BUSINESS | TAYEBWA | ENTREPRENEURS

KAMPALA - The Deputy Speaker of Parliament, Thomas Tayebwa, has called on authorities to put in place enabling laws and policies to attract and support young entrepreneurs in the country.

Tayebwa also castigated what he described as “internationalizing everything” in term of ensuring standards for products made in Uganda instead of making adjustments to help people benefit from it.

“Most of the standards you are seeing here are international. While I was government chief whip, we were faced with the situation of Covidex, curing ministers and everyone but National Drug Authority (NDA) saying you should not be on the market. So in short, you are encouraging a black market to grow because this is a matter of life and death. 

And you are saying Covid has no cure, yet we have Covidex doing it; NDA is saying, it has not gone through the processes yet some people have been treated by the same product,” he explained.

While describing himself as a manufacturer of surface disinfectant which is similar to that imported by another company from Dubai and helped UNBS to develop standards but after which they favoured an importer at his expense.

The Deputy Speaker, Tayebwa, made the remarks while presiding at the Young Entrepreneurship Summit 2022 in Kampala.

According to Tayebwa, UNBS asked him to rebrand his product to call it ‘multipurpose detergent’ to favour the importing company which was unfair.

He made the remarks while presiding at the Young Entrepreneurship Summit 2022 in Kampala.

The event organized against the backdrop of the tough economic times, the country is going through, was supported by nine companies in addition to exhibitors of the summit that attracted more than 1000 participants.

Tayebwa asked the organisers to come up with recommendations in order for him to link them with the committee of parliament on trade, tourism and industry and present them to ensure that we make changes that help the young entrepreneurs.

He commended the young entrepreneurs saying that they would relieve the country of the growing strikes because they know how to make money.

Tayebwa explained the hard times and conditions he has gone through to acquire wealth and promised to assist the young entrepreneurs through his office to make adjustments to support them.

Tayebwa warned the young people to desist from planning to earn while working but instead plan to earn while at home.

“Now on the side of making enabling laws, it is very important to continue making engagements with audiences like this, so that we make laws that fit in a society rather than making society that fit in laws.”

He added: “it is important that we do make laws that fit well in businesses rather than businesses fit in laws because the other laws are based on reality about what business is doing.”

Tayebwa warned the young people to desist from planning to earn while working but instead plan to earn while at home.

“I have a problem with most of you. You are the big spenders in town and after you ask government to help. Being an entrepreneur is simple based on character, showing a simple business of food supply to people,” said Tayebwa accusing the Ugandans of abusing their jobs by duplicating other peoples’ businesses and destroying the brands.

Edwin Musiime, the organizer said the event sought to inspire and empower the entrepreneurs with new ideas and new innovative solutions    

“We are emphasizing and fostering economic recovery and building entrepreneur sustainability. Uganda is ranked as the most entrepreneur country, our conversation is now on do we engage, connect and grow with collaborations that are empowering entrepreneurs to sustain their businesses,” he said.