Moroto Municipality Market vendors have expressed disappointment over the delayed completion of the main market.
Moroto market is being constructed under the government’s Markets and Agriculture Trade Improvement Program (MATIP), with funding from both government of Uganda and the Arab Bank of Economic Development in Africa (BADEA).
The new market being constructed by Ambitious Construction Ltd will have shops, stalls, open spaces, toilet facilities, parking and ramps for easy access by people with Disabilities (PWDs).
The project, which is being supervised by the ministry of Local Government, will be handed over to the Moroto Municipal Authority upon completion and is expected to house 4,000 traders.
Construction works on Moroto market commenced two years ago and were due for completion in December last year. However, close to a year later, works are still ongoing, something that has not gone down well with the traders.
Namboze Alifa, one of the traders, said that the Town Clerk of Moroto Municipality, Isaiah Tumwesigye had promised traders that the market would be complete and fully operational between September 1 and December 2019, but that is yet to materialize.
“We are wondering what’s going on. Nobody has explained why the market has taken so long to finish, or when it will be completed, and yet we are losing our products to thieves every night,” she said.
Simon Wamuno, the vice Chairman of Moroto Municipal Traders Association affirmed that the delay in finishing the facility was exposing traders to losses from burglary.
“Most of our traders operate from mud and wattle houses which thieves easily break into and steal from. We had hoped that if the construction of the market is done quickly we would not continue to incur losses,” he said.
But Robert Kairu, the Moroto Municipal Engineer, urged the traders to be patient and allow the contractor complete all the work.
“It’s true the completion of the work has been a little bit delayed but it’s in the final stages. I appeal to our traders to be patient,” he said.
According to Kairu, after completion of the market, the Municipal Council will remove evict all the container-shops from the major streets of Moroto.
“We have very many containers that are being used as shops in our streets, but as soon as this market is completed, we shall push everyone into the market and no more containers will be allowed in the town,” he said.
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Fruits farmers in Teso and Acholi regions have reason to smile following an announcement by the Soroti fruit factory that it will resume buying fruits from the farmers as the economy begins to pick up in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The announcement was made by the factory’s Executive Director, Douglas Kakyuku Ndawula in an interview with theCooperator.
Ndawula said the factory’s management had suspended buying fruits from farmers due to the nationwide COVID-19 lockdown and follow-up restrictions that affected the factory’s sales.
“Now that the market is picking up seriously after the lockdown was lifted, we are registering fairly good sales and will soon start buying fruits from the farmers,” he said.
According to Ndawula, the 87% drop in sales resulting from business closures during lockdown was slowly being reversed, with the factory now registering a 55% gain in sales.
He said the factory will start buying fruits from farmers by next week and called upon fruit farmers in Teso, Acholi regions to be ready to supply the factory with fruits.
The factory which is located in Soroti was established in 2014 by the government of Uganda as an investment promotion initiative aimed at supporting value addition in fruit processing for the promotion of industrial growth, income diversification and increasing household incomes.
According to Ndawula, since the factory started its operations, they have so far procured about 2,500,000 kilograms of oranges and mangoes from more than 109 farmer cooperatives to produce ready-to-drink juice under the company’s Teju brand, as well as fruit concentrate.
“Our main products are Juice concentrates and ready-to-drink mango, orange and lemon juice which must meet the required standards, domestically, regionally and internationally.
He urged farmers to focus on cultivating improved fruit varieties that are needed by the factory.
“The factory will only buy improved mango varieties including Boribo, Kakule, Tommy Atkins, Zillet, Apple Mango, Kent, Keitt and Haden, while for oranges we only buy Valencia, Washington Naval and Hamiline,” he said.
Meanwhile many farmers welcomed the factory’s move to resume buying fruits, describing it as a great relief to farmers who have endured harsh living conditions under the COVID-19 pandemic.
Samson Opolot, one of the fruit farmers in Atira Sub County in Serere district, hopes to earn some money to pay school fees now that schools have been allowed to open on October, 15.
“When the President opened up candidate classes on Sunday, I was speechless because I had nowhere to get school fees. But if the factory resumes buying fruits next week, that will save some of us,” he said.
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Several traders who lost their merchandise in the Saturday July 11 conflagration that engulfed Nyamityobora market suspect that the popular market was deliberately torched by motivated individuals, despite the police’s insistence that the cause of the fire is as yet unknown.
Located at Mile Two on Mbarara-Masaka road, the iconic Nyamityobora market- sometimes named Kijungu- is one of the sights that welcome you into Mbarara Town.
Vendors in Nyamityobora Daily Market were left in tears after an abrupt fire gutted the iconic market and destroyed property worth over Shs 500m.
The fierce blaze started in the wee hours of the night and destroyed a lot of property including tonnes of dry and fresh food stuffs, stalls, clothes, shoes and several eateries within Kijungu cell, Nyamityobora division, in the new Mbarara City
Nyamityobora market Chairperson, Wilson Rwamukore, confirmed that a total of 600 registered traders had lost property worth Shs 500m, including the market office.
