Chinese aid to Uganda and its implication on national security

Abstract

The main purpose of this study was to investigate Chinese aid to Uganda and its implications on national security. Specifically, the study sought to evaluate the scope and nature of China’s aid to Uganda as well as discussing the underlying implications of China’s aid/debt to national security. The study utilized data from World Bank website among the World Bank Development Indicators for analysis, this data was compared with data from the Ministry of finance, planning and economic development (MFPED), Uganda Debt Network (UDN) and Economic Policy and Research Center (EPRC) for sameness. China’s aid to Uganda had been creeping till recent period, on the other hand, technical aid has been observed to peak during the years 2000--2010 and the fall due to the rising demand for nominal assistance. China’s holding of Uganda’s government debt was low between 1970-2000. Afterwards, the figure is seen to significantly grow between 2006 and 2011 and then eventually fall in the following years. Consequently, technical assistance, budget support, emergency relief assistance and investment technical assistance take the lion’s share of China’s aid. Ugandan government needs to develop its own capacities to sustain the infrastructure otherwise China will continue to provide highly skilled man power to do so. The challenge is to focus on capacity, use China’s aid to build our own capacity. Internal capacity should be further developed in particular on how to negotiate and supervise in order for Uganda to have skills & resource endowment.