Photo Credit: AFP
Ugandan President, Yoweri Museveni, has tackled the Western World leaders over the United State purported plans to expel Uganda, Gabon, Niger and the Central African Republic (CAR) from a special US-Africa trade programme.
Recall that SaharaReporters earlier reported that the President Joe Biden-led US government decided to remove the four African countries from the trade programme over alleged violation of human rights.
The US introduced the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) in 2000.
It gives eligible sub-Saharan African countries duty-free access to the US for more than 1,800 products.
President Biden said that Niger and Gabon – both of which are currently under military rule following coups this year – are ineligible for AGOA because they "have not established, or are not making continual progress toward establishing the protection of political pluralism and the rule of law".
He also said that the removal of the CAR and Uganda from the programme was due to "gross violations of internationally recognised human rights" by their governments.
In May, the US government had said it was considering removing Uganda from Agoa and introducing sanctions on the country after it passed a controversial anti-homosexuality law.
Reacting to this, President Museveni claimed that the removal of his country and other African countries would not impede the countries’ growth and development, adding that Africa could develop without foreign aid.
Fellow Ugandans and, especially, the Bazzukulu. Greetings.
I need to advise you not to be over-concerned by the recent actions by the American Government in discouraging their companies from investing in Uganda and on removing Uganda from the AGOA list.
Some of these actors in…
— Yoweri K Museveni (@KagutaMuseveni) November 5, 2023
He said, “I need to advise you not to be over-concerned by the recent actions by the American Government in discouraging their companies from investing in Uganda and on removing Uganda from the AGOA list.
“Some of these actors in the western world overestimate themselves and underestimate the freedom fighters of Africa. On account of some of the freedom fighters making mistakes of philosophy, ideology and strategy, some of the foreign actors, erroneously think that African countries cannot move forward without their support.
“Certainly, as far as Uganda is concerned, we have the capacity to achieve our growth and transformation targets, even if some of the actors do not support us. It is the eight points that I outlined for you at our recent Independence celebrations that are decisive. The eight points are: patriotism – not following politics of identity but following politics of interests; supporting the private sector; economic infrastructure development to lower the costs of doing business in the economy; regional integration to create big markets that can absorb our products; working with foreigners who respect us; eliminate corruption; social infrastructure to develop the human resource through universal education and health, and protecting the environment that controls our water and our rain.
“It is good that the American government avoided the mistake of de-funding the procurement of the HIV drugs for our 1.4 million People on those drugs. However, all our people on the ARVs and all the Ugandans need to know that we had a contingency plan to fully fund the procurement of those drugs if ever the external funders were unable to fund them.”
President Museveni equally berated US government for being mean in their judgement towards African countries.
He continued: “These pressures from outside are joogo (dharau - looking down upon somebody, underrating somebody) towards the Africans and must be rejected.
“I am told that some of the Arab Countries have similar laws. Why don’t these actors put similar pressures, on them? In 1963, the OAU was founded in Addis Ababa. Only 36 African Countries were independent that time and they are the ones that attended. Almost another 20 countries were not yet Independent.
“That OAU meeting, then, demanded that all the African countries, must be independent, either by peace or by war. The “jogooists” (the arrogant) of the World, mocked us. What can Africans do? In 1964, Frelimo launched the Armed struggle against the Portuguese Army in Mozambique, joining the MPLA that had launched an uprising earlier.
“By 1994, the whole of Africa had been liberated by the force of the Africans supported by the Socialist Countries of the Soviet Union, China, Cuba, etc. Africa has got all the ingredients to succeed if we use them correctly.
“Uganda, under the NRM, is and will succeed, regardless of what some of the external actors and internal detractors do.”
“The further good news is that not all the Western Countries’ actors are of the same arrogant attitude. Many, actually, either agree with us or believe in the correct principles of live and let live. Even in the colonial times, some Western actors supported our anti-colonial struggle. People like Fenner Brockway, Dingle Foot, Olof Palme, etc, supported us,” he concluded in a statement he released via his verified account on X (formerly Twitter).