Uganda’s planned oil refinery is entering a more demanding commercial environment. Kenya has broken ground on a proposed 700,000-barrel-per-day refinery at Lamu, backed by Aliko Dangote, while Tanzania is advancing plans for a 200,000-barrel-per-day facility at Tanga. Together with Uganda’s proposed 60,000-barrel-per-day refinery at Hoima, these projects are reshaping the outlook for petroleum refining in East Africa.

The concern is simple. If the region cannot absorb the combined output of its proposed refineries, which project will secure sufficient customers to operate profitably?

The question is legitimate, but it risks reducing a strategic investment decision to a contest for regional market share. Uganda is not planning to build a refinery simply to sell fuel to its neighbours. It is also seeking to support an economy that the government wants to grow tenfold, from approximately USD50 billion in 2023 to USD500 billion by 2040.

That ambition changes the context in which Hoima should be assessed. An economy of that scale will require substantially more productive infrastructure, industrial capacity and reliable energy supply. Petroleum will not meet all those requirements, but it will remain important to transport, aviation, construction, agriculture and parts of manufacturing for years to come.

The relevant question is therefore not whether East Africa needs three refineries of different sizes. It is whether Uganda can develop a commercially viable domestic refining industry that strengthens its economic resilience without relying on unrealistic export projections.

The domestic market is the starting point

Uganda currently consumes approximately 6.5 million litres of petroleum products a day and spends an estimated USD2 billion to USD2.5 billion annually on imports, according to the Uganda National Oil Company figures cited in recent regional reporting. That is an established market before the additional requirements of a larger economy are considered.

An expansion in manufacturing, mineral processing, commercial agriculture, tourism and construction would increase demand for freight transport, industrial machinery and other equipment that depends on liquid fuels. Growing aviation activity would create additional requirements for jet fuel, while greater urbanisation and trade would place further demands on transport and logistics.

The scale of that increase should not be assumed. Better fuel efficiency, electric mobility and the expansion of renewable electricity could moderate petroleum consumption. But neither should Uganda plan its energy infrastructure on the assumption that the transition will eliminate demand for liquid fuels before 2040.

The Tenfold Growth Strategy requires an energy system capable of supporting rapid economic expansion while accommodating technological change. Domestic refining is one possible component of that system.

The distinction is important because Uganda does not need to prove that petroleum demand will grow indefinitely. Instead, it needs to demonstrate that sufficient demand will remain, over the refinery’s economic life, to justify the investment and that locally refined products can compete with imports.

Energy security in an unstable world

Dangote’s 700k barrels a day refinery in Nigeria has scale but scale does not necessarily undermine the case for Uganda’s domestic refinery

The case for Hoima becomes stronger when energy security is considered alongside commercial returns.

Uganda is landlocked and depends on international supply chains and regional transport corridors to obtain refined petroleum products. Even when fuel is readily available in international markets, disruptions to shipping, higher freight and insurance charges, foreign-exchange pressures or interruptions along regional routes can raise the cost of getting it to Ugandan consumers.

Recent instability in the Middle East has illustrated how geopolitical events can affect petroleum prices and supply arrangements far beyond the immediate conflict zone. A domestic refinery would moderate these vulnerabilities and diversify the country’s supply arrangements.

Instead of depending almost entirely on finished products imported from overseas refineries, Uganda would have the option of processing some of its own crude and distributing the resulting products domestically. Strategic storage and continued access to imported fuels would provide additional protection against disruption.

This is the argument for redundancy in national infrastructure. A country does not necessarily build every strategic facility because it offers the lowest cost in every conceivable circumstance. Sometimes the value lies in having an additional source of supply when the alternatives become unreliable or expensive. The question is how much Uganda should pay for that resilience and ensure the cost remains proportionate to the benefit.

Refining is part of industrialisation

The second consideration is the opportunity to develop industries around the processing of domestic crude.

Exporting crude while importing refined products leaves Uganda dependent on processing capacity elsewhere. Domestic refining would allow the country to participate in another stage of the petroleum value chain, creating opportunities for engineering, maintenance, logistics, laboratory services and other industrial suppliers.

Depending on the final configuration, the Hoima complex could also support downstream production involving liquefied petroleum gas, petrochemicals and other industrial inputs.

These possibilities matter in an economy seeking to expand manufacturing and retain more value from its natural resources.

They should not, however, be confused with guaranteed economic gains. The refinery will need to demonstrate that its output can be sold competitively and that the value generated domestically exceeds the costs and risks of the investment.

Employment, local procurement and downstream industrial development should be measured against clear targets. Otherwise, the promise of value addition can become a justification for capital expenditure without sufficient accountability for the results.

Lamu changes the export equation

The emergence of Lamu makes it harder to rely on regional exports as the principal justification for Hoima.

A 700,000-barrel-per-day refinery, if delivered and operated as envisaged, would have substantial scale advantages and the potential to pursue customers beyond East Africa. Uganda’s smaller facility cannot expect to compete on volume alone.

