THREE SEPARATE events connected themselves in my mind in a way that I feel some clever Ugandans could take up and turn into wealth down the generations if they focus on (or even just read) this.

One – President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni hosted a delegation of foreign businesspersons coming in from the United Kingdom and India.

Two – a fisherman caught a really massive fish that some people claim weighed in at more than 170 kilogrammes and somebody sent the video round via social media.

Three – the government launched two ferries in Eastern Uganda in the Lake Kyoga basin.

In reverse order, the launch of the two ferries was exciting news even to me. 

The project cost UGX42billion (almost USD12million). 

On a side note, the story in The New Vision announcing this was positioned above a report about a Kololo property valued at around USD2million being the subject of a rental dispute.

Six similar properties could have built those two ferries whose launch we are celebrating this week.

That’s a mildly depressing thought when you read, in the stories, that those ferries have been on a waiting list for decades.

Infrastructure of this kind unlocks economic activity almost like it’s magic or witchcraft.

Presidency Minister Milly Babalanda, in her analysis, said the ferries would cut travel time for area residents from eight hours to one-and-a-half hours – just as the cost of travel would.

Just the week before, at an East African Community meeting in Kigali-Rwanda, the private sector and government participants there all cited infrastructure as the first thing we need to sort out in this region and on the continent.

Regional integration, our main hope for proper economic development, will not happen without infrastructure in place to enable business activity. 

Continental integration and the use of the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) is just a dream if we can’t get even a sack of groundnuts across just one of our silly borders without the ridiculously high costs caused by poor infrastructure.

In his remarks when meeting the UK-India-Uganda Multi-Sectoral Trade Delegation, President Museveni focused on “the importance of continental economic integration as a pathway to shared global prosperity.”

“President Museveni emphasised that sustainable prosperity is built on linking producers to consumers, supported by infrastructure, peace, skills development, and affordable finance,” reads the State House media release.

Of course!

Back in 1885 when European countries and the United States wrote down their Berlin Agreement deciding how to split Africa up and take charge of our resources, they outlined this in quite some detail.

Because we have so far failed to Be Serious about our lives, we study that history seemingly so that our schools can boast in the media about how many children scored highly and why we should pay them to take in the next generation.

In 1885 those Europeans and Americans knew Africa so well that in that Berlin Agreement they describe rivers and lakes almost as if they could have called out which ffenne tree could be used as a territorial marker. 

Meanwhile, in 2026, many of us are here with our vast amounts of education and have no clue where Bukungu-Kagwara-Kaberamaido are yet we can explain in detail how to get from one corner of Europe to another. 

I checked on Google Maps and saw that the drive from Bukungu to Kaberamaido Town Council would take six and a half hours – and that’s a technological guess that sometimes does not know the reality of weather-related road travel delays.

A clever, educated person who buys land and sets up some interesting ventures in those parts today will be smiling to the bank in a couple of years to come.

More so if they can mobilise like-minded people to set up sizeable investment funds that would take advantage of the improved infrastructure launched there this week.

Of course, many of us will not or cannot because we first have to build residential houses in our villages.

Understandable, somehow, for Ugandans.

Even that video clip of the monster fish won’t make us consider how our water bodies are so well endowed that there is even more opportunity below the surface of those waters than above it where the ferries are visible.

Another news item made its way onto my mind as I was thinking this and became relevant.

Malaysia’s national halal authority, Jabatan Kemajuan Islam Malaysia (JAKIM) reportedly handed over a certificate to Uganda’s Free Zones and Export Promotions Authority (UFZEPA)clearing us to trade with them even more.

Guess how much fish Malaysia imports from other countries? USD1.5billion worth of fish – including from countries like Norway. 

Norway is 9,520 kilometres from Malaysia; Uganda is 7,800 kilometres from Malaysia.

The internet says Norway does not have a halal certificate from Malaysia even though that sister country of ours recognises the Nordic certification.

WE do.

What’s lacking?

Not just infrastructure – Africa needs to Be Serious about linking the dots that will build our economy.