Uganda is set to open at least four foreign missions in a bid to deepen its diplomatic reach across the globe, The Observer has established.
This will bring the total of Uganda’s missions abroad from the current 35 to 39. The new missions will be in Goma DRC, Cuba, Brazil, and South Korea, we have been told. Some of the missions could be opened as early as the next financial year.
A new embassy in Goma means Uganda will have two missions in the Democratic Republic of Congo – the other being in Kishasha. This won’t be the first time the country is having two missions in a single country. In Kenya, Uganda has missions both in Mombasa and Nairobi.
An official at the ministry of foreign affairs told us that the new missions are expected “not just to cement Uganda’s relations [with the respective countries] but also push the country’s trade interests.”
In October, President Museveni met the Cuban vice president and said Uganda planned to reopen its embassy in the capital, Havana.
“We shall be happy to open our embassy in Cuba. We had one but we retreated. We should go back to Cuba,” Museveni is quoted in a State House statement.
A South Korean firm, SK Engineering, was one of those shortlisted to build Uganda’s oil refinery before the contract was awarded to a Russian consortium, RT Global Resources, which later pulled out. Having a mission in the Korean republic could be key to scout investors for the country. The impeached South Korean president Park Geun-hye visited Uganda in May 2016, before her impeachment late last year.
Currently, Uganda does not trade a lot with South Korea. Figures from the Bank of Uganda show that Uganda exported goods only worth $160,000 to the Korean republic while imports were worth $37m.
Having a mission in a foreign country is costly and countries will always measure the sort of gain – economically and politically from having an embassy there.
Apart from DRC – where the country registers a trade surplus, trade between Uganda and the other three countries is tilted in the favour of the latter.
Bank of Uganda figures show that while Uganda imported goods worth $26.8 million from DRC in 2015, its exports to the country were worth $152m in the same year.
In Brazil, Uganda did not export anything in 2015 compared to $7.1m from the South American country. In 2014, Uganda earned $40,000 in exports to Brazil.
There are no figures available for trade with Cuba, but in a State House statement, the Uganda government said the two countries “have supported each other at international forums through the Non-Aligned Movement to defend and protect their strategic political and economic interests and partnership.”
Efforts to reach the ministry of foreign affairs permanent secretary Patrick Mugoya for a comment were futile as his known phone numbers were off.
amwesigwa@observer.ug