Tanzania’s Tanga plans add another layer of uncertainty. The region’s proposed refining capacity could exceed its projected domestic demand, meaning that some facilities would need to sell into wider African markets.

Geography could be Hoima’s competitive advantage

There is another factor in the regional refining contest that deserves greater attention. Logistics. While coastal refineries enjoy direct access to seaborne crude and established shipping infrastructure, Hoima is considerably closer to landlocked markets in the Great Lakes region and parts of Central Africa. For customers in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Burundi and other inland markets, sourcing petroleum products from Uganda could reduce the distance travelled compared with supplies originating from coastal refineries in Kenya or Tanzania.

In petroleum distribution, distance translates into real costs through road or rail freight, handling, transit delays and border procedures. A refinery positioned closer to its customers could therefore compete on delivered price even without matching the production scale of its coastal rivals. The advantage would be particularly relevant where dependable cross-border transport links and efficient customs arrangements make shorter supply routes commercially attractive.

This is not an automatic guarantee of competitiveness. The actual advantage will depend on the cost of moving products from Hoima, the condition of regional transport corridors, border efficiency and the prices offered by competing suppliers. But it gives Uganda a potentially important market beyond its domestic consumption. Not necessarily the entire East African coast-facing market, but the inland economies for which proximity and dependable supply could matter as much as refinery scale.

For Uganda, the implication is not necessarily to abandon refining. It is to be more realistic about the role of exports. Hoima should be designed and operated first around a credible domestic market, with regional sales treated as a potential source of additional revenue rather than an assumption on which the entire investment depends.

That requires a rigorous assessment of delivered costs. The price of crude, financing charges, processing efficiency, product yields, refinery utilisation and the cost of moving finished products to customers will determine competitiveness.

A refinery can have access to domestic crude and still struggle if its products are more expensive than imports. Conversely, a smaller plant with reliable feedstock, efficient operations and well-designed distribution infrastructure may serve a defined market successfully without matching the scale of its competitors.

Uganda’s planned 211-kilometre multiproduct pipeline from Hoima to the Namwabula storage and distribution terminal in Mpigi is therefore an important part of the project, not an incidental addition. Its cost and performance will influence the price at which refinery products reach the market.

Could modular technology change the economics?

Developments in modular construction and process engineering also warrant consideration. Standardised equipment and staged construction can offer advantages in delivery schedules, project execution and the ability to expand capacity as demand develops.

Modularity is not, however, a guarantee of lower costs. Smaller facilities can face higher unit costs and lack some of the processing efficiencies available to large, integrated refineries.

Uganda should therefore examine whether phased development or modular configurations offer a better risk-adjusted return than committing to a single configuration from the outset. That assessment must account for the characteristics of Uganda’s crude, the required product mix, environmental standards, maintenance requirements and the economics of expansion.

The objective should be neither to build the biggest possible refinery nor to pursue smaller plants simply because they appear easier to finance. It should be to establish the capacity Uganda can operate reliably and profitably under realistic demand scenarios.

The refinery must complement the energy transition

A USD500 billion economy will also require more electricity, greater energy efficiency and a progressive shift towards lower-carbon technologies.

Uganda should pursue those priorities alongside its petroleum investments. A refinery expected to operate for decades must be tested against scenarios involving slower fuel-demand growth, increasing vehicle electrification and changing international fuel standards.

This is not an argument for choosing between oil and renewable energy but a case for planning the two together.

Liquid fuels will remain important to several sectors during the transition, while electricity will become increasingly important to industry, households and transport. A balanced energy strategy must recognise both trajectories and avoid locking public resources into infrastructure whose economic assumptions cannot withstand technological change.

A strategic asset must pass the commercial test

The Kingfisher Development Area in Kikuube District

Uganda’s refinery has a credible strategic rationale. It could diversify fuel supply, reduce dependence on imported finished products and create opportunities for domestic industrial development.

But strategic rationale is not a substitute for commercial viability. The project must have transparent financing, dependable crude supply, competitive production costs and realistic projections of domestic demand. Government should also disclose the assumptions underpinning the investment and subject them to independent scrutiny.

The USD500 billion ambition makes the energy question more urgent, not less. An economy of that scale cannot afford to overlook the resilience of its fuel supply. Equally, it cannot afford a refinery whose costs undermine the investment needed for roads, electricity, health, education and other productive infrastructure.

Therefore, Hoima does not need to win a regional contest for refinery size to justify its place in Uganda’s development strategy. It needs to supply a meaningful share of the domestic market at a competitive cost, strengthen resilience against external shocks and support industries that create lasting economic value.

The arrival of Lamu and the prospect of Tanga should force Uganda to sharpen its commercial assumptions, not abandon the broader question of why it wants to refine its own oil.

In a world where geopolitical disruptions can rapidly alter energy costs and supply routes, resilience has economic value. The task is to build that resilience without paying more for it than the country can sustain.

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There is a troubling lesson in the dispute between Lubega Institute of Nursing and Health Professionals and Hon. John Musila, the Member of Parliament for Bubulo East.

It is not a lesson about the rights of a parent to defend a child. Nor is it about whether a student accused of wrongdoing should ultimately be found guilty or innocent.

