The Secretary-General of the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) party Rt Hon Richard Todwong has applauded the Luzira prisons leadership for their deliberate initiative that empowers and prepares prisoners with necessary income-generating skills ahead of release.

Todwong spent the better part of Sunday afternoon in the precincts of Luzira prison touring various projects like furniture making, baking, carpentry and joinery among others that were being undertaken by the correctional facility. 

The NRM boss first visited the Upper Maximum prison section to interact with prison heads and thereafter went on to check on the conditions of the inmates. He was later led on a two-hour tour to the furniture workshop and showroom, bakery section of wardens’ spouses, and a visit inside the state-of-the-art market with over 1000 traders’ capacity that is still under construction.

In his speech as Chief Guest to a section of political leaders of Luzira prisons parish and spouses of prison wardens who were gathered at the Prisons Academy and Training facility, Todwong said he was thrilled by the outstanding works being done in the barracks. 

He promised to lobby government and private enterprises for support and seek markets for their products to encourage mass production.   

“I have been challenged by the works presented to me by the wives of prison wardens and inmates at the bakery and the high quality and competitive furniture respectively. These initiatives are in line with NRM’s current manifesto and the president’s call for socio-economic transformation,” Todwong said.      

Todwong also donated 20 million shillings to women to be invested in their SACCOs by buying more machinery required in their business income-generating activities like bakery, hairdressing, and tailoring among others.

The Commissioner of Prisons Service in charge of Estates and Engineering Mr Gelevas Tumuhimbise said the idea of projects is meant to equip prisoners who are serving their sentences to attain economic productive skills ahead of release. 

“For the last eight years, we have been training and equipping prisoners with life skill abilities ahead of post-prison release to adopt positive behaviour to enable the prisoners to deal effectively with demands and challenges of life after sentence. We are glad to be contributing to the growth and development of our country in this manner,” Estates Commissioner, Mr Tumuhimbise said. 

He stressed that the prison’s core mission is to transform every inmate into a responsible and productive citizen of Uganda, adding that: “This is part of the rehabilitation process that is part of our core mandate as an institution of the state.” 

The women who made their communication through a memorandum to the Secretary-General read by their leader praised the NRM party for being a pro-people hence enjoying massive support for now over three decades. 

The women who confessed their love for the ruling and mass party asked the party leadership to arrange for them training and orientation in the Kyankwanzi leadership institute to align with the right progressive ideology.

Emyooga and Parish model

On the invitation by the Rt.Hon.Todwong, the National Coordinator of the Emyooga program, Ritah Namuwenge said she had picked great interest in what the women were doing and promised to support them with financial assistance to boost production and increase homestead incomes. 

She revealed that 70% of families who were in the subsistence economy before the introduction Emyooga initiative had since reduced to 37%.

“This gives me great confidence that with the emergence of the parish development model together with the existing poverty alleviation initiatives, the remaining percentage still producing for the stomach will be integrated into the money economy,” Namuwenge said. 

The presidential initiative on wealth creation (Emyooga) was formed to provide seed capital, free financial literacy service, enterprise selection, and training in building social capital and build business patriotism to various people engaging in various enterprises.  

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ChildFund Uganda has launched a five year strategy plan aimed at supporting 4million vulnerable children in Uganda.

Speaking during the commemoration of the Day of the African Child at Soroti Hotel, Moses Otai, the Country Director of ChildFund Uganda said the organisation is planning raise USD 40milion (Shs 140b) to facilitate all the activities throughout the five year strategic plan.

The strategies include; ensuring that children aged zero to five years access nurturing care at home and access quality early learning outside the home, health, and nutrition in households that are economically resilient,

“We aim at seeing that children and young adolescents have increased access to equitable, inclusive and quality basic education and studying in improved school environments that promote life skills.”

It also aims at ensuring that youths have improved access to opportunities for employment, engagement and living a healthy life. The organisation will continue skilling youth and adolescents with all skills set based on their interests for them to earn income in a non exploitative way and be active contributors to their communities.

“We will focus on strengthening the prevention, response, resilience of communities to disasters and impact, ensuring that boys and girls and persons with living disabilities are actively engaged in programs and social affairs to equitably improve their lives.” he said

Mr. Otai said ChildFund Uganda  will work with different stakeholders to see that Community Based Child Protection Mechanisms (CBCPM) is being strengthened to prevent and respond to violence, abuse, neglect and exploitation of children in the country.

In tandem, ChildFund commemorated the day of African Child under the theme; under theme; fighting all harmful practices against children. Mr. Otai said; “Most of us have been African Children and we are parents of African Children. It is essential that we recognize value and elevate the dignity of Children.”

“It is my call that we become the ambassadors that will fight all harmful practices against any child starting from our households.” he said.  

