By Richard Onapatum
BUGEMA UNIVERSITY: President Yoweri Museveni has reiterated the government commitment to promote science and technology as one major way to enhance development across the country.
“As NRM government will continue to support sciences because through scientific research, we are able to generate innovations and these innovations support industrial growth.” Museveni said.
He explained that these Industries provide jobs and thus widening the country’s tax base, hence spurring socio-economic transformation.
The president made the remarks in a speech read for him by the Vice president Maj. (Rtd) Jessica Alupo during celebrations to mark 75-years of Bugema University which started as a ministerial training college in 1948.
The Institution was only training ministers of the church and teachers both in Luganda and English then.
The university celebrated the anniversary together with its sister schools including Bugema Adventist Vocational secondary school and Bugema Adventist Primary School which were started at the same time.
President Museveni said that as a country, they have benefited a lot from Universities through, science, innovations and research. He was glad to note that Bugema university is promoting Science and Technology.
He congratulated the University for offering quality education to students and thus playing apart in the development of Uganda.
“I therefore, congratulate Bugema University for having curved a niche in techno-sciences which resonates very well with the government’s effort in promoting science and technology,” he said.
Museveni said as the country continues moving through the fourth industrial revolution, with the developments in the ICT sector, cloud computing technologies, and artificial intelligence, higher education institutions such as Bugema University have a key role to play in conducting relevant research and coming up with innovations that support industrial growth, thereby spurring transformation through the creation of more jobs.
He explained that as per Uganda’s Vision 2040, our education sector operates in an environment that is gearing up to transforming the country into a middle-income country.
The president said the Uganda is steadily improving its performance in key human development indicators related to education and training so as to prepare the workforce for a dynamic labor market that requires an appropriate mix of increasingly sophisticated cognitive and technical skills where the large majority of jobs are outside agriculture and the informal sector.
He appreciated the sacrifices and efforts of all the different stakeholders in contributing to the progress and success of Bugema University and contributed Sh20m towards the construction of the Science Complex at the university main campus in Bugema in Luweero district to promote science education.
He thanked all the participants in this fundraising drive for the Science Complex who turned up to support Bugema University.
He noted that when we work together, our effort will not be in vain but live to benefit many other generations. He asked the university to provide a bill of quantities for the entire science complex. It is estimated at Sh3b.
The university Chancellor and also the Archbishop of the Seventh Day Adventists Church, Dr. Prof. Moses Maka told the gathering who turned up for the celebrations that all together the institutions have trained tens of thousands of learners who are out there contributing to the development of their countries in different fields.
The institutions are situated on a 640 acre of land and the university was chartered by the government in 2007.
He lauded government especially president Museveni for continued support Bugema university, its sister institutions and as the church.