It is about something more fundamental: whether political office should confer the power to override institutional processes when those processes become inconvenient.

According to a statement issued by Lubega Institute on October 6, the institution became aware of allegations involving the alleged forgery of banking slips in the names of a Stanbic Bank agent. The institute says its investigations implicated 90 students, including the daughter of Hon. Musila, and that, after obtaining legal and professional advice, it reported the matter to police because forgery, uttering forged documents and impersonation are criminal matters.

The institution further says that police subsequently apprehended the alleged principal originator of the forgeries after a period on the run.

These are serious allegations and they should be treated as such until tested through the proper legal process. But that cuts both ways.

The appropriate response to an allegation of criminal conduct is investigation, evidence and due process—not political pressure, public mobilisation or the invocation of parliamentary privilege as an alternative court of law.

Lubega says Hon. Musila was invited, together with other parents and students, to meet the institution’s Board over the matter. It says a meeting involving parents, students and police was held and resolutions reached.

The institute further claims that the MP subsequently insisted that his daughter be allowed back into the institution despite the police and State position, and that when management declined, the matter was taken to Parliament.

The central question is not whether Hon. Musila has the right to speak on the floor of Parliament. He plainly does. Parliament is precisely where elected representatives should raise matters of public interest. The question is what Parliament should be used for.

Parliament is not a substitute for a police investigation. It is not a disciplinary board for a private educational institution. And it certainly should not become an avenue through which the relative of an elected official receives treatment unavailable to other students facing the same allegations.

There is also an important distinction between parliamentary oversight and parliamentary intervention in an individual disciplinary dispute. The former strengthens democracy. The latter can weaken institutions if it is perceived as an attempt to bring political authority to bear on an institution that has followed an established process.

This is particularly important in health education. A nursing or medical qualification is not simply another academic certificate. It is a licence, in practical terms, to enter a profession in which patients entrust their lives to people who must demonstrate honesty, competence, discipline and ethical judgment.

That is why Lubega’s insistence that professional ethics matter deserves serious consideration.

The institute’s position is that a student accused of forging financial documents for personal gain cannot simply be allowed to proceed into a profession where graduates may eventually handle medicines, public resources and, most importantly, people’s lives.

While that does not mean the students should be presumed guilty, it demands that the allegations should be properly investigated and determined by the competent authorities.

Indeed, that is the protection both sides need. If the students are innocent, due process should clear their names. If wrongdoing is established, the consequences should follow.

What should not happen is for either political influence or institutional power to determine the outcome before the evidence has been tested.

There is also a wider issue here for Uganda’s Parliament. Members of Parliament are powerful public figures. Their words carry considerably more weight than those of the average citizen. When an MP raises a matter on the parliamentary floor involving a private institution, there is inevitably a risk that the institution will be placed under public pressure before the underlying facts have been fully established.

That makes restraint especially important. The proper role of an MP is not to guarantee a particular outcome for a constituent or family member. It is to ensure that the law and public institutions work fairly for everyone—including those with no political connections.

Lubega Institute therefore deserves to be heard on its own evidence and processes, just as Hon. Musila deserves the opportunity to present his side and seek lawful redress.

But neither side should be allowed to turn the dispute into a contest of political influence.

For Uganda’s institutions to mature, Parliament must remain Parliament, the police must remain the police, educational institutions must retain legitimate disciplinary authority, and courts must remain the ultimate arbiters of criminal guilt.

That separation is not an inconvenience buts the architecture of the rule of law.

And when the allegations involve the integrity of future health professionals, defending that principle is not defending one school against one MP. It is defending the standards that Uganda’s health system ultimately depends upon.

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President Yoweri Museveni is right to insist that Uganda’s oil revenues must be used to build a productive and durable economy rather than finance a temporary consumption boom.

The President’s message at the naming ceremony for Uganda’s crude oil at Kingfisher was particularly important because it went beyond the first barrel. He argued that the country’s finite petroleum resources should create productive capacity in power, transport, railways, universities, industrialisation and human capital that will outlive the oil fields.

That is the right ambition, but there is a less glamorous question that Uganda must confront before the oil money begins to flow in earnest. How much of that money will actually reach the projects for which it is intended?

The greatest threat to Uganda’s oil transformation may not be a collapse in oil prices or even the depletion of the resource. It could be the familiar leakage that occurs when public money passes through weak procurement systems, inflated contracts, poor-quality works and inadequate supervision.

This is why Uganda needs to treat public procurement and project implementation as two sides of the same oil-revenue protection system.

Cleaning up procurement is essential but it is not enough. A perfectly conducted tender can still produce a poor road, bridge, hospital or power project if implementation is not properly supervised. Conversely, strong technical supervision cannot fully compensate for a procurement process that awards contracts at inflated prices or to firms without the capacity to deliver.

The country therefore needs a much tighter chain of accountability; from project selection and budgeting, through procurement and contracting, to physical implementation, payment and eventual handover.

This matters because infrastructure is likely to absorb a substantial share of the public investment Uganda hopes to make from its petroleum revenues.