In her speech, delivered by Peter Pex Paak, the Resident City Commissioner (RCC) Soroti City, the Vice President Jessica Alupo applauded the ChildFund Uganda and the local implementing partners for complementing on government programs, reaching out to hundreds of deprived children and youth in the country.

“ChildFund Uganda is a donor funded organisation. Due to the peaceful environment and country’s position in respect to children’s rights enshrined in the Children’s Act among others, the donors decided to invest in our children and we really appreciate it,” She said.

She decried the increasing numbers of street children in the country begging on streets especially in cities of Kampala, Soroti and others. She alluded the shooting numbers of street children to parental negligence, poverty and lack of basic needs at their homes.

She warned parents against Female genital mutilation which is practiced in Amudat and other parts of Karamoja Sub-Region, child marriage in areas where poverty is prevalent. She said Parents are mortgaging their children because they have nothing to feed on.

She in tandem said there social economic interventions put in place to support parents which include; Emyooga supporting 18 enterprises in  tailoring, salon, welding metal fabrication and others. The Myooga funds are meant to boost businesses. The Parish Development Model (PDM) is set to be rolled out in the next financial year where each sub-county will get Shs100M. She urged Ugandans to take part in the PDM program to improve their household income.

“The government has put up training centers in 18 sub regions where hundreds of the youth have been trained in various skills and given working tools to start up their businesses. The equipment include tailoring machines, salon equipment and others,” She said

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The Ministry of Energy and Mineral Development and SNV Netherlands Development Organisations (SNV) Uganda have today launched the Africa Biodigester Component (ABC) project, which aims to boost access to biodigesters for circular agriculture and renewable energy.

The four-year project running until 2025 is funded by the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs and managed by the Netherlands Enterprise Agency (RVO). The 3.7million Euros project targets the installation of at least 8,000 small scale biodigesters across Uganda, providing energy access for at least 40,000 people.

Speaking during the launch in Entebbe today, SNV Uganda Country Director Phomolo Maphosa said the energy sector is still dominated by solid biomass, mainly in the form of firewood and charcoal, which contributes 88.6% of the country’s consumable energy.

‘Biodigesters offer increased benefits in the form of clean energy for cooking, and organic fertilisers for agricultural production, which will mitigate against the effects of deforestation and soil degradation,’ she said.

Joost van Ettro, Head of Cooperation at the Embassy of the Netherlands in Kampala highlighted that at the current rate of deforestation, in 25 years Uganda would have very few trees left.

‘Interventions such as the ABC project are therefore critical if we are to retain our biodiversity.’

He reaffirmed the commitment of the Netherlands to work with the Government of Uganda towards this important objective.

ABC Uganda aims to promote the scaling of biodigester technology towards agricultural value chains, both tangible in terms of increased agricultural production, and more intangible benefits such as reducing exposure to indoor air pollution, long term soil improvement, water retention capacity and carbon capture.

To achieve this, the ABC project will adopt information and awareness raising, provision of Business Development Support to biodigester companies and strengthen the biodigester business model for end users. Furthermore, the project will support 2 Government and Sector Institutions developing an Enabling Environment that stimulates involvement of the private sector.

All these provide communities with renewable energy, agriculture, health, employment and environment benefits, such as the production of bio-slurry as organic fertiliser, job creation, improved livelihood, and reduced environmental pollution. The project will explore commercialisation of bio-slurry as organic fertiliser, to increase farm output as well as creating new revenue streams for biodigester owners.

In his remarks, Dr Brian Isabirye, representing the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Energy and Mineral Development (MEMD) emphasized the importance of the innovation led approach in addition to technology-transfer in bolstering the biodigester market.

‘Political leaders are counting on ABC leadership to provide guidance, support and evidence to support the government in delivering the much-needed social outcomes’ he said.

The Guest of honour, Hon Peter Lokeris, State Minister for Mineral Development appreciated SNV and the ABC consortium for supporting the government’s Biomass strategy to promote modern technologies for cooking. ‘The project will also reinforce the government’s initiatives in achieving its National Development Plan (NDP) III targets to increase access to clean cooking and reduce the demand for firewood and charcoal, while creating employment for Ugandans,’ he said.

The project is implemented as a joint effort by a consortium of SNV, German Agency for International Cooperation (GIZ) and Biogas Solution Uganda Limited (BSUL) in codevelopment support of the Netherlands Enterprise Agency (RVO). SNV, as lead implementer, takes responsibility for overall project management and stakeholder coordination and in cooperation with BSUL, for the further strengthening of demand and supply of the sector. GIZ’s vast experience will be put to good use to support key sector actors to improve the enabling environment for the biodigester sub-sector in Uganda.

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