Capt. Mike Mukula, the National Resistance Movement (NRM) Vice Chairperson for the Eastern Region, has formally appealed to President Yoweri Museveni to support the establishment of a coffee processing plant for the Bugisu Cooperative Union (BCU) in Mbale.
Mukula emphasized that the proposed facility would serve as a transformative investment, unlocking the untapped economic potential of Eastern Uganda, creating jobs, and enhancing Uganda’s competitiveness in the global specialty coffee market.
“I humbly request your direct intervention once again—this time to support the establishment of a coffee processing industry in Mbale,” Mukula stated.
Below is the full Petition
My thinking is further sharpened and guided under the mentorship of General (Rtd) Salim Saleh, whose constant engagement with grassroots economic realities continues to shape my understanding of our national economic architecture.
Your Excellency, through your visionary leadership, you have repeatedly enlightened us on the historical economic syndrome of Africa and Uganda – a syndrome anchored on the exportation of raw materials: the three C.C.C (Coffee, Cotton, and Copper), later extended to the three T.T.T (Tea, Tourism, and Tobacco). You have persistently warned against this colonial legacy that traps Africa in cycles of economic dependency and vulnerability.
You have consistently called upon us to metamorphose from a raw-materials-based economy into a value addition and industrial-driven economy, where Uganda’s exports to global markets reflect real value, rather than the painful narrative of shipping away our wealth in its rawest, cheapest form. I am fully aligned with your vision,
Your Excellency. Indeed, if Africa and Uganda are to attain true economic independence, we must radically transform the structure of our economies, disrupt the exploitative value chains, and capture the full benefits of our God-given resources through value addition and industrialization. In this spirit, I profoundly commend your recent intervention in Ntungamo District, where the robust value addition efforts for robusta coffee are beginning to bear fruit. This is an outstanding model of how strategic state action can rewire local economies, empower farmers, increase national revenues, and project Uganda’s stature in international markets.
A deliberate government-led initiative to set up a modern coffee processing plant in Bugisu would:
* Expand value addition capacities and enable Uganda to export fully processed coffee products, not just raw beans;
* Create thousands of direct and indirect jobs, particularly for our youth under the Parish Development Model (PDM) framework;
* Incentivize increased coffee production by giving farmers predictable and better- paying markets;
* Strengthen Uganda’s foreign exchange earnings and reduce vulnerability to external commodity price fluctuations;
* Revitalize and modernize cooperative movements, inspiring confidence and pride among our smallholder farmers.
Your Excellency, this project would be a strategic extension of your broader vision for rural industrialization, a catalyst for East African trade integration, and a model for how
Uganda can break free from colonial economic patterns and ascend to true wealth creation and sovereignty.
As Vice Chairman for the Eastern Region of the NRM. I pledge to mobilize the political, social, and economic structures necessary to support this initiative should it receive your blessing. Bugisu is ready. Uganda is ready. Africa is watching.
With humility, conviction, and loyalty. I seek your hand to ignite yet another economic revolution – this time, one that will make Mbale the cradle of value-added coffee production in Uganda.