“It has 600 traders and property worth Shs 500 million had been lost; even my money and books were burnt in the office. I was informed at 4 am, and and by the time I reached here, the entire market had been burnt,” Rwamukore said.
Byansi Muhammad, the area councillor representing Nyamityobora ward regretted that the unfortunate incident happened during the COVID-19 lockdown.
“It is unfortunate our market has got burnt during a bad time of COVID-19 when people were no longer working as their businesses were all locked down,” Muhammad said.
Arson suspected
Several traders who spoke to theCooperator expressed their suspicion that the fire that destroyed their livelihoods was no accident.
Ketty Rukundo, who for the past eight years has operated a hotel in Nyamityobora market, told theCooperator that she learnt about the inferno by phone call early Saturday morning.
“It was around 5:00am when I was called by a colleague saying, ‘You are sleeping and yet the market is burning?’ By the time I reached there, I could not save anything- everything had been burned; I simply broke down,” Rukundo says.
Rukundo believes the fire was planned by some market leaders who had earlier suggested developing a standard Nyamityobora market, while Wilson Rwamukore, the market Chairperson, blamed the tragedy on “enemies of the market”.
“It was torched by some enemies of the market, but we shall wait for the police investigation report,” he said.
Councillor Byansi Muhammad was equally shocked by the timing of the fire outbreak.
“If the fire was from a charcoal stove, the market would have got burnt around 11pm. But now, with this fire of 5 am, we really don’t know,” Muhammad mused.
For his part, Lawrence Birungi, a trader whose posho store was torched in the conflagration, says the fire’s outbreak during curfew time makes it even more suspect.
“We leave the market at 6 pm because of the curfew, so we were are surprised to learn that the fire that destroyed our businesses started between 4-5 am when there are no boda bodas operating. Some of us think this fire was planned.”
The widely held suspicions of arson are fanned by the narrative of the fire’s genesis and progression provided by Brian Semanda, one of the security personnel at the market. According to him, the fire was set from different corners of the market.
“The fire started in the middle of the market, but by the time we got there, another side of the market had also started burning. This means the fire was intentionally set by some unknown people,” Semanda said.
Police response
ASP Samson Kasasira, the Rwizi regional police mouth piece, says the cause of the fire hasn’t been established yet but investigations are still ongoing.
However, many blamed the police for not acting fast enough to stop the fire, despite the market having Nyamityobora police post for a neighbour.
“How can our market get burnt from left, right, to centre, when there is a police station next door? So we blame the government because they didn’t offer any help until we made an alarm to the central police station. And even when they came, the fire van had no water and we had to put out the fire ourselves,” one Saidat Rukundo charged.
But Kasasira says the police had responded in time to save a significant part of the market.
“Today morning fire gutted Nyamityobora market. It is said to have started at 4 am, and our fire rescue team was able to respond and put out the fire, saving half of the market and the neighbouring structures,” he said.
Vendors trying to rescue some of their property in the fire
Nevertheless, he admitted that the police don’t have enough resources to man all the police units in order to cater for such disasters.
Appeal for restitution
One of the affected traders, Ketty Rukundo, appealed to government to support the traders to recover from the fire loss.
“We only recently resumed work, after the lock down, and this has happened. If government could help us to reconstruct our structures and pay our loans so that we can cater for our children, it would be a big help,” she said.
Others like Byansi Muhammad appealed to the president to come to the rescue of the vendors who were already affected by COVID-19.
“This is a double pandemic to the traders’ entire household income. I appeal the office of the disaster and preparedness to come and help them,” Muhammad said.
He adds that some of the traders had loans in different banks and requested that their payment be rescheduled,
“I don’t think these people will be able to clear in time; they should be added some time.”
Mbarara Deputy Town Clerk, Richard Mugisha says as the City Council they will deliberate and consider how best to help the traders.
“It would be premature for me to say what we as a council are going to do for the affected vendors, since this has just happened. We shall have a meeting on Monday with our political leaders, make an assessment of the extent of the damage, then come up with a clear plan on how to help them,” he told theCooperator in an interview, Saturday.
“But we also appeal to the other relevant central government offices especially the disaster management department to see how to come in and help our traders,” he added.
COVID-19 effect
Trader, Lawrence Birungi, says the COVID-19 restrictions on mobility had hampered traders’ ability to reach the market in time to save some of their property after they got news of the fire outbreak.
“Even if we wanted to rescue our property we were not allowed by police to move because of the curfew. Moreover, even bodabodas which are the easiest means of transport were stopped from carrying passengers because of COVID-19,” he lamented.
Some of the vendors looking on as the police extinguishes the fire.
In addition, Mugisha, says the COVID-19 restrictions have dampened business performance of the former Mbarara Municipality.
