Buganda kingdom unveils sh305.5b budget for 2025/2026 FY

_____________

Buganda Kingdom Lukiiko (parliament) has passed a sh305.5b budget for the 2025/2026 financial year.

Buganda’s second deputy Premier and finance minister, Robert Waggwa Nsibirwa, while reading the budget on Monday, June 16, listed the priorities to include: youth development, early childhood training and developing partnerships.

In his presentation, during Lukiiko sitting at Bulange-Mengo, Nsibirwa also revealed that the Uganda Government has expressed readiness to pay sh38b, being rent arrears owed to the Mengo establishment.

Buganda Finance Minister, Robert Waggwa Nsibirwa, honours the Lukiiko before presenting the 2025/26 kingdom budget at Bulange on June 16. (Courtesy photo)

Describing the commitment as a good gesture to honour debts, Nsibirwa explained that arrears were accruing due to unpaid rent on land taken over by the state. Early this year, he added that the total debt stood at sh500b.

“The central Government allocated only sh38b to Mengo in their budget for 2025/2026. While we thank the Government for that gesture, we wish to request them to honour the payment this time round and also consider paying more of the balance of the verified amount,” said Nsibirwa.

Highlighting the budget theme "Integrating Youth into Programme design and implementation to attain shared Prosperity", Nsibirwa said that under the Buganda Cultural and Development Foundation (BUCADEF) Mwanyi Terimba Programme, about 10,000 budding coffee champions will be trained to become certified pruning, harvesting, and post-harvest experts ready to serve the expanding coffee estates in the Kingdom.

Katikiro Charles Peter Mayiga and other cabinet members during the budget reading at Bulange on June 16. (Courtesy photo)

He said the Kingdom will invest in a new apprenticeship and internship scheme and create the Buganda Professional and Skills Bureau (Buganda Digital hub) where about 5,000 youth are expected to be trained.

Nsibirwa also reported that the Kingdom has 22 partnerships with different stakeholders aimed at improving livelihoods among people in Buganda and out of these, 12 partnerships are under review.

“Considering our youth, Uganda and by extension Buganda, boasts of the world’s youngest population with a median age of just 15.7 years, and a staggering 32% of our nation – over 14 million souls aged between 15 and 35. Too often, these bright young women and men are dismissed as unemployed or wayward, yet they are neither victims nor liabilities; they are our future,” said Nsibirwa.

Katikiro Charles Peter Mayiga ddressing Lukiiko before budget reading at Bulange on June 16. (Courtesy photo)

Urging stakeholders to work towards achieving a huge budget in the future, Katikiro Mayiga said the budget grew from sh257b last financial year.

Prof. Umar Kakumba, the Lukiiko’s finance committee chairperson, expressed optimism that the Kingdom's financial status is improving each year, noting that it was at sh119b during the 2021/22 financial year.