POLITICS | DP | UYD

KAMPALA - Democratic Party's (DP) youth wing, the Uganda Young Democrats (UYD), has commended the Government for its plan to merge public agencies and commissions saying it will save the country from unnecessary expenditure.

UYD president Ismail Kiirya says government officials tend to target agencies with big budgets and manipulate them for personal gains. 

Therefore, Kiirya says the move to merge them with ministries will ease the monitoring and evaluation which will not only stem corruption but also enhance productivity.

Addressing the media at DP headquarters yesterday, December 6, 2022, in Kampala, Kiirya said the merger has come at a time when the country is facing dire corruption and grappling with paying public workers' salaries.

 “We need a manageable number of workers to match with national budget capacity. Merging is one way to go,” Kiirya said.

The journey to restructure the government entities began with a July 2017 letter by President Yoweri Museveni instructing then Vice-President Edward Ssekandi and then Prime Minister Ruhakana Rugunda to develop a blueprint to eliminate “wastage of meagre resource".

In 2018, the Government undertook a reform to rationalise public agencies and public expenditure with a view of eliminating structure ambiguities, functional duplications and overlaps, wasteful expenditures and realising savings which could be used to facilitate other critical public services.

However, in September 2021, the then Deputy Speaker of Parliament, Anita Among, temporarily stayed the merger and the rationalisation of government agencies until an ad-hoc committee does a cost-benefit analysis of each of the agencies before their merger and ensures that the act (merging) is done in accordance with the law.

On Friday, December 2, 2022, public service minister Wilson Muruli Mukasa told reporters at the Uganda Media Centre that the merger would take effect starting July 1, 2023, and that the Government will use the intervening period for requisite legal, administrative and budget reforms.

According to the Government’s final plan, the National Identification and Registration Authority will, through a process to be staggered over five years, move to the internal affairs ministry.

Uganda Wildlife Authority is to be merged with the Uganda Wildlife Education Centre, Uganda Human Rights Commission and the Equal Opportunities Commission will become one as will the national youth, women, children, disability and older persons’ councils.

The councils regulating medical and dental practitioners, nurses and allied health workers will be merged and so will power generation, transmission and distribution companies.

Cabinet has also decided to merge Uganda Investment Authority with Uganda Free Zones Authority and bring into one entity the National Planning Authority, National Population Council, Town and Country Planning Board and National Physical Planning Board. 

Entities created out of mergers will remain independent or semi-autonomous, while those mainstreamed will revert or be re-hatted under the control of parent or line ministries, according to the plan.

According to the plan, the Government is supposed to merge and transfer the functions of 77 agencies.