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Labour Unions have joined the Uganda National Teachers’ Union (Unatu) to reject the government’s seven-day ultimatum to end their strike, insisting that teachers will not return to classrooms until their demand for salary enhancement is addressed.

‘There is no amount of intimidation that will force teachers back to class without the government responding to our call. What we need are answers, not threats,’ Unatu General Secretary, Mr Filbert Baguma, said on September 30.

He accused the government of neglecting its promises for three years.

‘Government knows where the teachers are and therefore there is no reason for him to start intimidating and threatening us. The minister has been sleeping on the job,’ he added.

The standoff between the teachers and the government followed the Minister of Public Service, Mr Muruli Mukasa, yesterday issuing a stern warning, declaring the industrial action illegal and directing teachers to resume work within one week.

‘You are hereby enjoined to call off the industrial action, and for your members, especially those who are participating, to resume duty immediately and not beyond one week, or else you will be regarded as having abandoned duty and resigned accordingly,’ Mr Mukasa said while addressing the media.

The directive wasn’t taken in good faith, not only by teachers, but also by the local government labour union leaders, who dismissed the threats, saying intimidation cannot solve the salary dispute.

Mr Hassan Mudiba, the secretary general of the Uganda Local Government Workers’ Union, said the government should instead open space for dialogue.

‘We know the law, and intimidation is itself illegal. What we need is an open time for negotiation on what can be done to solve the issue or a grace period for action, not authoritative comments reminding us of our jobs. Workers are frustrated and tired of being discriminated against,’ he said.

He added that unions have resolved to lay down their tools until the government demonstrates goodwill towards a fair solution.

‘Workers are calling for equal treatment and respect, because we all serve the same country. A lot of money is being utilised by corrupt officials, yet our payrolls are suffering, hence an interruption in public service delivery. We are putting our tools down until a positive course is taken, and it is under the law that local government workers have a right to withdraw or call a peaceful strike in case of any grievances,’ Mr Mudiba noted.

‘Unions are simply reminding the government of its long-standing unfulfilled promises and commitments. We are not walking away from our duties; we are demanding fairness. Government must recognise this reality and engage with us constructively,’ he stressed.

Salary enhancement journey

Mr Mukasa defended the government’s record, saying Shs2.5 trillion has been committed to salary enhancement since 2018/2019. Of the 368,291 public servants, he noted, at least 125,276 officers have benefited, with 60,077 now earning 77 percent of the approved long-term pay targets. Still, nearly two-thirds of civil servants have not received any increment since 2014/2015.

The minister acknowledged this but attributed the delay to competing national priorities. He further noted that the government plans a phased 25 percent salary increase for humanities teachers in the 2026/2027 Financial Year, pending approval by the Ministry of Finance.

Mr Mukasa also accused Unatu of breaking the law, saying no certificate of dispute had been issued by the Public Service Negotiating and Consultative Council before the strike began.

‘The commencement of industrial action when discussions had not even started is uncalled for and jeopardises the cordial relationship the government has enjoyed with the unions,’ he said.

Despite the threats, teachers have vowed to maintain their strike, leaving millions of learners idle across the country. Next week remains uncertain as 431,856 Senior Four candidates are to sit for the 2025 Uganda Certificate of Education (UCE) as learning continues to be paralysed across the country.

Teachers, mostly in secondary schools, have entered the third week of their strike, which started on September 15. According to section 7 of the Public Service (negotiating, consultative and disputes settlement machinery) Act, workers in the public service shall have the right to withdraw labour or call a strike in furtherance of a labour dispute, provided the negotiating machinery is exhausted.

Salary disparities

In July 2022, the government implemented a substantial pay rise for science teachers, increasing salaries by up to 300 percent. Under the adjustment, graduate science teachers’ pay rose from Shs1.1m to Shs4m, and Grade V science teachers’ pay from Shs796,000 to Shs2.5 million.

Currently, a graduate arts teacher earns a gross salary of Shs1,078,162 and takes home Shs841,931, while their science counterpart earns Shs4m gross and Shs2,858,000 million net.

Amudat District, in the Karamoja region, is facing a serious health crisis. Many mothers and babies are dying from problems that can be prevented. Even though efforts have been made to improve healthcare, the situation is still bad.

Poor roads, lack of ambulances, faraway health centres, and harmful cultural practices make it hard for pregnant women to get the help they need. In the financial year 2024/2025, the district recorded four mothers who died during childbirth, and 34 babies died before or shortly after birth.

