President Museveni commissions SFC Officers' housing units

PIC: President Yoweri Museveni poses with SFC soldiers after commissioning the housing facilities

INFRASTRUCTURE

WAKISO - President Yoweri Museveni has today commissioned 25 housing units for officers of the Special Forces' Command (SFC) at the Kambarage Nyerere Barracks at Busambaga-Katabi, in Entebbe Municipality.

The building of the housing units began in May 2017, spearheaded by the engineering unit of SFC. The units are named after the late Martin Mwesiga, a soldier who fought tirelessly to end the dictatorship of Idi Amin.

President Museveni, who had contributed 2,000 bags of cement earlier to the project, commended SFC for having used their own manpower to construct the houses, adding that it saved a lot of money that they would have spent on using private construction companies.

"Some private contractors are poor. They go to banks and borrow money at 24% interest rate and on account of greed, put in a profit calculation of 19% which makes it 43%, that we would have to pay," the President noted.

President Yoweri Museveni commissioning the housing units

He urged soldiers to refrain from corruption tendencies and greed so that more houses can be built to accommodate more soldiers and their families. He said Army schools could not be sustained because of corruption as some people used to bring the entire clan which overwhelmed the system.
 
President Museveni thanked SFC for remembering Mwesiga and advised them to have a systematic and organised way of keeping records for the children of the veterans so that the Army can be able to help them.

"In 1973, Mwesiga died. At the time, the country was in a bad situation. Comrades like Mwesiga, who died early, were young and educated people who sacrificed for the nation. His grandson can now live in peace because of his sacrifice," he said.

The President promised the SFC unit that he would talk to the Government to see to it that they get construction equipment for the army so that they stop hiring them.

The Chief of the Defence Forces, Gen. David Muhoozi, noted that the construction of the housing units spoke volumes about the self-reliance and welfare in the Army. He noted that there was a lot of cost-saving in the project as SFC used their own skills and labour to put up the simple structures. He urged the defence leaders to emulate what SFC had done.

The commander of SFC, Brigadier Don Nabaasa, said the housing unit comprises of five blocks, each having five houses that are two bed-roomed, self-contained, adding that over sh217m was used to construct each of the blocks.