A kilometre of road that costs more than it should is oil revenue lost. A poorly constructed bridge that requires premature reconstruction represents another claim on future revenue. A public building that takes years to complete while contractors receive payments is capital that has failed to generate the intended economic return.

The leakage is therefore not simply the cash allegedly lost to corruption. It is also the economic value that Uganda fails to obtain for every shilling spent.

That distinction is important because corruption is often discussed in terms of money disappearing from government accounts. But the larger economic damage can occur when corruption and weak oversight result in projects being unnecessarily expensive, delayed or badly constructed.

Uganda could therefore enter the oil era with billions of dollars of additional public resources and still fail to achieve the economic transformation those resources should finance.

The answer should be a national infrastructure vigilance system that follows projects from the drawing board to completion.

Major oil-funded projects should have clear costs, timelines, measurable outputs and publicly accountable implementing agencies. Payments should be tied rigorously to verified milestones. Independent technical inspections should be routine for major projects rather than an afterthought when problems emerge.

Uganda also needs to strengthen the capacity of institutions responsible for procurement and project oversight. The objective should not simply be to catch corruption after money has been lost, but to make it increasingly difficult for leakage to occur in the first place.

There is also a role for citizens, professional bodies, the media and Parliament in this process.

Public scrutiny should extend beyond the announcement of a new project or the signing of a contract. Ugandans should be asking a few questions. What was promised? What was budgeted? Who was contracted? What has actually been delivered? At what cost and to what standard?

Museveni’s call for an integrated petroleum strategy — linking oil to refining, energy generation, industrialisation and human capital — is sound because Uganda’s objective should be to use oil to diversify the economy rather than make it more dependent on hydrocarbons.

But diversification itself requires disciplined investment. The refinery should generate industrial opportunities. Reliable electricity should support manufacturing. Better transport and rail infrastructure should reduce the cost of moving goods. Universities and technical institutions should produce the skills required by an increasingly sophisticated economy.

None of these outcomes is automatic simply because oil revenues become available. Oil can provide the capital. It cannot provide the discipline to spend that capital well.

That discipline must come from institutions. Uganda has already spent years preparing for first oil. It has negotiated investments, built infrastructure, trained petroleum professionals and developed the regulatory framework for the sector.

The next institutional and equally important challenge is ensuring that the wealth generated by the resource is converted into assets rather than absorbed by waste and rent-seeking.

The President’s warning against repeating the mistakes of other African oil producers should therefore be taken seriously. The lesson from the continent is not merely that oil revenues can encourage excessive consumption. It is that resource wealth can magnify existing weaknesses in governance and public financial management.

Uganda’s best defence is to ensure that every major investment financed from oil revenues is subjected to clean procurement, competitive pricing, competent contracting and relentless implementation oversight.

The country does not need to create another layer of bureaucracy for its own sake. It needs to make existing accountability mechanisms work better and ensure that responsibility for project outcomes cannot be passed endlessly from one institution to another.

With first oil now approaching, this is the right moment to establish the standards by which the oil era will be judged. The ultimate measure should not be how much oil Uganda produces or how much revenue enters the Treasury.

It should be what that money builds. If oil revenues produce reliable infrastructure, productive industries, skilled citizens and a stronger private sector, Uganda will have converted a finite resource into enduring wealth. If too much of the money disappears through inflated procurement, unfinished projects and weak supervision, the country will have extracted the oil without extracting its full economic value. ultimately, oil wealth must be protected not only at the wellhead, but all the way to the completed project.

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Fifty-four years after President Idi Amin ordered the expulsion of Asians from Uganda, the episode remains largely trapped in an argument about right and wrong.

It was wrong. It was a traumatic act of dispossession that tore families and businesses from a country many considered home. It also inflicted enormous damage on Uganda’s economy.

The fortunes of many of those expelled, particularly those who rebuilt their lives in Britain, Canada and elsewhere, have since become part of the evidence of what Uganda lost.

But there is a more useful question to ask in 2026: what did Uganda learn?

That question matters because history becomes useful only when it changes the choices a society makes.

The temptation is to reduce the Asian expulsion to a story about race. That interpretation is too narrow. Beneath the racial language of the time was a much deeper problem: Uganda had inherited an economy structured around unequal access to opportunity.

Colonial economic policy had encouraged Asians into commerce and intermediary roles while systematically excluding the African majority from many of the opportunities required to build wealth and productive enterprises.

The Asians did not create that system. Nor can they be blamed for the resentment it eventually produced.

But neither should Uganda romanticise what happened by pretending that entrepreneurial talent alone explains the dramatically different outcomes experienced by many of those expelled.

Talent matters. Enterprise matters. Hard work matters. But institutions matter just as much.

The Asians who rebuilt their lives abroad did so in economies where capital markets, property rights, education, professional networks and relatively open opportunities allowed enterprise to flourish. Their success tells us something not only about them, but also about the environments in which talent is given room to work.

That is perhaps the most important lesson for Uganda today.

Social inequality is no longer primarily a question of Asians versus Africans, or Ugandans versus foreigners. It is increasingly a question of social class and access to economic opportunity.

