Your Excellency, President Yoweri Museveni,
I extend my gratitude for your leadership and commitment to Uganda and Africa. On your 80th birthday, you reaffirmed the Pan-African vision of creating the East African Federation and consolidating the African Continental Free Trade Area (AFCFTA). Your message of achieving prosperity for Africans by creating a large market and ensuring strategic security through integrated defense systems resonated with many of us who deeply believe in African unity and self-reliance.
You invoked the legacy of great African leaders like Nyerere, Nkrumah, and Kenyatta, who envisioned a continent free from exploitation, poverty, and disunity. Yet, the reality today is stark. African leadership has largely veered from the path of unity and development, leaving the continent grappling with rising debt, corruption, and misplaced priorities.
Africa’s economic potential is undeniable. We are blessed with vast natural resources, youthful populations, and strategic global positioning. Yet, many African nations are weighed down by crushing debt burdens that jeopardize their sovereignty and ability to develop independently. Instead of self-reliance, we are seeing nations mortgaging their future to international creditors, particularly China, which now holds a significant portion of Africa’s external debt.
Zambia, for example, faces over $32.8 billion in debt, largely for infrastructure projects that have brought little economic transformation. In Kenya, debt has skyrocketed to $70.8 billion, while Uganda’s public debt reached UGX 96.1 trillion ($25.3 billion) as of June 2023. The debt servicing burden is suffocating the ability to invest in critical sectors like education, healthcare, and industrialization. The Bank of Uganda projects that external debt servicing will account for 35% of GDP in 2024/2025.
Although borrowing can fuel development, the lack of transparency and accountability raises serious concerns about whether African leaders are making the right choices. Corruption remains a cancer that drains Africa’s resources. The $16 billion power sector scandal in Nigeria and Uganda’s Prime Minister’s $12.7 million for Peace, Recovery, and Development Plan scandal are just a few examples of how corruption diverts funds meant to improve the lives of Africans. Without eradicating corruption, dreams of unity and prosperity will remain unattainable.
The spirit of Pan-Africanism, grounded in collective action and selflessness, has been overshadowed by a culture of personal gain. Leaders today seem more focused on retaining power and accumulating wealth than on fostering unity. This is why Africa remains politically and economically fractured, unable to speak with one voice on the global stage or uplift its people from poverty.
Your Excellency, African unity is still achievable, but it demands accountability, strategic planning, and a commitment to self-reliance. We must end the cycle of dependency, reduce the debt burden, and eradicate corruption. If we do not, Africa risks becoming a perpetual source of raw materials and cheap labor for the world, rather than the prosperous, united continent our forefathers envisioned.
The Pan-African dream is alive, but it requires a new generation of leaders dedicated to integrity, accountability, innovation, and the collective good. Only then can the future you envision for Africa be realized.
God bless Africa.
The writer is an NRM Cadre and PhD Student
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