Uganda Management Institute (UMI) launches the Anthem and Flag during the 50th anniversary
The colorful ceremony was graced by several dignitaries including; security officials, politicians, academia and the alumni among others.
The institute used the moment to launch their first anthem; composed by local artist and advocate Silver Kyagulanyi. They also launched the institute’s first flag; all commissioned by the minister of state for higher education, JC Muyingo.
The flag was immediately raised by the minister, as St Paul’s Choir led the gathering in singing the anthem.
It was a mix up of thanksgiving prayer sessions from different Inter-Religious Council clerics led the Vicar General Kampala Diocese, Msgr Charles Kasibante, who represented the Archbishop of Kampala Diocese Dr. Cyprian Kizito, as the main celebrant.
Muyingo congratulated the Institute for the 50 years of dedicated and fruitful service towards delivering the required human resource to the country.
“It is not an easy road because many things start and fail to celebrate their first anniversary,” he said.
However, Muyingo noted with concern over the integrity of public servants churned out from the institute, saying many public servants have been involved in corruption scandals and imprisoned. He asked UMI’s leadership to review their curriculum, emphasizing the need to integrate integrity in all their programs.
The First Lady and Minister of Education, Janet Kataaha Museveni also asked the need for UMI to always do introspection when there are issues on indiscipline in the public sector.
“Whenever there is a strike in a public university, corruption in public sector or other unethical behavior therein, do introspection. These are your products; ask yourself and your staff-is there something we have not done right? Is there something we could do better? In that way your relevance over the next 50 years will be forever felt,”
Mrs. Museveni said in her statement presented Muyingo. He bragged of having stood in as a dangerous substitute for the First Lady who could not make it due to other state duties.
UMI’s Director General, James Nkata said UMI has been taken through the furnace of academic training, research and consultancy purity “and we are now presenting to you the purest gold after 50years”. He stressed that the legacy day marks the memory of the institute as they host the institute’s flag and “a day we sang the anthem for the very first time”.
The Prison’s boss, Dr. Johnson Byabashaija the UMI patron, caused laughter among other guests when he testified that he had disobeyed his boss who had asked him to go for a postgraduate diploma in public management. “I already had my degree and masters and never saw the need for this diploma.
They just went and paid for my one year course and brought me the bank slip. They told me it was my choice to go for it or not. I went because I had no choice,” he said.
However, Byabashaija said the one year course turned around his life in management to date. “Now all my officers at the rank of superintendent and assistant commissioner must go for that course. That’s why prisons are performing better than other institutions. I am not afraid to say that,” he noted.
The institute was a department under public service ministry but later became semi-autonomous in 1992, following the enactment of the UMI Statute. The institute later became corporate under the Universities and Other Tertiary Institutions Act 2001, which made it open to all scholars including those from the private sector.