The next rupture, if Uganda fails to address these inequalities, may therefore look very different. It may not discriminate by the colour of one’s skin. It could be directed at whoever is perceived to have accumulated wealth while others remain excluded from meaningful economic participation.

That is why building an inclusive economy is not simply a matter of social justice but an insurance policy against future instability.

Uganda may indeed have lost a significant development opportunity in 1972. But the country also witnessed the emergence of an indigenous entrepreneurial class that the colonial economy had denied sufficient space to develop.

The problem is that this class still has some distance to travel.

Too much indigenous enterprise remains concentrated in merchandise trading, importation and low-value commerce. The next transition must be towards industry, agro-processing, technology, digital innovation and productive investment.

That transition will not happen through rhetoric. It requires access to affordable capital, reliable infrastructure, skills, markets and predictable rules.

It also requires Uganda to confront an uncomfortable reality: some of the country’s worst exploitation of workers and producers today is perpetrated by fellow Ugandans.

In agriculture, ruthless middlemen can squeeze farmers while retaining disproportionate margins. Poor wages and weak bargaining power can transfer value from those who produce to those who control markets.

An inclusive economy must therefore reward contribution more fairly — whether the contributor is a farmer, factory worker, entrepreneur, professional or investor.

The lesson of 1972 should not be that one community prospered while another lost.

It should be that no society can afford an economic system in which large sections of its people feel permanently locked out of opportunity.

Uganda cannot undo 1972. But it can ensure that the next generation inherits an economy in which prosperity is broad enough, opportunity is open enough and institutions are fair enough that nobody has to be defined as an outsider before they can be treated as a citizen.

That would be a far more meaningful way to remember the expulsion than endlessly revisiting the wound, without building a country that has learned from it.

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The death of genocide mastermind Félicien Kabuga in The Hague has brought a dramatic and symbolic end to one of the longest-running manhunts in modern international criminal justice.

The United Nations International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT) confirmed on Friday that Kabuga died while hospitalized in The Hague, where he had been under UN detention following his arrest in France in 2020 after more than two decades on the run.

In a statement issued from Arusha and The Hague, the UN tribunal said Dutch authorities had commenced standard investigations into the circumstances surrounding his death, while Mechanism President Judge Graciela Gatti Santana ordered a full inquiry led by Judge Alphons Orie.

Kabuga, a wealthy Rwandan businessman once regarded as one of the world’s most wanted fugitives, had been charged with genocide, conspiracy to commit genocide, incitement to genocide and crimes against humanity linked to the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda.

Prosecutors accused him of financing extremist militias, facilitating hate propaganda and supplying resources used during the massacres that killed more than 800,000 people in approximately 100 days.

For decades, Kabuga’s name occupied a near-mythical place in international justice circles.

An arrest warrant was first issued by the former International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), but Kabuga managed to evade capture across several countries for over 25 years before French authorities arrested him near Paris in May 2020.

His capture was hailed globally as a breakthrough moment for accountability over the Rwanda genocide — particularly because many believed age and time might permanently shield senior suspects from prosecution.

Yet the legal process that followed revealed the growing challenges confronting international war crimes tribunals.

Kabuga’s trial formally began in September 2022, but proceedings soon became overshadowed by concerns about his health and mental fitness. In 2023, judges indefinitely stayed the case after finding he was no longer fit to stand trial because of severe cognitive decline.

At the time of his death, he remained in detention while awaiting provisional release to a country willing to receive him.

That unresolved status leaves behind a deeply complicated legacy.

For survivors of the genocide, Kabuga’s death may represent the final disappearance of one of the men they viewed as central to organizing and enabling the killings. But it also means one of the most anticipated genocide trials of recent decades will never reach a verdict.

The development therefore carries implications far beyond Rwanda.

Kabuga’s case had increasingly become a measure of whether international justice institutions established after the atrocities of the 1990s could still deliver meaningful accountability decades later. Instead, his death before judgment highlights a recurring dilemma: justice mechanisms often move more slowly than history itself.

The case also revives broader questions about the effectiveness and future of international criminal tribunals.

Supporters argue that Kabuga’s eventual arrest demonstrated that genocide suspects can never fully escape accountability, regardless of how much time passes. Critics, however, contend that delayed prosecutions risk depriving victims of closure while consuming enormous institutional resources.

For Rwanda, the symbolism is especially powerful. The genocide remains the defining event in the country’s modern political identity, shaping everything from governance and national reconciliation to regional security policy and diplomatic relations across Africa and beyond.

Kabuga’s alleged role was particularly significant because prosecutors portrayed him not as a battlefield commander, but as part of the financial and ideological machinery that enabled mass violence. His prosecution was expected to deepen historical understanding of how economic elites, media structures and political networks helped fuel genocide.

Now, that judicial process ends without a final courtroom reckoning.

Still, Kabuga’s death is unlikely to diminish the historical consensus surrounding the atrocities of 1994 or the global legal precedents established in their aftermath.

