CommonwealthUganda

Strategy If I had access to 900 million shillings in government funding, I would assemble a highly skilled team of 16 professionals, including: •3professional photographers •3 international journalists •2 local journalists •2 Ugandan travel influencers •2 experienced guides •2 travel writers •2 security officers This team would embark on a 29-day documentary safari across Uganda, with the goal of capturing, documenting, and showcasing at least 60% of the country’s undiscovered and underexplored destinations. The outcome would be a powerful visual and written narrative that highlights Uganda’s hidden tourism potential, positioning it as a must-visit destination on the global stage.

Taxing Cement is Taxing Jobs. === Cement is not a luxury. Cement is jobs, skills, and infrastructure. In Uganda, a bag is already around UGX 32,000 to 40,000. In China, that same bag is closer to UGX 7,000 to 11,000. In Turkey, about UGX 11,000 to 15,000. So why is cement in a developing country priced like a luxury commodity? And then we add tax on top? Because, every bag moved is a mason trained, a technician empowered, a contractor scaled, housing accessed, . Construction is one of the few industries where skills are built through doing. The casual labourer today becomes the mason tomorrow, and the mason becomes the contractor. When you increase tax on cement, you are not just raising revenue. You are raising the cost of building homes, schools, clinics, and businesses. You are slowing down the second largest employer in Uganda after agriculture. Fewer sites start. Fewer young people learn. Fewer businesses emerge. Projects delay. Informal jobs disappear quietly. Housing becomes more expensive. The economy tightens where it should expand. Serious economies don’t treat cement as a consumption good. They treat it as a production input. So, given that we now know how cement is important to industry development, do we still want to tax each bag more or do we want more bags moving across the country?