A desert locust on a tree

However, Prime Minister Ruhakana Rugunda has assured the country that government has made preparations to ensure the imminent locust invasion is prevented.

He described it as an emergency that requires immediate intervention during an Inter-Ministerial meeting comprising Ministries of Agriculture, Finance, Internal Affairs, Defence, Security, Environment, Local Government, East Africa Community Affairs, Presidency and Disaster Preparedness and Uganda Wild Life Authority.

He urged the public to stock food reserves as a precautionary measure.

“With an imminent threat of locusts invading our country from our neighbors in Kenya, I would like to assure the public that the Government is taking this matter seriously and consequently, different agencies of Government have been instructed to work together and collectively heighten our preparedness to prevent and handle the invasion,” the Prime Minister said in a statement on January 21.

He said the Ugandan government is in contact with authorities in Kenya to explore ways of jointly addressing the challenge.

Locusts invasion

What experts in the region say

According to The Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD), the severe Desert Locust outbreak in the region is threatening rural food security across East Africa.

IGAD Executive Secretary Dr. Workneh Gebeyehu while calling on member states, the East African Community and partners to pull resources together to prevent, control and possibly eradicate the Desert Locust, said the desert locusts is a threat to livelihood in the Horn of Africa.

“IGAD calls on Member States, the East African Community and partners to pull resources together to prevent, control and possible eradicate the Desert Locust threat to the food security of the region,”said Dr.Workneh Gebeyehu,IGAD’s Executive Secretary and added, “Prevention and control measures must be scaled up to contain further spread of the Desert Locust”.

Locals take to chasing locusts from the fields

In a statement, Dr. Gebeyehu said the invasion is a threat to food security of the region. He called for scaling up of prevention and control measures to contain further spread of the Desert Locust.He urged member states to act urgently to avoid a food security crisis in the region.

The Executive Secretary urged for increased ground surveillance for early detection. He called for use of wind forecasts, to help pre-empt trajectory of desert locust bands and swarms as well as immediate regional mapping of current invasion and forecast trajectory.

Dr. Gebeyehu urged countries to act urgently to avoid food security crisis in the region through aggressive targeted aerial and ground spraying and immediate up scaling of aerial control operations.

IGAD is appealing to governments to make use of the mass media especially Radio to disseminate and educate the public in order to aid early detection and reporting.

Map showing the spread of the desert locusts that started from the Greater Horn of Africa

“Encourage citizens to report any incidences of desert locusts,” said Dr. Gebeyehu in the statement.

Dr. David Phiri, FAO Sub regional Coordinator for the Eastern Africa and Representative of the African Union and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa warned that the locust invasion is worsening the food security situation in the region.

“The locust is making a bad food security situation worse in the sub-region, exacerbating the existing dire food insecurity and malnutrition in the sub-region,” said Dr. David Phiri, FAO Sub regional Coordinator for Eastern Africa.

Dr. Phiri further warned that the weather seems favorable for the locust breeding in high probability that the locust will continue to breed until March-April 2020.

The United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has warned that the large immature swarms are spreading from the initial invasion areas of Mandera County, south of Wajir and Garissa, west along the Ethiopian border in Marsabit county and southwest into central areas of Isiolo, Samburu, Meru and Laikipia counties.

The UN body says one immature swarm is 60 kilometers wide. FAO further warns that the swarms are expected to move into the Rift valley’s Baringo County and move northwest into Turkana County.

Other swarms are expected to move to Tana River County, while others will move to the northeast Uganda and southeast South Sudan. When the swarms mature, they will begin to lay eggs in the sandy moist soils giving rise to numerous hopper bands in February.

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The electoral commission chairman Eng. Badru Kigundu reveals plans for the nation to hold residual elections in the local government councils that will be held in 109 districts. On releasing the plan today Kigundu confirms that a number of areas in local governments were voting did not take place during the general polls on account of death or violence among other issues has called for the hosting of this exercise.

The exercise kicks off on 11 May 2016 with consultative meetings with the polling for residual local government and tallying slated for 31 May 2016. Among the posts to be elected include, professional bodies at KCCA and Regional representatives of older persons.

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Ngobi further reminds government to increase the budget allocations for the local governments from the current 15% to 38% saying this will help the local govt effectively extend services to the communities since they are left with a huge work load compared to the central government.

