By Dr. LAWRENCE MUGANGA

Your Excellency, please accept my warmest, most sincere, and heartfelt congratulations on your remarkable and overwhelming victory in the elections held on January 15, 2026. Securing 71% of the vote is not just a political win, it is a resounding declaration of trust, confidence and hope that the people of Uganda have placed in your hands. This is the highest percentage you have ever received, and it speaks volumes about the faith Ugandans have that you can lead them into a future of unprecedented prosperity and transformation.

Your Excellency, this mandate is a sacred responsibility. It is also a once-in-a-generation opportunity to leave a legacy so powerful, so transformative and so visionary that it will be studied, celebrated and remembered for generations to come. The question before us today is simple but profound: what bold action will you take in these next five years to fundamentally transform Uganda’s economic trajectory and secure prosperity for millions of young Ugandans?

I write to you today with deep respect, appreciation for your decades of service to our nation and a passionate conviction that I must share an urgent message that could change everything for Uganda, for East Africa and potentially for the entire African continent.

Your Excellency, I write to you today not as a politician, not as a critic, but as an educator and economist who is deeply committed to one guiding principle that has shaped every decision I have made in my career: Country first. Uganda comes first, our young people come first, our economic future comes first. Everything else is secondary.

TEN-FOLD GROWTH

Your Government has articulated one of the most ambitious economic visions I have ever encountered: The Ten-fold Growth Strategy. The goal is clear and inspiring. We want to take Uganda’s gross domestic product (GDP) from approximately $50b to $60b today and catapult it to an astounding $500b by 2040. This represents a ten-fold increase in just 14 years.

Your Excellency, let me be very clear: I believe this dream is absolutely achievable. I am not a skeptic. I am a believer. But I also know the mathematics of economic growth, and the numbers tell us something very important. To achieve a $500b GDP by 2040, Uganda must sustain annual GDP growth rates of 14-18% for the next decade and beyond. These are not ordinary growth rates. These are exceptional, extraordinary and transformative growth rates.

The critical question we must ask ourselves honestly is this: can we achieve 14-18% annual GDP growth using the same economic strategies, the same sectors and the same methods we have relied on for the past 20 years? I respectfully submit to you, Your Excellency, that the answer is no. Agriculture is vital. Coffee exports are important. Oil and gas will contribute significantly. Manufacturing and mineral extraction are necessary. But relying on these traditional sectors alone, using conventional approaches, will not deliver the explosive growth we need.

To achieve the Ten-fold Growth Strategy, we need a new engine. We need a powerful, modern, proven vehicle for wealth creation. That vehicle Your Excellency is technology, and specifically, Artificial Intelligence (AI).

What can be achieved in this 5-year term (2026-2031)

  • 2026 (Year 1): Launch One Laptop Per Child Policy | Establish manufacturing at Namanve / Kapeeka

  • 2027 (Year 2): First 5 million devices distributed | Connect all schools via Starlink / Kuiper

  • 2028 (Year 3): All 15 million children digitally equipped | GDP growth accelerates to 12%-14%

  • 2029 (Year 4): AI-powered education fully operational | Uganda becomes E. Africa digital hub

  • 2030 (Year 5): $200b GDP milestone within reach | East Africa integration through technology

One laptop per child: It pays for itself

  • 15 million devices

  • Solar-powered

  • Made in Uganda

  • AI-enabled learning

THE INVESTMENT vs. THE SAVINGS

  • Total investment cost: $1.2B (15 million devices at $70-$80 each – bulk)

  • Total savings (10 yrs): $15B (Conservative estimate over a decade)

  • NET GOVT SAVINGS: Up to $13.8B

WHERE THE SAVINGS COME FROM (Eliminated):

  1. Library Buildings: $750m-$3b (15,000 schools x $50k-$200k each govt expenditure)

  2. Physical Textbooks: $3b-$10b ($40-$150 per student x 15m (5yrs) govt expenditure)

  3. Computer Labs: $1.2b-$2b (10,000 labs x $120k-$200k each govt expenditure)

THE REALITY

Your Excellency, in your recent address to the East African Community (EAC) leaders, you made a sobering observation that struck me deeply. You said Africa’s entire GDP, the combined economic output of all 54 African countries and over 1.4 billion people, stands at approximately $3.3 trillion. You compared this to the US, whose GDP is roughly $40 trillion. The comparison is indeed shocking and should motivate us to urgently act.

