Thousands of Ugandan youth are busy tiring themselves walking on streets in search for employment. However, President Museveni says his children Natasha Karugire, Diana Museveni Kamuntu, Patience Museveni Rwabwogo and Muhoozi Kainerugaba are lucky not have gone through such an experience.
In his state of the nation address on Sunday night, Museveni , unlike some parents in Uganda, his children have never looked for jobs because he planned for them.
“You don’t see my children looking for jobs because they are busy with their wealth. Some parents don’t plan for their children and neither do they bequeath their wealth to them. But in such cases, the state plans for them (unemployed youth),” Museveni said.
Museveni said youth unemployment rates would be low if all parents in Uganda started planning for their their and bequeathing them wealth.
“Our young people are educated but they don’t have jobs and therefore no source of income. They end up being misled by politicians. Some have resorted to taking drugs. The youths must be taken advantage of to create wealth for the country. There are no big insolvable problems,” he said before adding that he plans to build rehabilitation centres for drug addicts.
Youth unemployment is one of the biggest problems government is grappling with.
In July 2018, while talking to our sister publication, Daily Monitor, the chairperson of the Parliamentary Committee on Finance, Planning and Economic Development, Mr Henry Ariganyira Musasizi, said Uganda seems to be losing the fight against unemployment because it is not giving enough attention to those areas that can absorb so many of unemployed Ugndans.
In 2012, the Uganda Bureau of Statistics revealed that the share of unemployed youth (national definition, 18 to 30 years) among the total unemployed persons in the country was 64 per cent.
According to the 2013 Millennium Development Goals report by UNDP and government of Uganda, there are about 600,000 to 700,000 new entrants into the labour market each year in Uganda and more than 95 per cent of these are youth.
However, it is estimated that out of these, only 9,000 people find jobs.