The institutions created after Rwanda and the Balkans transformed international law, expanding the principle that individuals — including financiers, propagandists and political actors — can be held personally accountable for crimes against humanity and genocide.

Even so, the conclusion of Kabuga’s case without a verdict may reinforce calls for faster, more adaptive systems of international justice capable of handling aging suspects and prolonged conflicts more effectively.

More than three decades after the genocide, the world is once again reminded that while history can pursue fugitives for decades, time itself often remains the ultimate adversary of justice.

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Multilateral development banks occupy a delicate space. They are political creations, established by treaties and backed by sovereign shareholders. Yet their operational credibility depends fundamentally on financial independence, institutional discipline and market confidence. That balance is fragile. When political considerations appear to influence financial decisions — or when markets suspect they do — the cost can be immediate and enduring.

Afreximbank’s break with Fitch Ratings followed a downgrade that pushed the bank into non-investment grade territory. The institution argued that the rating agency misunderstood its Establishment Agreement and failed to properly recognise the strength of shareholder backing. That may well be a legitimate concern. However, withdrawing from the rating relationship altogether risks sending a troubling signal to investors: that the bank is unwilling to subject itself to external scrutiny when assessments turn unfavourable.

Credit ratings are not endorsements. They are risk opinions. Markets understand that disagreements between issuers and agencies occur. What they watch closely, however, is how institutions respond. A development bank’s willingness to engage constructively with scrutiny — even when critical — reinforces perceptions of governance strength. Abrupt disengagement can instead raise doubts about transparency, resilience and tolerance for independent oversight.

The deeper concern lies in the perception of political influence. Afreximbank’s shareholders are sovereign states. Some of those states have recently faced debt distress, restructuring episodes and contentious rating downgrades. In that context, the optics of severing ties with a rating agency may invite speculation that political sensitivities, rather than purely technical disagreements, are shaping institutional decisions.

Even the perception of political encroachment can be costly. Multilateral banks depend on global capital markets for funding. Their business models rely on borrowing at competitive rates and on-lending to member states and enterprises. If investors begin to price in governance risk — or fear that financial discipline may yield to political imperatives — borrowing costs rise. Over time, that erodes the very development mandate the institution was created to advance.

There is also a systemic dimension. African financial institutions have long argued that global rating methodologies inadequately reflect regional realities. That debate deserves serious engagement. But credibility in reform advocacy requires demonstrating the highest standards of governance at home. If calls for methodological fairness are accompanied by actions perceived as defensive or politically driven, the broader argument risks losing force.

The danger, therefore, is not the disagreement itself. Robust debate between issuers and rating agencies is healthy. The danger lies in what this episode might signal about institutional independence. Development banks must be insulated not only from market volatility, but from political pressures that could compromise objective risk management.

The path forward should prioritise transparency and reassurance. Afreximbank would strengthen its position by publicly clarifying governance safeguards, reaffirming its commitment to independent oversight and maintaining engagement with multiple international rating agencies. Markets are less concerned with disagreements than with opacity.

Africa’s financial architecture is maturing. Institutions like Afreximbank play a central role in shaping that trajectory. Preserving their independence is not merely a governance ideal — it is a financial necessity. If political overreach, real or perceived, takes root, the consequences will not be symbolic. They will be measured in basis points, investor confidence and long-term development capacity.

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One of the core assumptions underpinning any justice system is that courts exist not merely to determine winners and losers, but to deliver justice through a process that is independent, impartial and grounded in law. In that sense, litigants go to court not solely in pursuit of victory, but in the expectation that a fair process—faithfully applied—will command legitimacy, even where the outcome is unfavourable.

It is against this backdrop that the High Court’s dismissal of Mathias Walukagga’s petition challenging his exclusion from the 2026 parliamentary race must be assessed. Justice Simon Peter Kinobe’s ruling was procedurally sound, swift and firmly anchored in the letter of the law. The judge confined himself to the narrow questions placed before the court and concluded that the Electoral Commission acted lawfully in rejecting Walukagga’s nomination on the basis of expired academic qualifications.

From a strictly legal standpoint, the reasoning is difficult to fault. The law is explicit: a Mature Age Entry Examination certificate is valid for two years, with no provision for extension. By the time Walukagga presented himself for nomination, that certificate had lapsed. The court applied the law as written, and in doing so, reaffirmed an important principle of judicial restraint—courts do not rewrite statutes under the guise of interpretation.

Yet judicial correctness does not automatically equate to jurisprudential completeness. While the court answered the procedural question decisively, it left a more substantive issue unresolved—one that goes beyond Walukagga as an individual and speaks to the coherence of Uganda’s electoral and educational frameworks.

At the heart of the matter lies the concept of equivalence. The Electoral Commission’s case rested partly on the argument that Walukagga’s Mature Age certificate had expired, and that any equivalence derived from it therefore collapsed. But this reasoning exposes a deeper ambiguity: what does equivalence to A-Level education truly mean in law and in practice?

