Working with youth, mentoring young adults into innovators against poverty, I am among those who disapprove the Parliament of Uganda’s decision to merge the Secretariat of the National Youth Council with those of other councils of “special interest groups.” A decision which has sparked debate in Uganda on marginalisation of “special interest groups.”

Considering that Uganda has among the youngest populations in the world with over 70 percent of its population below the age of 30, Uganda’s youth should not be considered a “special interest group”; but rather the main human resource of our nation that should be better natured and utilized.

This far, since the enactment of the National Youth Council Act in 1993, the National Youth Council structure with a 700,000 strong countrywide membership from village, parish, sub-county, district and national levels, is marginalised and under-funded. This should not be the case.

The merger of the National Youth Council Secretariat with those of the National Council for Persons with Disabilities, National Council for Older Persons, National Children’s Council and National Women’s Council, is irrational and will further marginalize it.

In terms of democratic participation and inclusion, the decision by Parliament to integrate secretariates of “special interest groups” into one secretariat, the National Secretariat for Special Interest Groups, is a setback.

The National Youth Council was rightly established as a non-partisan body to ensure and assure that the youth voice is strong in national governance and at all levels. It does not make sense for Parliament to weaken it by ameliorating its Secretariat, when actually such a Secretariat should be better capacitated and used as a channel for overseeing government programmes.

With a strong National Youth Council Secretariat, for example, it would be unnecessary for the Inspector General of Government to recruit 4,000 community members to fight corruption. The fight against corruption is part of the very mandate of the National Youth Council – to participate in overseeing and monitoring implementation of government programmes.

Parliament should have instead strengthened the National Youth Council to become a formidable nurturing ground for good governance and leadership. A structure through which the majority of Uganda’s population independently participate in discourse that has direct impact on their lives and through which our youth learn and take responsibility for public interest decision-making.

If I were in Parliament, I would have voted for the merger of the Uganda National Roads Authority back into the Ministry of Works and Transport, and voted to retain the independence of the National Youth Council. A vote, according to the Minister of Works and Transport, Gen. Katumba Wamala, that would have “saved Uganda 39 billion shillings in monthly wages.”

It is baffling how Parliament voted to retain the independence of the Uganda National Roads Authority, which directly duplicates the role of the Ministry of Works and Transport; and to disempower the National Youth Council, which has a vital role to play in democratic governance.

In our commitment to contributing to Uganda’s human resources development, starting right away, we, at the CPAR Uganda Secretariat, will henceforth make every effort to normalize identifying, liaising and working with the National Youth Council structures within the geography that we work.

By Ms. Norah Owaraga, Managing Director.