By Isaac Christopher Lubogo
Labour Day in Uganda.
That annual ritual where the state dons borrowed robes of solidarity, the workers are marched like ceremon aqial cattle to sun-scorched fields, plastic chairs groan under the weight of bureaucratic indifference, and tired promises echo through megaphones like expired sermons.
It is not a celebration. It is a performance. A tragicomedy staged on the graves of dignity, equity, and economic justice.
1. A Day for the Jobless? The Irony of an Unemployment Carnival
How does a nation with unemployment rates galloping beyond 9% (UBOS 2023)—with youth unemployment unofficially hovering around 64%—dare beat drums and wave banners in honour of “labour”? What labour? For whom? Where?
Walk into Wandegeya or Kisenyi and see graduates polishing boda mirrors, selling airtime, or lugging sacks of tomatoes—armed with degrees but unemployed, unemployable, and unemploying.
The “celebration” becomes grotesque: a feast in a famine. A laugh in a funeral home.
International Labour Organization (ILO) conventions require not just the celebration of labour but the protection and creation of decent jobs. Uganda?
Here, job creation is political choreography, not economic policy. Most jobs come not from government planning but from individual hustle—meaning Labour Day should be renamed “Struggle Day”, if honesty still had currency.
2. The Exploited and Forgotten Informal Sector
Over 80% of Uganda’s workforce lies in the informal sector, according to the ILO.
No contracts. No NSSF. No maternity leave. No occupational safety. Just sweat, survival, and silence.
Take Mama Namuddu, a mother of five in downtown Owino Market. She sells second-hand bras, working under tarpaulin for 14 hours a day.
When rain falls, the only thing she gets drenched in is the hypocrisy of national speeches praising the “resilience of Ugandan workers.” Resilience is not a virtue when it’s born of neglect.
What, precisely, does Labour Day offer her? A day off? She can’t afford to skip. A speech? She can’t afford to listen. A government pledge? She’s heard them since Amin. She needs policy, not poetry.
3. Wage Slavery Masquerading as Employment
In the civil service, salaries come late. Sometimes, not at all. Promotions are frozen. The public sector wage bill is bloated at the top, skeletal at the base.
The lowly teacher earns less than a day’s rent in Kololo, while the presidential convoy grows longer by the month.
Even in the private sector, stories abound: employees made to sign “no lunch break” contracts; salary delays of months without interest or apology; pensioners dying before a single shilling reaches them.
And still, on May 1st, we celebrate?
4. The Myth of the Worker’s Union in a Union-less Country
Trade unions in Uganda exist in law but not in effect. The National Organization of Trade Unions (NOTU) is reduced to an NGO-in-waiting, long de-fanged, de-funded, and de-relevant. Many fear to strike—because the state wears velvet gloves but holds iron fists.
Ask the nurses. Ask the teachers. Ask the factory workers at Mukono Industrial Park who dare not whisper “conditions” or “compensation” lest they join the long list of unexplained dismissals.
The Labour Disputes Tribunal is so underfunded and underpowered it might as well sit under a mango tree.
5. Migrant Labour and the Export of Desperation
Every year, Uganda “exports” tens of thousands of its youth to the Middle East. Officially called “labour externalization,” this is nothing but the outsourcing of poverty and desperation.
Many are maidservants, drivers, or security guards who end up tortured, raped, or murdered. And the state? It sends condolences and another delegation.
If Labour Day were honest, it would open with a moment of silence for the blood-soaked remittances that finance this nation’s fragile forex reserves.
6. The Death of Meritocracy and the Rise of Nepotocratic Employment
In a country where jobs are not advertised but whispered, where interviews are staged and CVs only matter if they come with an envelope, Labour Day becomes a farce. In ministries, boardrooms, and commissions, the question is not “What did you study?” but “Whom do you know?”
This is why brilliant engineers become boda riders and visionary teachers become domestic workers in Dubai.
Not because they are lazy. But because Uganda rewards allegiance, not ability.
7. International Embarrassment: Failing Every Global Test of Labour Justice
Uganda has ratified 31 ILO conventions, yet consistently violates them.
From gender discrimination in workplaces to failure to enforce minimum wage policies, Uganda’s labour sector remains a breach in motion. In 2021, the ILO cited Uganda’s lack of enforcement mechanisms as a “grave concern.”
So, what exactly are we celebrating on May 1st? The government’s inability to enforce the very conventions it signs?
Conclusion: Retire the Mask. Reform the Labour.
Labour Day in Uganda should not be celebrated. It should be mourned. It should be a day of national soul-searching, not sycophantic celebration.
A day where leaders listen, not speak. Where workers are not bused to stadia, but their voices bused to Parliament.
Until we can guarantee decent work for all, respect for workers’ rights, timely and fair compensation, real employment opportunities, and enforcement of labour laws—then Labour Day in Uganda remains a grotesque masquerade, and to dance in it is to mock the very people whose backs built this nation.
Let the speeches end. Let justice begin.
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