Advanced Level education is ordinarily understood as two years of structured study, assessment and progression. A Mature Age Entry Examination, by contrast, is an aptitude test sat over a matter of hours. While the law recognises this pathway as an alternative route into higher education, it remains unclear whether such an assessment can reasonably be equated—substantively, not just procedurally—to the rigour and duration of A-Level study.

Justice Kinobe chose not to interrogate this broader question, and he was arguably entitled not to. Courts are not policy forums, and judges must be cautious not to stray beyond the issues framed before them. However, the fact that this question remains unanswered points to a gap that the legislature and regulatory bodies have yet to address with sufficient clarity.

Notably, the court declined to award costs, recognising that the petition raised issues of public importance not previously tested in Ugandan jurisprudence. That acknowledgment matters. It signals that while the law was correctly applied, the policy architecture surrounding candidate qualifications remains unsettled.

Walukagga retains the option of pursuing appellate review, where differing judicial perspectives may further enrich the debate. But beyond the fate of one candidate, the case should prompt a wider national conversation. If Uganda is committed to broadening political participation while maintaining credible standards for leadership, then the rules governing academic qualifications must be coherent, defensible and clearly aligned with their stated purpose.

Justice is not only about strict adherence to process; it is also about ensuring that the rules themselves make sense. In the Walukagga case, the courts have spoken clearly on the former. It is now up to lawmakers and regulators to confront the latter.

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Jimmy Cliff spent his life trying to explain something simple yet profound: that reggae was never just a rhythm, never just a genre, never merely a sound from a small Caribbean island that somehow conquered the world. To him, reggae was born out of necessity — a declaration of existence from people who had long been denied dignity.

“We formed this music out of the need for recognition, for identity, respect, love and justice,” he once said. Those were not abstract words for Cliff but the coordinates of his own life.

Born James Chambers into deep rural poverty in St. James, Jamaica, he grew up hearing the echoes of dispossession — the kind that leaves marks on a nation, not just an individual. Yet from those beginnings, he stitched together a voice and a worldview that would become one of the great moral and artistic forces of the 20th century.

When Cliff entered the industry, Jamaica had no reggae, no template, no global stage waiting. There was ska — fast, bright, restless — mirroring the energy of a young nation finding its post-independence footing. There was rocksteady — slower, steadier — reflecting a people exhaling after the storm of political and social upheaval.

Then came reggae: a new beat carrying an old longing, a cultural and philosophical ascent rooted deeply in Rastafari’s insistence on African consciousness, black pride, and human upliftment. Cliff didn’t just witness that evolution; he catalysed it. His early work gave reggae its emotional vocabulary, equal parts defiance and tenderness.

For Cliff, music was never entertainment alone. “The essence of my music is struggle. What gives it the icing is the hope of love,” he said. Few artists embodied this duality as naturally.

From Wonderful World, Beautiful People, which made global audiences dance even as it pleaded for decency, to Vietnam, which Bob Dylan hailed as the greatest protest song he’d ever heard, Cliff carried the conscience of a generation.

He sang about war, injustice, poverty, longing and resilience — but always with that unmistakable melodic warmth that made the listener believe that hope was still rational.

His starring role in The Harder They Come was more than a film credit. It was a cultural breakthrough, a cinematic and musical detonator that blasted Jamaican sound and struggle into international consciousness. Cliff played Ivan Martin, a young dreamer battered by a corrupt system — a mirror of countless real lives.

The film told the world where reggae came from. Cliff, through music like Many Rivers to Cross, told them why it mattered.

It is no exaggeration to say that without that film — without Cliff — reggae might have remained a regional sound instead of a global language.

Cliff’s accolades — the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the Order of Merit, Grammy wins — were meaningful, but they were never the core of his legacy. That belonged to the countless people who found themselves reflected in his work.

“When we saw Jimmy Cliff, we saw ourselves,” Wyclef Jean once said. That sentiment spans continents. For decades, Cliff was a soundtrack for the marginalised, the ambitious, the spiritually searching, the people climbing their own mountains one slow, determined step at a time.

To hear You Can Get It If You Really Want was to be reminded that dreams are not an extravagance — they are a right.

With his passing at 81, the world loses more than a legendary artist. It loses a moral voice — one that sang about resistance without hatred, about identity without exclusion, about justice without despair.

We lose an elder who remembered the birth of reggae not as a commercial milestone but as a cultural awakening.
We lose a philosopher disguised as a singer.
We lose a carrier of memory — of a time when music itself was a rebellion.

Most of all, we lose the rare kind of artist who understood that every lyric could be a lifeline, every melody a shelter, every beat a declaration that a people long overlooked were, in fact, profoundly alive.

His death — from a seizure followed by pneumonia — closes a remarkable earthly journey. But it does not silence him. His songs remain global prayers for justice, identity, consciousness and dignity. They remain the sound of people rising.

Jimmy Cliff once said that Rastafari appealed to the world’s consciousness because it lifted humanity. In truth, his music did the same.

He leaves behind a world that still aches for the very recognition, respect and justice he sang into being.
And he leaves us with a simple instruction, whispered through decades:

Sing. Resist. Rise. Hope.

