Ssenyonyi’s campaign kicked off in Bukomansimbi, Uganda’s top coffee-producing district, on November 19, 2024, where he rallied farmers to keep growing coffee.

The National Coffee (Amendment) Bill 2024, which proposes the dissolution of UCDA after 32 years of operation, has sparked heated debate and opposition from various sections of the public and some Members of Parliament. Despite the backlash, Parliament voted to advance the bill, citing the need for greater efficiency and alignment with MAAIF’s broader agricultural mandate.

Ssenyonyi demanded President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni to verify his claims that the Uganda Coffee Development Authority (UCDA) was giving seedlings only to opposition MPs and leaving out their NRM counterparts.

The parasitic nature of these agencies and authorities promoted waste and parasitism. The 2016/2017 public resource spending figures showed that agencies and authorities were taking UGX 2.2 trillion and the ministries UGX 2.6 trillion with duplication of responsibilities. The conducted survey indicated that agencies like UCDA were corrupt and wasteful, with officers awarding themselves contracts, supplying poor-quality, overpriced materials, and not delivering on time.

Putting in mind the above scenarios with undisputed data from reliable sources and the voices of the coffee farmers who they claim to be fighting for, after meeting Katikiro Charles Peter Mayiga, they shared that UCDA has not been of help to them as coffee farmers and that they should be left to embrace the president’s decision of rationalization.

UCDA was established in 1991 under the Uganda Coffee Development Authority Act, Cap. 325, which was repealed and replaced by the National Coffee Act No. 17 of 2021. The authority’s mandate includes regulating activities within the coffee value chain, promoting coffee quality, supporting research and development, and optimizing earnings for stakeholders in the sector.

The chairperson of ‘Let’s Fight Illiteracy and Ignorance’ and the Uganda Association of the Uneducated Persons, John Bukenya, has urged the opposition members of the parliament to stop politicizing the Uganda Coffee Bill that seeks to rationalize the Uganda Coffee Development Authority (UCDA) with the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry, and Fisheries (MAAIF).

Dr. Ezra Suruma, the former Minister of Finance Planning and Economic Development, has suggested that the National Coffee Bill...