Govt should revisit Coffee Agreement-Supreme Mufti Galabuzi

By Francis Lubega

02^nd May 2022

The Supreme Mufti Sheikh Muhammad Shaban  Galabuzi wants a review of the Coffee agreement signed  between  the Government and and Vinci Coffee Company Limited reviewed so as to cater interests of local farmers in the same industry.

The Supreme Mufti made the suggestionin in his message at Kibuli Mosque in Kampala where he was officiating at the 2022 Eid Al Fitr prayers.

The  said agreement was signed by the Minister of Finance Matia Kasaija on February 10, 2022, and witnessed by Ramathan Ggoobi the Secretary to Treasury on behalf of the government and Enrica Pinetti, an Italian investor and the Board Chairperson of Uganda Vinci Coffee Company Limited on behalf of the company. Pinetti is the woman behind the unimplemented Lubowa Specialized Hospital Project.

The company was given free land in the Industrial and Business Park at Namanve after it indicated its desire of establishing a coffee processing facility in Kampala, wayved off all taxes a concession that will end in 2032.

But in his message, the Supreme Mufti Galabuzi indicated that government needs to review that agreement because it doesn’t favour the local farmers dealing in coffee.

According to Galabuzi, the purported investor has failed to accomplish the multibillion Specialized Hospital facility in Lubowa and she is now jumping on the coffee deal which he thinks she is incapable of delivering.

For his part, the Katikiro of Buganda Charles Peter Mayiga in the message read for him by 1st Deputy Katikiro  Twaaha Kawaase  Kigongo, appreciated a number of leaders who have come together to criticize the coffee agreement saying the agreement needs to be changed because many of the people in Buganda depend on coffee as their source of income before he reteirated his call to farmers never to be diverted.

President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni on Sunday during the Labour Day celebrations said government is considering looking into the concerns rose by the public about this coffee agreement and indicated that the agreement still stands.