What was the justification for the formation of the National Planning Authority (NPA) by the government?
Uganda was initially not planning with a long term perspective. The planning was mainly short and medium term. The National Planning Authority came in to fill the vaccum that was formed by ad hoc planning.
This kind of planning has led to problems like universities producing thousands of graduates who cannot be absorbed in government or the private sector. NPA is therefore looking at how the supply of labour can match with demand to create equilibrium.
We are looking at this problem in totality. We need long term interventions to address this and that is why we are here.
Because of long-term planning, countries like Malaysia can tell the number of health centres that will be needed in the nation in the next 30 years.
On the other hand, because planning is not coordinated, you find a newly tarmacked road being dug by utility companies to lay wires and pipes, a few months after construction.
This turns out to be expensive when the roads need to be repaired afresh. If there is coordination, this cannot happen. NPA is here to harmonise national planning in a cost effective manner.
What is the mandate of NPA?
The primary mandate of NPA is to put in place, supervise, evaluate and coordinate the National Framework System and strategies that facilitate cost effective and participatory national development Planning in Uganda.
It also monitors and evaluates the effectiveness and impact of the development programmes as well as the performance of the economy of Uganda.
Other functions are to advise the President on development policies and strategies, review high priority development issues and make recommendations among others.
What are the key achievements of NPA so far?
We have identified key sectors for development in this country and made recommendations to the government.
NPA has come up with a Medium Term Plan 2005-2007 and have developed a proposed Career Guidance Guidelines for Uganda.
We believe this will reduce the problem of unemployment because students and parents do not have what to refer to for career guidance.
This is one of the main causes of unemployment in Uganda. We have developed strategies for transforming public service delivery in Uganda.
In addition to that, the authority has come up with the first e-government Strategy. This is intended to introduce online systems to link government departments that will promote effectiveness.
The Authority has been liasing with the African Capacity Building Foundation in Zimbabwe for several years, which has resulted into Uganda through NPA, getting a grant worth $15.5 million. This grant will be used for a period of three years to strengthen National Capacity Building Programmes in areas of planning, public management and accountability.
The programme will involve the office of the Auditor General, the Inspector General of Government, the Accountant General in the ministry of Finance and the Uganda Management Institute to promote accountability and transparency, which are key to development.
NPA has also created the "Blue Room." This is a forum like Ekimeeza for people from all walks of life. NPA chooses a topic for discussion on a monthly basis, say the impact of UPE in Uganda.
A key note speaker is invited and he or she speaks about the topic, people in the audience respond and their ideas are integrated in the national planning framework.
NPA has carried sectoral development studies in forestry, tourism, fisheries and other sectors.
As the government's principle strategic planners, what do you think should be the priorities -the foremost pressing challenges- of the country's economic development efforts?
Poverty reduction should be the key desire for government and the NPA.
We have talked about poverty reduction for years and different programmes have been introduced to combat it.
We have registered economic achievements at macro level but these successes have not been translated to the poor people. We therefore need to target the households at parish level.
We have to make these successes meaningful to the poor through providing health services, building roads, providing piped water and other areas.
Another priority is to introduce commercial agriculture supported by irrigation mechanisms because relying on rainfall cannot promote commercial agriculture.
There is also need to add value to our exports through agro- processing. We are supposed to support farmers' cooperatives to enable farmers market their produce easily and access loans.
Another priority is making sure that we implement the e-government strategy framework to improve public service delivery.
How do you follow up all the development recommendations you submit to various sectors of government to find out whether they are implemented?
We go to Parliament and make noise. We ask why the recommended plans are not followed and fully implemented.
We analyse and establish whether funds that are allocated to government departments, ministries and districts utilise funds that allocated to them in the national budget.
We look at their policy statements to find out whether they contribute to the objectives of the Poverty Eradication Action Plan (PEAP).
Autor: Jude Luggya
Quelle: AllAfrica, 10.01.2006
