Government Cannot Do Business Not Even Poorly. (Number 3)

The debate on whether can start or run business will never stop. Many European countries have successful government owned companies and yet countries like the United States do not have these types of companies. The decline of the United Kingdom in the 60s and 70s was attributed to the growing public sector. The revival of the UK was attributed to entrepreneurship introduced by Margaret Thatcher in the 80s. Many African countries followed this privatization effort which was dictated by the multi-lateral institutions especially the IMF and World Bank. Uganda was no exception. We reduced government ownership of doing business and to date there are hardly any productive enterprises in Uganda. However government has gone ahead to undertake a number of public sector initiatives. The record so far has not been very good.  This story that follows from the New Vision of June 2013 talks about a fish factory built in 2005 that was still unutilized. These are the famous white elephants, the projects that never take off.  The fish processing factory was built in Busia  on the lake Victoria shores to improve fish trade in the area. The factory has a processing factory with cold storage and 8 years later on the factory was not operating. The factory was intended to reduce environmental stress in the region and at the same time improve livelihoods on communities that depend on fish.

The story that follows below tells it all. There are two similar factories in Kalangala which are also idle. Indeed government cannot do business.

Busia’sSh3b Fish Factory Lifeless 

Lake Victoria is under threat mainly by human activities. In a campaign, Save Lake Victoria ending today, Vision Group platforms published investigative articles and programmes highlighting the irresponsible human activities threatening the world’s second largest fresh water lake. Today, we explore how the fish handling facility in Majanji on the shores of Lake Victoria in Busia district is lying idle.

It cost over sh3 billion. It was supposed to be a state-of the- art fish processing facility, complete with storage facilities. But it has only been host to snakes, bats and rats. The fish handling facility in Majanji on the shores of Lake Victoria in Busia district was completed in 2005 under the Lake Victoria Environmental Management Programme.

Lake Victoria Environmental Management Project was a trans-boundary programme designed to achieve and develop global environmental objectives, by improving collaborative management of trans-boundary natural resources of Lake Victoria Basin. It was also meant to reduce environmental stress in the targeted pollution hotspots and selected degraded sub-catchments.

This as a means of improving the livelihoods of communities who depend on the natural resources of the basin. The fish processing facility at Majanji was supposed to help local fishermen process and pack fish for both local and international markets.

The facility had running tap water, a cold room, storage and fish drying facility plus air-conditioned offices. But it was never to be. There was no fish in the lake. Today, the taps are dry. The tables in the offices are covered with bat droppings An extensive network of cobwebs decorates the white walls. The bushy compound is a safe home for reptiles and insects. “This factory is rotting because there is no fish left in the lake,’’ Hassan Omari, a 58-year-old former fishermen says.

He adds that in the 1980s, he used to get two tonnes of fish. “Today, things are bad. There is corruption and bribery and use of small nets,’’ Omari says. He narrates that they fished using 12 to 13 inch nets for Nile Perch as opposed to the small nets used today. Some fishermen use mosquito nets. According to Umari, the smallest Nile perch was 10 -15kg by then.

Today, factories take fish measuring a minimum of 20 inches and weighing 2kg and above. Even this size of fish is rare in Majanji. There are many small boats from Kenya in Majanji scavenging for young fish in the lake. Local fishermen say the Kenyans pay a weekly fee of sh100,000 to fisheries officials to be allowed to sweep the lake clean of young fish. Information from National Fisheries Resources Research Institute NaFFIRI show that the Nile perch has declined from an average of 1.2 m tonnes for the period 1999 - 2007, to about 0.8m today, while mukene has increased from about 0.4 million to 1 million tonnes over the same period.

The increase in the smaller fish species is attributed to the decrease in the Nile perch which preys on them. Nile perch is the top predator. Currently, mukene accounts for about 70% of Lake Victoria biomass. “Government should empower us fishermen to save the lake. Government officials are useless and too corrupt.’’ Omari adds. Jafari Bumali, another fisherman agrees. He says the Government is not serious.

“When I was young, the colonial masters used to quarantine some parts of the lake to allow fish to grow. You could earn a year in jail if caught fishing from a quarantined area of the lake,’’ Bumali explains. He adds that if the Government has failed to patrol the lake, it should at least ban the manufacture and importation of cheap illegal nets. Illegal nets are cheaper costing sh25,000 a piece compared to the recommended size which go for up to sh90,000.

“The Government should bring back Wembley operations on the lake. The officials of Wembley never took bribes. They would get your boats and nets and burn them,’’ recalls Abdu Kasim Byansi 37, a fisherman. Operation Wembley was formed in 2002 in response to organised crime that had brought the city of Kampala to its knees. A military general was put in charge of the Operation Wembley.

Operation Wembley would track down and destroy cells of terrorists and criminals and arrest them without offering a chance for trial in a criminal court. In contrast, this operation brought murders and organised crime in the capital to a halt. Then Wembley Operations spread to Lake Victoria to discourage bad fishing methods using the same tactics.

Byansi was a victim of Wembley. He used to engage in illegal fishing until Wembley officials burnt his nets and boat. “They were right to burn my boat, I thank them. I was wrong. Look at the fish factory, it is rotting. There is no fish. Yes. We want Wembley back.”