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By Haggai Matsiko How close links to Mbabazi  cost Chinese US$3bn deal When Uganda’s Prime Minister Amama Mbabazi visited China in June last year, he met with Wang Yilin, the chairman of China National Offshore Oil Company (CNOOC).   At the time, The Independent heard from sources that the two discussed …

By Haggai Matsiko Army that beat Machar’s fighters faces an unceremonious exit A potholed runway ushers you into Juba International Airport—the most critical South Sudan government installation.  A small old stuffy building with dusty window panes and a dusty cracked cement floor, the terminal is manned by policemen who don …

By Haggai Matsiko Is she the reason Uganda’s most expensive parliament cannot deliver? The Speaker of Parliament, Rebecca Kadaga, continues notching good ratings in opinion polls and among commentators on public affairs. However, the same cannot be said of her House and its 385 legislators.  In a recent poll by …

By Julius Businge Budget priorities expected to enhance socio-economic transformation What should a Shs 15 trillion budget focus on in a country like ours?  A mini survey conducted by The Independent in Kampala on peoples’ perception about the budget found out that they were interested in seeing medicines in public …

By Julius Businge  New poll indicates majority of Ugandans happy with the economy but… A poll conducted in April this year by Research World International (RWI) in partnership with Monitor Publications Limited and Uganda Governance Platform paints a good picture about Uganda’s economy since 2011. The major objective of the …

By Ronald Musoke The wealthy, at 42%, are the least optimistic Political opinion polls by their nature are supposed to be situational, often times, commissioned to gauge those things that are in the public domain at the time. If responses of Uganda’s richest people in the recently released opinion poll …

By Haggai Matsiko Can the opposition build enough muscle to change its poll-predicted fate in 2016? It is only 18 months to 2016 when Uganda goes to the next polls. Yet while President Yoweri Museveni, hit the campaign for these polls as early as 2012, not much has been going …

By Independent Team As Museveni’s election cash is set to flow again The forthcoming 2014/2015 budget is set to Finance Minister Maria Kiwanuka’s first election budget. She faces a common dilemma; uncontrolled public spending on elections, which requires an uncommon response; tough controls, especially on the foreign reserves.  Of course, …

By Patrick Kagenda Fight for May 22 by-election win shows President’s desperation When President Yoweri Museveni and his NRA rebels captured power in 1986, Brenda Nabukenya was a two-year old toddler in Luwero where most of the war of `liberation’ was fought. She turned 18 years-old in 2002 and, therefore, …

By Haggai Matsiko  Museveni’s sole candidature stumbles, amidst money fights President Yoweri Museveni has a heck of a job restoring order in his ruling party, the National Resistance Movement (NRM) ahead of the 2016 polls.  The fallout with his Premier and party Secretary General Amama Mbabazi over the latter’s perceived …