But allow me, Your Excellency, to make this comparison even more alarming, more urgent and more compelling. Let us not compare Africa to entire countries. Let us compare Africa’s GDP to individual technology companies. The numbers are absolutely staggering and should serve as a wake-up call for every African leader:

  • Nvidia, a single company that manufactures chips powering AI systems, has a market capitalisation of approximately $4.7 trillion. This one company is wealthier than the entire African continent.

  • Apple, a technology company, is valued at approximately $4.0 trillion. Again, wealthier than all of Africa combined.

  • Alphabet, the parent company of Google, stands at $3.8 trillion. Still larger than Africa’s GDP.

  • Microsoft commands a market valuation of $3.4 trillion. Once again, exceeding Africa’s entire economic output.

Your Excellency, think about this for a moment. If Nvidia, just one company, chose to distribute its entire wealth to every person on the African continent, each of our 1.4 billion brothers and sisters would receive approximately $3,000 (about sh11.3m) each. One company could do that. These numbers are not just statistics, they are a call to action.

What is the common thread connecting all these extraordinarily wealthy companies? What is the secret to their unprecedented accumulation of wealth? The answer is beautifully simple and crystal clear: They have mastered technology. Every single one of them deals in technology, innovates in technology and has built global empires on technological excellence. If Uganda and Africa want to generate unprecedented wealth, attract massive foreign exchange and compete on the global stage, we must participate actively and aggressively in the global technology ecosystem.

TRANSFORMATION

Your Excellency, I want to share with you research from ARK Invest, one of the world’s most respected research and fund management firms focused on disruptive innovation, and led by the renowned investor, Cathie Wood. Their research reveals something absolutely extraordinary: The global economy is currently undergoing the largest technological transformation in the entire history of human civilisation.

When we study economic history from the 1700s to today, we see a clear and undeniable pattern. Whenever major technological platforms emerged whether the steam engine, railroads, electricity, the telephone, or the automobile we witnessed significant surges in GDP growth rates and economic expansion. Each wave of technological innovation brought tremendous prosperity to the nations that embraced it early and decisively. Those nations that hesitated or resisted were left behind economically.

Today, we are witnessing something unprecedented. We are not experiencing the emergence of just one technological platform. We are experiencing the simultaneous convergence of five major innovation platforms:

  1. AI: Systems that learn from data and assist with complex tasks like medical diagnosis, translation, recommendations and creative work.

  2. Robotics: Machines that can sense, move and perform physical tasks autonomously.

  3. Energy Storage: Advanced battery technologies that revolutionise how we store and use electricity.

  4. Multiomic Sequencing: Technologies that decode human biology to improve health and medicine.

  5. Public Blockchains: Secure, transparent digital record systems that are nearly impossible to falsify.

The convergence of these five platforms is creating an economic revolution of historic proportions. According to ARK Invest’s projections, by 2030, this technology-driven transformation will create a total global market capitalisation of $300 trillion. Of this, AI-driven innovation platforms alone will account for $210 trillion, representing 70% of the total global market.

To put this in perspective, the current global market capitalisation as per 2025 stands at $148 trillion. We are witnessing the potential for the global economy to more than double in just five years, fuelled almost entirely by technology. Global GDP growth rates are projected to surge to at 7-12% annually due to this technological convergence.

Your Excellency, AI is the biggest technology disruption in history and is unquestionably the most transformative technology the world has ever seen. Research consistently shows that AI will increase knowledge and worker productivity by an astonishing four times, by 2030. Studies from leading institutions confirm that workers using AI tools complete tasks 40% faster with 18% higher quality. Global annual spending on AI software alone is expected to reach $14 trillion by 2030.

Your Excellency, this is the greatest wealth generation event in human history. The question before Uganda is urgent and existential: Will we participate in this wealth creation, or will we watch from the sidelines as other nations capture the opportunities and leave us behind? We cannot afford to be passive observers. We must act decisively and immediately.

UGANDA’S YOUTH

Your Excellency, Uganda possesses something that many developed nations desperately wish they had: an extraordinarily young population. Over 76% of Uganda’s 46 million citizens are under the age of 34. This is not a challenge. This is not a burden. This is our greatest strategic asset, our most powerful competitive advantage and our pathway to unprecedented prosperity.