Out of more than 20,000 women who went for antenatal care, only about 4,000 gave birth in health facilities. Most mothers still rely on traditional birth attendants, who often don’t have the tools or training to handle emergencies. Mr Peter Lobot, a retired health worker, said the number of deaths is worrying.

‘Every month, mothers die during childbirth, and many babies don’t survive their first week. If we had more health centres and a district hospital, many of these lives could be saved,’ he said. Many pregnant women do not finish all the recommended antenatal visits. This means problems during pregnancy or childbirth are often discovered too late.

Mothers share their struggles

Ms Pauline Chelain, a 37-year-old mother from Kataboko, said it’s hard to decide where to give birth. ‘Sometimes we have to choose between giving birth at home with a traditional birth attendant or walking many kilometres to the nearest clinic. The roads are bad, there’s no transport, and we suffer a lot,’ she said.

She added that many health centres are far, and some women have to walk over 70 kilometres. By the time they arrive, they’re tired or already in serious condition. The district also has very few health facilities. Most parishes that are supposed to have health centre IIs do not have them, and the sub-counties that should have health centre IIIs also don’t possess them.

Similarly, constituencies that are meant to be served by health centre IVs have none, and the district does not even have a government hospital. Monitor has learnt that the only hospital in the district is owned by the Church of Uganda.

The locals made the remarks during a mobile health clinic organised on Tuesday by ActionAid Uganda with funding from the European Union at Ding-Dinga Village, Kataboko Sub-county in Amudat District. Some relief came through a mobile health clinic run by ActionAid Uganda with support from the European Union.

The clinic visited Ding-Dinga Village in Kataboko to offer health services and raise awareness against harmful practices like early marriage and female genital mutilation (FGM).

The goal is to help communities protect young girls and support women’s health. But local health experts say more government help is needed. They are calling for more health centres, more trained staff, and regular health outreach programmes.

According to the District Health Office, Amudat has a population of over 203,000 people, but with only 11 small health centres, most of which lack enough equipment and staff.

Ms Juliet Chepar, who is six months pregnant, said: ‘The nearest hospital is over 100 kilometres away.

When labour starts, there’s no time. The roads are bad and there’s no transport.’ She explained that many women turn to traditional birth attendants. ‘They try their best, but they don’t have the skills or tools to help when there are problems,’ she said.

Health officials speak out

Ms Esther Acheng, the district official in charge of maternal and child health, said the poor state of health services is putting mothers and babies in danger.

‘People walk long distances to reach a health centre. Some child deaths are never reported,’ she said. Only 46 percent of women give birth in health facilities, and only 14 percent use family planning services in the district.

Ms Daisy Awilo Omech from ActionAid Uganda said they are working with the district to help women and girls in hard-to-reach areas. ‘We have shelters in Amudat for girls facing problems like early marriage or FGM. We provide first aid, legal help, and counselling,’ she said.

The Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Assets (PPDA) Appeals Tribunal has raised concerns over persistent delays by accounting officers in making administrative review decisions on bidder complaints.

Speaking to the media during an engagement with officials from government ministries, departments, and agencies in Kampala on Friday, PPDA Registrar Mansour Atiku said such conduct violates the law and undermines confidence in Uganda’s procurement system.

“An accounting officer who receives a complaint is required to suspend the procurement process immediately and issue a written decision within 10 working days. However, many officers go beyond this stipulated time, frustrating bidders and casting doubt on the fairness of public contracting,” he said.

Atiku added that the authority has recorded repeated cases where accounting officers deliberately delay, mishandle, or completely ignore complaints raised by aggrieved bidders.

“The law is very clear. Once a complaint is received, the procurement must issue a decision communicated within 10 days, and going beyond this period is not only unlawful but also weakens the credibility of our procurement processes,” he emphasised.

Such delays deny bidders timely redress, create room for corruption, and undermine the principles of transparency and accountability.

“Procurement is about fairness and safeguarding public funds. When complaints are mishandled, service providers lose trust in the system, and the quality of competition suffers,” Atiku noted.

The PPDA Act requires that, upon request, a bidder who lodges a complaint must receive a report from the procuring entity detailing the reasons for rejection and the stage at which rejection occurred. Paul Kalumba, a member of the tribunal, warned that PPDA will not hesitate to sanction officers who fail to comply with the law. “Accountability starts with the accounting officer, and there will be consequences for negligence and non-compliance will attract personal liability,” he said.

