By Charles Katabalwa and Leonard Kamugisha Akida,
KAMPALA
The opposition Democratic Party (DP) has tasked coffee farmers in Uganda to oppose the government proposed merger of Uganda Coffee Development Authority (UCDA) into the Ministry of Agriculture.
This comes after President Museveni’s remarks at the 5th Presidential CEO Forum, where he claimed that Uganda’s coffee market would remain unaffected after disbanding of the Uganda Coffee Development Authority. The President also noted that he has people who are capable of providing coffee seedlings, retaliating that even without a coffee agency, the quality, purchase, or sale of Uganda’s coffee will not be affected.
Fred Mukasa Mbidde, DP’s National Vice President, however, contends that the merger would undermine the progress made by UCDA in promoting coffee production and abuses the liberal economy in the country.
He says that unless there is hidden agenda, UCDA should remain a separate agency if coffee production should benefit coffee farmers and the country at large.
He calls upon ugandans mostly coffee farmers to stand strong and oppose these plans.
Additionally, Mbidde refuted claims that by disbanding UCDA, the president is plotting to handover Ugandan coffee to Italian businesswoman Enrica Pinetti and her company – Uganda Vinci Coffee Company Limited (UVCCL) to habe monopoly over purchase and exportation of Ugandan coffee. Mbidde believes that the president has many options if he is interested in monopolizing coffee in Uganda.
“If the president wanted to hand over coffee to Pinetti, he has the way to do it, the same way he amended the constitution during Age limit, he can hand it over […] I don’t subscribe to a view that one company can’t handle this because the proposers and opposers of this did not give enough reasons,” Mbidde said recalling a British company, IBEACO that had monopoly over Ugandan cash crops before independence.
He called for government interventions such as establishing buffer stocks and stabilizing coffee prices.
