector because part of the problem in Africa is that they don’t understand the role of the private sector. This is a philosophical mistake.”

Furthermore, President Museveni asked the delegation to deliver in extra international traders to Uganda to take a position in the quite a lot of sectors of the economic system.

Mr. Faruq Muhammad, the Managing Director and Global Head of Structured Export Finance at Standard Chartered Bank thanked the President for developing an enabling atmosphere that has allowed them to finance quite a lot of initiatives in the nation.

“Uganda is a very good market for us. My first visit to Uganda was when we were financing Warid Telecom (now Airtel) which had just received an operational licence. As an international institution, we have a lot of tools and products and we appreciate the opportunity to use them as a joint benefit for the government and us partners,” Mr. Muhammad mentioned.

“Now we are looking at some key projects like the transmission lines, Kidepo Road Projects and some of the oil roads.”

The Board Chairperson of Standard Chartered Bank Uganda, Ms. Maria Kiwanuka mentioned the financial institution has been a just right cadre of financial building in the nation.

“There are quite a number of projects that we have executed here in collaboration with the Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development. We have worked very well with the government of Uganda in several areas especially the infrastructure development,” she mentioned.

The Managing Director/CEO of Standard Chartered Bank Uganda, Mr. Sanjay Rughani knowledgeable President Museveni that the financial institution is the oldest monetary establishment in Uganda, having existed for 112 years.

“For all these years, we have always wished good for Uganda and we have always supported the nation’s development agenda,” he mentioned.

Mr. Sanjay additionally famous that Standard Chartered Bank has contributed to a few % of the nation’s GDP thru lending, worth addition and supporting initiatives.

“We are currently working on projects worth USD 1.3 billion. In recent times, we have submitted our interest to finance many other projects such as SGR, Umeme buyout, among others, all worth USD4 billion of investment,” he mentioned.

“We not only do project financing here, but we also engage in international partnerships that are very crucial for Uganda. This can only happen when we have an enabling environment which has been achieved under your leadership. Manufacturing is also very key, that is why we have lent Shs400bn to manufacturers.”

Mr. Sanjay additionally congratulated the President for his visionary management that has enabled Uganda to be sturdy and resilient amid the present difficult international financial occasions.