“Most of those businesses have not been paying our local revenue since they were not working, and up to now they are yet to get to full capacity because of social distancing and the curfew,” Mugisha explained.
He adds that levies on some businesses had to be slashed in response to the slowdown in business.
The Deputy Town Clerk says the market was especially affected because, prior to curfew, some traders used to operate up to midnight while markets like Nyamityobora that were known to operate for up to 24 hours are no longer working.
“COVID-19 affected our revenue levies substantially. As council, we estimated that the impact of COVID-19 on businesses was 80%, and therefore we reduced the payment for those which are still operating by an 80% margin as well.”
Disaster-proofing city structures
Mugisha says the new Mbarara Central region market has been installed with fire extinguishers to cater for such disasters in the future.
“Yes we have the fire mitigation measures already in place for the new central market construction,” he said.
However, he opined that such disastrous challenges sometimes emerge from reckless traders who don’t provide security for their businesses.
“Yes we can mitigate but the fire could have come from a candle or out of carelessness caused by some people within the market.”
Government has established a contingency plan for members that may lose their monies in Savings and Credit Cooperative Organizations (SACCOs).
The latest safeguard has been established in form of a special Savings Protection Fund for SACCOs, with the aim of shielding members from unforeseen losses that usually arise out of management deficiencies or embezzlement tendencies in associations.
Established under the recently gazetted Tier 4 Microfinance Institutions and Money Lenders (SACCO) regulations 2020, the fund provides for compensation of members of savings and credit organizations for loss of their savings.
The regulations that were signed by the Minister of Finance, Planning and Economic Development, Matia Kasaija, were finally gazetted on July 7, to fully operationalise the Tier 4 Microfinance Institutions and Money Lenders Act, 2016, which established the Uganda Microfinance Regulatory Authority (UMRA) as a licensing and supervisory agency for SACCOs.
According to the regulations, SACCOs are now required to contribute an annual premium of 0.5 percent of their annual savings to the Protection Fund, which will directly be managed by UMRA.
The regulations put in place penalties for SACCOs that fail to comply with the requirements. Under its mandate, the regulatory authority has can suspend licenses of any microfinance institution over noncompliance with the regulations.
The State Minister in Charge of Microfinance, Kyeyune Haruna Kasolo, explains that the fund is somewhat similar to the Deposits Protection Fund that protects deposits by a certain percentage of the monies they hold in the event a commercial bank becomes insolvent.
He says the contingency fund is part of a well thought-out approach to strengthen the microfinance sector in the country and build public trust in SACCOs which have proven their capacity to improve the livelihoods of local populations by offering them affordable credit.
In the recent past, thousands of depositors affiliating to the various SACCOs have suffered losses as result of dishonest managers disappearing with the institutions’ finances.
The minister indicates that the new law mandates the authority to directly supervise the institutions at any time, as a way of preventing such eventualities
The gazetting of the regulations according to UMRA has also outlawed the operations of any SACCOs, Money lenders and other non-deposit taking microfinance institutions without valid operations licenses renewable on an annual basis.
Among other salient aspects, the regulations also demand that SACCOs submit to the authority their monthly returns on capital adequacy and liquidity statements.
UMRA was established by an Act of Parliament in 2016 with the aim of promoting a sound and sustainable non-banking financial institution’s sector, to enhance financial inclusion, financial stability, and financial consumer protection among the lower income population of the country.
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Masindi Resident District Commissioner (RDC), Martin Mugabi, has given Masindi Sugarcane Growers Association Limited (MASGAL) and Kinyara Sugar management one week to sort out their grievances over the sugarcane price for this financial year.
This was during a mediation meeting between the two parties that the RDC called at his office on Tuesday this week to resolve the impasse between the parties.
The meeting came after MASGAL rejected the price of 91,586 shillings for a tonne of sugarcane that Kinyara Sugar announced for this financial year which MASGAL says was reached without consulting them.
On July 1, 2020, Kinyara Sugar Ltd issued a new cane price for the 2020/2021 financial year which would be Shs. 91,586 per ton of sugar cane sold by the out growers. This was a decline from the previous price of Shs 108,200 shillings per tonne in the last Financial Year.
Speaking to the cooperator news a after the closed meeting, RDC Mugabi revealed that during the meeting the parties agreed to continue dialoguing on the matter with the aim of arriving at a mutually agreeable price.
“Another meeting will be held next week during which the two parties are expected to reach a consensus. I however appeal for calm from the farmers as the parties dialogue to ensure peace and prosperity in the area”, said Mugabi.
The chairperson Masindi Sugar cane out Growers Association Limited (MASGAL), Cosmas Byaruhanga, said they are ready to dialogue with Kinyara over the matter.
“The farmers would not have protested the price that Kinyara announced without consulting them if it was on the higher side,” Byaruhanga said.
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