Banks and pension funds feast on gov’t securities gravy train as businesses get more starved of credit and choked by high interest rates.

The government of Uganda’s continued uncontrolled borrowing from commercial banks via government securities and at anti-market rates to the detriment of the private sector dominated the greater part of the just-ended Absa 2024 Economic Outlook Forum. Various experts called out the government for failing to tame its growing appetite for borrowing from the local markets and at double-digit rates, something that is increasingly making it unattractive to lend to local businesses especially SMEs and startups on one hand while also killing venture capital options as the pension funds, whose long term funds would be a reliable source of very affordable…