Kalumba also urged officers to guide bidders properly on how to file complaints, including the payment of prescribed administrative review fees, instead of using technicalities to frustrate them.

Common complaints

PPDA data shows that bidders regularly raise grievances about irregularities in how procuring entities handle administrative reviews. These practices, Kalumba said, are damaging not only to bidders but also to the government’s bid to deliver services through credible contractors.

“The tendency to sabotage bid submissions, delay decisions, or cancel processes midway erodes trust. We urge all accounting officers to respect the timelines and procedures provided by law,” he emphasised.

Executives often hash out the same words to their reports , ‘let us create value.’ And it has become a standard language across the C-suite, value creation, and value propositions.

Everyone is looking for ways of creating more value for the consumer. It could be through better packaging, accessible pricing or even improving the product-service surrounding.

As a result, the customer or consumer is walking away with more value. And then organisations keep wondering – but we are creating all this value yet it’s not reflecting in both the top-line. In fact, it could be eroding the bottom-line as value creation often comes at a cost impact to the company.

What then is the challenge? Why is it that an organisation could create so much value yet not reap benefits of this endeavour? It comes down to the second thing – value capture. It is one thing to create value, it is another thing to capture it. Value creation is like energy generation, it is hard to capture every unit generated. It gets lost somewhere or somebody else captures it.

It then presents the famous two by two matrix, four-quadrant scenario. In the first quadrant are organisations that create low value, capture low value. No one wishes to be in this space. It’s the whisper before total annihilation. In the second quadrant are companies that create high value but capture low value.

So much so little

This is another miserable step. Because it means you are doing so much for so little. Then you have the third quadrant of creating low value but capture high value. It is the dream state, they are the kind of organisations that even sell their breadcrumbs, convert their waste into revenue. And finally, the ideal state of high value creation and high value capture.

One of the FMCG companies in Uganda pulled off the fourth state with one of their brands. They engaged in premiurisation, gave life to the label and the bottle.

Thereafter, they transitioned the new brand from a gin to a liqueur, and this meant a lower alcohol by volume (thus more savings). But because of this remiurisation (adding flavours to the original brand), they were able to sell it at a higher price and sell more volumes.

This was the ultimate signature example of high value creation, and high value capture. Such an endeavour requires a fully integrated innovation team. That is to say, an innovation team with an end-to-end approach around the product.

They can study the entire value chain of the product, create value at every line of the chain, and capture value at every stage of the chain. These are teams with a commercial outlook and financial sensitivity. You could call it strategic innovation that results in competitive advantage. It requires looking within what an organization already has and giving it a whole new approach. That could mean rethinking a process, rethinking a product, rethinking a structure. You could also think of when banks digitised and got many services on the phone. By creating value (convenience), they also captured it (more transactions volume, and thus more charging avenues).

The bottom line here is that organisations must take the conversation of value creation to its natural conclusion – value capture. It is no use creating value that will not be captured. There is no point throwing resources at immature markets, or markets that have not yet hit a critical mass that serves as a precursor to some innovations.

Sometimes, we call this high value creation, low value capture as organisations that were so ahead of themselves. They gave consumers more than what they could pay for at the moment. It is comparable to a technology startup releasing more features than what a user currently requires, rather than saving those features for later releases. Think of it as avoiding over-engineering or gold-plating.

The trap

Most organisations are caught up in the trap of gold-plating and over-engineering. Take the example of restaurants on an online food delivery platform. It is a beautiful thing to have branded paper bags. But does it translate to repeated purchases? Is it worth the cost to currently brand one’s packaging bags? Or would that effort rather translate into improving the quality and taste of the food which will enable one to command higher prices and lead to repeat purchases. The branded paper bag is high value creation, low value capture. The better food is high value creation, high value capture.

Again, it is back to what really matters to a consumer in each industry, as they make a purchase decision. For the food industry, one cares that their food arrives in one piece, it arrives hot and fresh, and it arrives tasty. All else is gold-plating. And the consumer won’t pay for that gold, but it will reflect on the operational cost-line of the organization.

As executives drive conversations in the C-suite, it is also time they drive the conversation of value creation is a futile attempt if it is not followed by value capture. If you do not capture the value that you create, you will be just an example of a company that was ahead of its time but did not survive to see the future. And those examples are endless.