By AKAMPA RUGABA
The approach of promoting cash economy at the village level is far more better in improving household incomes and livelihoods of Ugandans than the model of people always sitting in 5 or 3 star hotels to discuss how people will get out of poverty. Gone are the days. This is a new era of securing the future of Ugandans.
The Parish Development Model (PDM) is here and anticipated official launch is February 26, 2022, and will be launched by yet, the best advocate for for poverty alleviation through improving household income, H.E Yoweri Kaguta Museveni Tibuhaburwa.
PDM is the latest intervention in the NRM Government’s continuous quest to lift all Ugandans from the poverty puzzle.
PDM will organise and boost wealth creation opportunities at the lowest economic planning unit and turn every parish in the country into a model “development unit”.
The Model targets a new catchment area that should leave nobody behind.
Under local government structures, every Ugandan lives in a parish, which is the administrative unit below a sub-county and above a village cell.
With PDM, my people of Rubumba/Kabashaki/Kahengye under Eastern ward (Formerly Kabingo Parish) will be able to apply for this fund, utilize it to the maximum and be part of the cash/money economy.
PDM is expected to alleviate over 39 per cent of households from subsistence economy to commercial production. There have been different empowerment programmes before but PDM is different. None of the previous programmes placed economic power in the hands of the people at grassroot in real terms, geographically and financially.
The Model comes along with several pillars including production, infrastructure and economic services, financial inclusion and social services, community data (Community Information System), governance and administration, and mindset change. It is by far the most ambitious empowerment initiative ever envisaged at grassroot, and should, in a few years of implementation bear out the wisdom of continuously innovating around the theme of mass “socio-economic transformation’.
PDM is also a culmination of NRM’s “Securing Your Future” slogan as used in last year’s general elections as one big way for the party to fulfill the contract entered into with Ugandans in the winning Manifesto. The financial inclusion agenda will promote savings and investment by households in the most viable activities with a potential for generating a production surplus for home and local consumption, and the market.
To ensure a great start, great emphasis should be put on public sensitisation (which is being done in conjunction with the Ministry of Information and Communication Technology). Limited or no citizen awareness results in everyone moving in their own directions, risking the programme’s great promise.
With PDM, Ugandans are on a clear path towards achieving the middle income status in the near by future and we hope that since production will be boosted at the parish level, more Government services will equally be improved at every parish including more connectivity to electricity, better & improved roads, clean water as well health and education services.
Let us embrace the PDM to secure Uganda’s future. Time is now.
