Why homophobic Ugandans are not evil people to hate but ignorant people to pity THE LAST WORD | Andrew M. Mwenda | Sometime in 2014, I went with my son, Michael, then a lad of 19 years, to Serena Hotel in Kampala for lunch. I was in Constitutional Court challenging the Anti-Homosexuality Act …
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Inside the politics that have led our capital city to move from potholes to giant craters on its streets THE LAST WORD | Andrew M. Mwenda | The road infrastructure in Kampala is in shambles. We can no longer even talk of our city roads being dominated by potholes. In fact, today we …
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The quintessential public servant and free market intellectual Uganda will miss THE LAST WORD | Andrew M. Mwenda | Tragedies rarely come in a trickle but in a flood. And so it was that on Wednesday last week, I heard of the death of my former lecturer and friend, John Ntambirweki. Then on …
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Lessons for Uganda’s policy-makers from the experience of her oil industry THE LAST WORD | Andrew M. Mwenda | I spent this week in Hoima (Kingfisher) and Bulisa-Bugungu visiting construction works on oil rigs and central processing facilities in the Albertine Graben. I was greatly impressed by the work that Petroleum Authority Uganda …
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How the new anti-gay law is bad for our country yet good for the long-term tolerance of homosexuality THE LAST WORD | Andrew M. Mwenda | So, Uganda’s parliament once again passed a law to hang homosexuals. This was done in the most democratic manner possible: 399 out of 529 MPs (75% of …
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Why I harbor a deep-seated hostility to parliamentary and other investigations into public corruption THE LAST WORD | Andrew M. Mwenda | I promised in this column last week to return to the NSSF saga and shade more light on how public hearings distort facts and purvey bias and prejudice. ( The Trouble …
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How prejudices have eclipsed facts in the NSSF investigation leading to unnecessary confusion THE LAST WORD | Andrew M. Mwenda | When the speaker of parliament, Anita Among, established a Select Committee of Parliament to investigate NSSF, I knew the battle for the truths about the Fund was lost. This is because when …
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Why a lot of surmons about economic transformation are a mixture of oversimplification and moralising THE LAST WORD | Andrew M. Mwenda | Kishore Mahbubani is a distinguished diplomat from Singapore and twice served as that country’s permanent representative to the United Nations. And he is also a brilliant intellectual and author. His …
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How all sides to this conflict made strategic miscalculations that will reshape the world order THE LAST WORD | Andrew M. Mwenda | Today (February 24th) marks one year since Russian tanks crossed into Ukraine in what President Vladmir Putin called a “special military operation.” Since then, the war has only proved …
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How the infrastructure in our capital city has declined to resemble that of Mogadishu after 30 years of civil war THE LAST WORD | Andrew M. Mwenda | Kampala has ceased to be a city. It now looks like a war zone. The roads around the city have literally fallen apart. Potholes rule …
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The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price