But here is the critical insight: this demographic dividend will only transform into economic prosperity if we equip our young people with the skills, tools and competencies demanded by the 21st century economy. If we leave them without digital skills, without technological proficiency and without the tools to create, innovate and compete globally, then our youth become an untapped resource, a missed opportunity and potentially even a source of social challenges.

However, if we boldly invest in digitally empowering every single young Ugandan, if we give them the tools and skills to participate in the global digital economy, then our youthful population becomes an unstoppable force for wealth creation, innovation and economic transformation. This is where the one laptop per child policy becomes not just important, but absolutely essential and urgent.

The policy is straightforward: provide every single one of Uganda’s approximately 15 million school-going children and young people from pre-primary through university with their own personal laptop or tablet computer. These devices must be powered by solar energy to work in areas without electricity, and they must be manufactured right here in Uganda to create jobs and build local technological capacity.

Your Excellency, the one laptop per child policy is not an expense. It is an investment that pays for itself through massive cost savings that will more than offset the initial expenditure.

JOBS

Your Excellency, to ensure sustainability and create thousands of high-quality jobs, these laptops and tablets must be manufactured right here in Uganda. We can establish modern technology-manufacturing facilities in industrial parks such as Namanve or Namunkekera in Kapeeka.

International technology partners from China, the US or other countries can be invited to set up factories, transfer technology and manufacturing skills to Ugandans, and create employment. This creates a win-win situation: we get affordable devices manufactured locally, we create thousands of manufacturing jobs, we build local technological capacity, and we reduce dependence on imports.

SATELLITE LINKS

Your Excellency, one critical question naturally arises: how will 15 million devices connect to the internet? The traditional answer involves massive capital-intensive infrastructure projects, digging trenches across the country, laying thousands of kilometres of fibre optic cables and spending billions over many years.

I urge you to think differently and embrace a faster and cheaper solution: low earth orbit satellite internet providers such as SpaceX’s Starlink or Amazon’s Project Kuiper. These revolutionary satellite internet solutions require minimal ground installation, just a satellite dish at each school or regional centre, and can deliver high-speed reliable internet directly to the most remote schools almost immediately.

By partnering with satellite internet providers, we bypass years of infrastructure development and billions in capital expenditure. We can connect every school in Uganda to high-speed internet within months, not decades. This is the kind of bold, innovative thinking that will propel Uganda ahead of our neighbours.

AI REVOLUTION

Your Excellency, the true economic power of the one-laptop-per-child policy lies in the massive productivity gains it will unlock. Research consistently demonstrates that AI and digital tools increase knowledge worker productivity by four times. Workers using AI complete tasks 40% faster with 18% higher quality. Microsoft reports that 90% of knowledge workers say AI helps them save time, while 85% say it helps them focus on their most important work.

When 15 million young Ugandans are digitally proficient and AI-empowered, they will be four times more productive than the previous generations.

EAC FRONTIERS

Your Excellency, you have championed the cause of the East African Federation and regional integration for over sixty years with unwavering commitment and passion. You have consistently urged your fellow East African leaders to pursue unity, create larger markets and build stronger regional co-operation. This vision is absolutely correct and essential for our collective prosperity.

However, political federation is often slow, complex and contentious, involving lengthy negotiations, political consensus-building, and treaty ratifications. I want to suggest to you that economic integration powered by technology can happen immediately and organically. When Uganda’s youth are digitally proficient, when they speak the universal digital language fluently, when they possess laptops and internet connectivity, they can instantly collaborate, trade and innovate with peers across East Africa and beyond. A software developer in Kampala can partner with a designer in Nairobi, a marketer in Dar-es-Salaam, an engineer in Kigali and an investor in Addis Ababa to create products and services serving the entire region.

This is real integration. This is how Africa captures the $210 trillion AI-driven wealth creation opportunity projected by 2030.

Your Excellency, in countless addresses to the nation, you have consistently emphasised your vision for a science and technology-driven economy. You have called for Ugandans to move beyond subsistence agriculture, embrace innovation add value to our products, and compete globally through scientific excellence. You have invested in infrastructure, encouraged industrialisation and promoted technical education.

The one-laptop-per-child policy will bring your long-held vision to complete fruition. When 15 million young Ugandans are equipped with digital tools, trained in AI-assisted learning and empowered to create and innovate, they will become the scientists, engineers, inventors and entrepreneurs you have always dreamed of producing.