In a bid to promote national development, the Uganda Bureau of Statistics (Ubos) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Bunyoro and the Bugisu.
According to the MoU, the two kingdoms will establish statistics units at their respective headquarters. Speaking at the Ubos headquarters, executive director Dr Chris Mukiza said the collaboration with institutions aims to promote partnerships and cooperation among users and producers of statistics to support planning and measure progress.
“We believe these institutions are part of the national statistical system. You generate a lot of statistics in your operations that we can harness and give meaning to,” Dr Mukiza said.
Mukiza said Ubos will ensure the institutions have strategic plans for statistics and will guide them to benchmark with neighbouring entities to strengthen the national statistical system, enhance data sharing, and improve data utilization.
Andrew Byakutaga Ateenyi, the prime minister of Bunyoro, revealed that the partnership journey began in 2020 when they first wrote to Ubos requesting support to establish a statistics unit within the kingdom.
“Earlier in 2018, the King of Bunyoro, directed us to transform and improve how we conduct business. We prepared a strategic plan to implement that directive, but realized that we lacked well-structured data to guide our efforts,” Byakutaga explained.
Representing the Umukuka of Bugisu, Mike Mudoma, Geresom Musamali said the kingdom also faced challenges in making evidence-based decisions due to a lack of reliable information.
“We thought of collecting, analyzing, and disseminating information, but we did not have the relevant expertise,” Musamali said.
“We decided to petition Ubos to exercise its mandate of developing collaborations with us and to guide us on this journey.”
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