Jimmy Cliff has crossed over. But the movement he helped build — and the humanity he insisted we recognise — endures, steady as a reggae beat.

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Can a culture of rule of law truly take root in a society where the powerful routinely operate above it? That question remains unresolved in Uganda, six decades after the 1966 constitutional rupture, when military force displaced constitutional order and set a precedent that has lingered ever since. That moment reshaped the relationship between state power, public authority and the everyday citizen, embedding a tension that continues to define Uganda’s political culture.

Today, impunity is no longer the exclusive domain of the armed forces—though they remain among its most visible practitioners. It has widened into a multi-layered ecosystem of privilege inhabited by soldiers, politicians, wealthy businessmen and even dubious foreign actors who navigate public spaces with casual disregard for legal norms. Kampala’s daily traffic theatre tells the story plainly: heavily tinted vehicles slicing against traffic, SUVs with no number plates barreling down pedestrian walkways, and armed escorts converting public roads into personal thoroughfares. These are not isolated displays of misconduct; they are public performances of untouchability.

Over time, such transgressions have hardened into a broader culture of entitlement. When land is grabbed, when vulnerable communities are evicted without due process, when repression becomes routine and increasingly normalised, these acts draw legitimacy from the everyday demonstrations of impunity. The underlying message is unmistakable: laws restrain the powerless, not the powerful.

This environment breeds a caste-like hierarchy in which privilege is not merely possessed but flaunted. Impunity becomes aspirational. Those lacking formal authority seek proximity to it—hoping for immunity from the constraints that govern ordinary life. The result is a self-reinforcing cycle: impunity displayed at the top cascades downward, encouraging more people to bend rules, cut corners, undermine institutions and pursue advantage outside lawful channels.

The cumulative effect is deeply corrosive. A nation preoccupied with the theatrics of power inevitably loses sight of the basic needs that shape everyday life. When elites are insulated from broken roads, dysfunctional health systems, failing schools and decaying infrastructure—because they can circumvent public services or purchase private alternatives—national priorities become distorted. The lived reality of the majority becomes invisible to those empowered to address it.

Meanwhile, policy reforms and governance interventions routinely stall because they threaten entrenched interests that benefit from the existing order. Oversight institutions remain constrained, underfunded or politically subordinated. Citizens, observing a system that shields its most powerful actors from scrutiny, turn to informal networks, patronage or quiet resignation.

Ultimately, the rule of law is not simply a legal doctrine but a shared cultural expectation that no individual stands above the norms that safeguard society. It demands fairness, restraint and a willingness—especially by those in authority—to submit to the same standards they prescribe for others. Uganda’s challenge, sixty years after the foundational breach of 1966, is not only institutional but cultural: rebuilding a social contract grounded in equality, accountability and mutual respect.

Unless that culture is deliberately reclaimed and defended, the promise of rule of law will remain elusive—forever overshadowed by the daily spectacle of privilege and impunity.

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This week, Africa’s leaders gathered in Yokohama, Japan, for TICAD 9, the Tokyo International Conference on African Development. Japan, like others before it, is extending a hand to help Africa unlock its potential. The conference showcased ambitious initiatives, including the landmark Safaricom Ethiopia project backed by Japanese capital and guarantees. The event brimmed with optimism about unlocking private investment and building strategic partnerships for infrastructure, energy, and digital transformation.

But beneath the pledges and panels lies the persistent paradox: Why, after decades of similar interventions, is Africa still lagging behind? Why does the continent remain a patient perpetually in recovery, unable to stand on its own feet?

Part of the answer lies in the structure of these engagements. While pitched as development partnerships, many conferences also serve as gateways for external powers to secure access to Africa’s vast resources and strategic markets. For Japan, TICAD is both an instrument of diplomacy and a hedge against Chinese dominance in Africa. For Africa, it becomes yet another forum where leaders shop for aid and projects, while sidestepping the deeper structural reforms needed at home.

Yet Africa’s biggest problem is not a lack of partners. It is the failure to govern itself effectively. Weak institutions, poor governance, corruption, and regulatory uncertainty keep investors wary and citizens disillusioned. Youth—who make up the bulk of the population—see leaders who talk about the future in foreign capitals while failing to build the basics at home.

The African patient, in truth, has never been short of medicine. What it lacks is the discipline to take the treatment consistently. Cleaning up governance, creating a predictable business environment, liberalising economies, and investing heavily in human development are tasks that cannot be outsourced. They require courage, vision and accountability from African leaders themselves.

This is why the continent’s youth and thinkers must interrogate both the motives of foreign partners and the decisions of their own leaders. Development is not imported; it is built. Japan’s interest in Africa is welcome. So was China’s, America’s, and Europe’s. But without internal reforms, even the most generous partners will not cure Africa’s chronic malaise.

At TICAD 9, the theme was “co-creating innovative solutions with Africa.” That “with” is the key. No external partner can substitute for Africa’s own agency. Conferences may open doors, but only Africans can walk through them with conviction.

Until the continent takes full responsibility for its own recovery, Africa will remain the paradoxical patient—surrounded by doctors, prescriptions and medicine, but never quite healed.

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