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Local government Finance commission has asked government to increase its financial allocation for better service delivery given that there is increasing creation of new districts. Members of the commission made the appeal while presenting the 2013/2014 annual report to the speaker of parliament today at parliament.

The chairperson of the commission Mr. Tom Matte who led the group says that government allocates only 12.9% of the national budget to local governments yet it requires for allocation of 38% of the national budget if they are to be effective in service delivery.

Matte adds that 2015/16 budget gives local governments 2.2trillion shillings down from 2.3trillion received in 2014/15 financial year which is a significant drop that will directly affect the already low quality of service delivery by local government.

The role of the commission is to support local governments to improve local revenue performance and to promote equity in resource allocation among local governments. According to Ashaba Aheebwa, the Director Finance and Administration, the creation of new districts was also going to affect their already meagre budget should government fail to revise it.

The speaker of parliament Rebecca Kadaga says that the budget given to local government should be increased given that government increased the number of districts in the country. She also committed to write to the Ministry of Finance over the matter but however added that parliament will intervene into the matter after party primaries.

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The district leaders of Wakiso and Mukono allege that pioneer easy bus illegally got the contract to operate in their areas of jurisdiction.

The district leaders of Mukono and Wakiso say that they want Pioneer Bus to operate only inKampalasince they were licenced by KCCA.

According to the programme at parliament, the management of Pioneer easy bus will appear before MPs on Friday to defend themselves against accusation of corruption. The woman MP for Kalungu, Florence Kintu confirms that parliament is probing pioneer easy bus and KCCA. She says that preliminary evidence shows that pioneer bus got the contract to operate in Wakiso and Mukono illegally because there was no advertisement to that effect. She says one can not be given a licence to operate in another district without involving the leaders of the district in question.

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Many LCI executives especially chairpersons, vice chairpersons, and secretaries have been holding different stamps for the same village council. This has made them to sell property for more than once.

The habit of LCI chairpersons or members to sell plots of land more than once is so rampant in Buganda region and some parts of western Uganda .

However the issue of LCI executives of the same council holding different stamps has reached the ministry of local government. So the local government minister, Adolf Mwesigye says that the ministry is planning to use sub counties, divisions, town councils and municipalities each to print official stamps for LCI executives.

By James Okello

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Besisira says all Local Councils right from LC111 to LC 1 have no minimum Qualifications which he said is dangerous when issues on Governance are being taken with people who have never gone to School.

Local government minister, Adolf Mwesige

He said the laws need to be amended to include Minimum Qualification for all Local Councils to avoid the embarrassment of some Leaders who failed to swear in English an indication that, such people cannot express themselves in a Council when an important matter is being discussed.

In Response the Minister of Local Government Adolf Mwesige who had appeared before the Committee to defend the Ministry Budget for the financial year 2011/2012 defended the Political heads at lower Councils they must be left to contest for any office because they need to be part and partial of decision making.

He said the law instead needs to be amended to create room for all lower Councils to debate freely in their local languages since English is a foreign language and majority of Ugandans are not educated on reason or the other.

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Drammer started when speaker Clovis Mugabo directed some individuals to quit the council hall for not respecting the Council’s dressing code.

However councilor Kato also tasked the speaker Clovis Mugabo to explain and apologize to council why he wasn’t dressed in a speaker’s gown.

The speaker thereafter asked councilor Kato to withdraw his statement or move out.

However councillor Kato maintained that there was no need for withdrawing his statement saying that the speaker as the head must be exemplary.

By Sunday Rogers

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Richard Rwabuhinga the Kabarole district chairman says that the district is expecting 800 million shillings to spearhead work at the site.

Rwabuhinga says his executive is to embark on supervising and monitoring government programs of prosperity for all and infrastructure development to avoid shoddy work and mismanagement of funds.

He says that priority will be on health centers to ensure enough drugs are in stock to meet the people’s demands.

By Sunday Rogers

The post Kabarole district headquarters construction starts first appeared on Uganda Multimedia News & Information.

Rwabuhinga notes that late coming and absenteeism hinders service delivery and promotes corruption.

He says that LC3 chairpersons of the newly created administrative units in the district have received motorcycles to ease their movement and service delivery to the people.

By Sunday Rogers

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