What GDP Per Capita Says About Your MP

Greetings. The recent primary elections of the ruling National Resistance Movement have shed some light on the status of our democracy. The age old demons of voter intimidation, bribery and violence were cast in a new light. For years, we've known the political campaigning system is a quid pro quo arrangement between the politicians and the electorate; in such a system one does not need a strong manifesto to contest. 

Political experts have voiced their concerns about the salaries paid to the Members of Parliament being the chief impetus behind the current state of our electoral process. However, are we really paying our legislators exorbitantly?

A Ugandan Member of Parliament takes home UGX 25 million per month, not including allowances. So for the calendar year, the legislator takes home UGX 300 million (US$ 80,475). In principle, these are just numbers, without significance. However, one has to set a benchmark upon which to view these figures. 

How do MPs salaries compare with the standard of living?

Gross Domestic Product (GDP) measures the total income of everyone in the economy. This single measure captures all economic production by individuals, companies and the government. The proportion of this measure to the total population, GDP per capita, gives an idea about the standard of living, i.e. the average income per person in the economy. According to the World Bank, Uganda's GDP per capita stood at US$ 642.78 a year. The annual salary of MPs is 118 times greater than that amount! For each shilling the voter earns, his/her elected representative is taking home 118 shillings, and as noted earlier this doesn't include allowances and other add-ons. 

Voters earning at the level of GDP per capita would have to work for 118 years in order to earn what the MP earns in 1 year! This is appalling for a country whose average life expectancy is 62.52 years, i.e. you're likely to die two years into your retirement! If the average person works between the ages of 25 and 60 (35 years of working), this means three-generations of voters of the same family would have to put in productive work to earn the same amount the legislator makes in one year!

How do other countries compare?

The first point of comparison would be our neighbours. Across the border in Kenya, the legislative arm of government is a bi-cameral house. Senators take home US$200,000 a year whereas the MPs in the lower house earn $58,744 per annum. Kenya has the highest GDP in East Africa, at US$1,710.51 per person each year. The Senators and MPs respectively earn 116 times and 34 times the per capita figure. In comparison with Uganda, this is a modest range from the national average.

One could call the United States the progenitors of the modern democracy - their dubious suffrage history notwithstanding. Their legislative arm is also bicameral, however members of the House of Representatives and the Senate earn the same annual salary of US$174,000 per year, absent of allowances. With a GDP per capita of US$ 63,051, a Congressman/woman earns just under three times that much.

The United Kingdom presents a more self-effacing scenario. Members of the House of Lords, do not earn a salary but can opt to receive £305 (US$ 396) in attendance allowance per day, as well as travel expenses and access to subsidised restaurants. In the House of Commons, an MP earns £81,932 (about US$106,986) per year. This figure is just more than double the UK's per capita GDP (US$ 46,827).

Country	GDP per capita (in US$)	Legislator Salary: GDP per capita
Uganda	956.00	117.8363
Tanzania	1,050.00	18.7550
Kenya	1,710.51	75.6336
United Kingdom	46,827.00	2.2847
United States	63,051.00	2.7597

Studies of GDP find that countries with a higher GDP per capita have better childhood nutrition, healthcare, education etc., than their less-endowed counterparts. A caveat should be added that countries with lower GDPs tend to spend a huge portion of that on their legislators.

Ceteris. Paribus.

References

Awich, L., (May 2019). "New house allowance puts MPs' salary way above world super powers," in The Star.

Dickinson, E., (January 2011). "GDP: A Brief History," in Foreign Policy Magazine.

Editor, (August 2019). "Analysis: MPs Salaries," in The Observer.

UK Parliament (October 2020). Pay and expenses for MPs. UK Parliament, https://www.parliament.uk/about/mps-and-lords/members/pay-mps/ 

US Senate (October 2020). Senate Salaries since 1789. US Senate, https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/briefing/senate_salaries.htm 

The Colonialists Behaving Badly

Greetings. Annually we commemorate our independence, in remembrance of regaining our "sovereignty" from the British Empire. The exploits of the Empire within Uganda are well documented, especially the activities within the central region. With regards to the rest of the country, there's not much popularised about colonial rule in those areas. As with the rest of the country, they do maintain colonial epithets on street names as well as schools. As the Empire was rewarding acres of land to Apollo Kaggwa and Nuwa Mbaguta in return for emasculating their respective liege lords, Kabalega was being banished from his kingdom. In certain instances the colonial era had its downside. The British weren't always honourable in their dealings within the protectorate. 

Samwiri Karugire explained how the British formulated a system of administration across the country. From his examples in Northern Uganda, it is evident how the existing status quo was maltreated and relegated to carrying out orders. It is from his text that I share the excerpt below;

The first challenge to the nascent British administration, therefore, was to establish a uniform system of administration over the whole protectorate and this challenge was not fully resolved throughout the colonial period - and even for some period after independence - because the factors militating against uniformity of administration were to prove intractable.

From the outset the British administrators were convinced that Kiganda model of local government would e the most viable, and probably the cheapest also, and that therefore this should be "exported" into all the parts of the Protectorate. What this meant was that the form rather than the substance of the Kiganda system of government should be the pattern of local government everywhere in the Protectorate.

The first practical problem arose out of the fact that the Kianda system of administration was peculiarly fashioned to suit Buganda conditions and that this fashioning had taken well ove a century to take a definite shape within Buganda. Outside Buganda, the system was a strange one, even in the kingdom areas. The first formal and concrete steps to establish the Buganda model of administration were taken by the promulgation of the 1919 Native Authority Ordinance. The main purpose of this Ordinance was to formalise and clarify the powers, duties and privileges of African chiefs in all areas of the Protectorate excepting Buganda. This was an important consideration because the African Chief was to be the principal grassroot instrument by which British control was to be established and consolidated in Uganda.

The law had been made, but what mattered was how it would work in practice for this is the ultimate test of the effectiveness of any law.

It was naturally in the segmentary and quasi-segmentary societies of Uganda that the Ordinance met its greatest challenges because it was primarily in those areas that the concept of one-man authority was entirely alien. In the small kingdom of Acholi the kings reigned rather than ruled and that the consensus of all the assembled elders of the particular kingdom was the source of the direction of public policy but decidedly not public opinion of the kings or of any other single person.

The Rwot of Atyak was deposed in 1927 "because he failed to carry out government orders", and was replaced by one Jakariya Atoyo from Patiko so that the "rule of Atyak's royal line came to an end at this time". In some instances some humiliating punishments were handed out to these traditional rulers for trivial offences. For instance, the ruler of Pajule, Aliker by name, was put into a latrine pit by the District Commisioner and he died soon thereafter. Lakidi, the ruler of Paimol, was imprisoned and finally hanged in public and in his place was installed one Amet, who was not only from outside the royal house of Paimol, but had also, to the considerable outrage of the Acholi, suffered from leprosy and lost some of his fingers. And this outrage was perpetrated by a European Officer (Postlethwaite) whom the Acholi had nicknamed gweno (chicken) - a very unflattering epithet indeed in Acholi. As a result of all these drastic measures government interpreters, clerks and other obsequious people were gradually put into positions of power over a society in which age and proven merit were the criteria of leadership. The system ultimately worked not because it was initially acceptable but because the British had the physical force to back up their appointees.

Happy independence day.

Ceteris. Paribus.

Source

Karugire, S.R., (1980). A Political History of Uganda. Kampala: Fountain. Chapter 4: The Administrative Framework, 1921-1960, pp. 123-125.