Despite hyping science disciplines for national transformation, the government continues to sidestep evidence-based decision-making, ignoring Global University Business Club Limited (GUBCCo), the one practical, scalable, and tested solution to Uganda’s graduate unemployment crisis.

I beg to be educated as to how long, out of the four decades in power, Uganda’s leadership has presented science as the magic key to national progress. From President Museveni’s speeches exalting STEM disciplines to the preferential treatment of science teachers and the recent curriculum overhaul, the message has been consistent: science will save Uganda from economic stagnation and graduate unemployment.

Yet behind this loud rhetoric lies a contradiction that has persisted for years and continues to cost the country dearly. If science is truly valued: if evidence, logic, and rational decision-making are as important as the President claims, why is the government so reluctant to apply scientific principles when addressing the crisis that is crippling Uganda’s future: graduate unemployment?

I have raised this question repeatedly, including in my two recent Daily Express articles: Curriculum Overhaul vs. Real Solutions and Museveni’s Blind Spot on Graduate Unemployment. I have presented evidence, proposals, data, and a fully tested solution, GUBCCo, developed through rigorous research and validated by real-world outcomes. Yet the silence from the leadership has been consistent and deafening.

This is not simply a political silence. It is a silence that reflects a deeper problem in Uganda’s governance: a refusal to adopt decision-making frameworks that could transform the country’s most pressing challenges. And nowhere is this refusal more visible than in the continued reliance on intuition over strategy.

This contradiction is not new to me. In my autobiography Destined to Triumph, I recount how, just like Museveni’s hyping of sciences today, Professor Ephraim Kamuntu once passionately exalted mathematics as the ultimate intellectual discipline. At that time, I had performed excellently in Mathematics at A-Level but unexpectedly fared poorly in Economics, despite having excelled consistently in class. Disappointed, I resolved to repeat Senior Six, hoping to correct the anomaly. Seeking guidance, I approached a neighbor, Professor Ephraim Kamuntu, an Old Boy of Ntare School where I studied A-level.

Instead, Prof. Kamuntu gave me what he regarded as a rational, science-based explanation.  He told me that mathematics is the foundational physical science from which all other sciences derive, and that if one excels in mathematics, then one can excel in any other discipline. He reminded me that when ancient Egyptians constructed the pyramids, one of the Seven Wonders of the World, the only science available then was mathematics. This saw me abandoning the idea of repeating Senior Six - mathematics had already validated my intellectual capacity; and God saw my eyes with winning a scholarship through the Ministry of Education to study statistics in the former Soviet Union. It was the same kind of selective “science-worship” we see in Uganda’s national leadership today, where the prestige of science replaces the practice of science.

In the universities where I later taught Operations Research, I emphasized decision science and, in particular, game theory, especially its three core concepts: positive-sum games, zero-sum games, and negative-sum games. These frameworks are powerful tools for evaluating policy and understanding how leaders’ choices shape national outcomes.

A positive-sum game is when all parties gain through cooperation. A zero-sum game is when one party’s gain is another’s loss. A negative-sum game is when everyone ends up worse off. These three concepts perfectly describe the government’s posture toward graduate unemployment.

If Uganda were pursuing a positive-sum strategy, it would embrace GUBCCo, which creates new value, expands the labour market, equips graduates for productive work, and grows the economic “pie” for all: government, employers, graduates, and the economy. This is what scientific decision-making would require.

Instead, the government behaves as though it regards GUBCCo’s rigorous graduate unemployment solution as a zero-sum initiative, where acknowledging an externally developed solution is perceived as a political loss.

More troubling, however, Uganda has effectively settled into a negative-sum game. The government continues to implement cosmetic reforms of curriculum revisions, ad hoc skilling programs, youth funds, name it, knowing very well that these measures do not address the structural causes of unemployment. Graduates remain jobless. Productivity remains low. The economy remains stagnant. And yet the cycle of ineffective interventions continues, year after year.

Negative-sum decision-making is the worst form of governance. It keeps everyone losing simply because those in power prefer predictable failure over disruptive reform.

The recent curriculum overhaul is a textbook example. Rather than engaging students to create their jobs as part of the curriculum, the government created subject combinations. Rather than align university training with labour market demand, it merely rearranged classroom content. The problem is structural, not pedagogical.

Uganda does not need new syllabi, but rather it needs new economic structures. This is why GUBCCo stands out. It was not built as a classroom intervention but as a national job creation transformation model. It equips graduates with real market needs, builds practical capability, and creates value where it did not previously exist. It is a tested, scalable system designed for Uganda’s actual economic realities. It is a positive-sum solution in the purest sense of the word.

The tragedy is that Uganda’s leadership is not failing because solutions do not exist. The solutions exist, and have been presented repeatedly. The failure lies in the unwillingness to adopt scientific strategies.

The President’s long-standing habit of elevating science rhetorically without embracing scientific reasoning has created a dangerous national illusion. Science is not a slogan. It is not a political ornament. It is a discipline of method, evidence, replication, and optimization. If government truly valued science, it would apply these principles in policymaking, not only in speeches.

The question that remains is simple but urgent: how long will Uganda continue to celebrate science in words while resisting its application in practice? How long will the leadership cling to ineffective solutions even as the unemployment crisis deepens? How long will a proven, positive-sum solution like GUBCCo be ignored simply because it originates outside the political establishment?

Uganda stands at a crossroads. If the leadership continues on its current negative-sum path, the country will lose generations of talent. But if it embraces positive-sum decision-making, rooted in evidence, not rhetoric, not intuition, the Country can finally address the cycle of graduate unemployment.

The choice is clear: whether the leadership will finally break free from the negative-sum cycle.

Dr. Julius Babyetsiza (PhD)

Founder GUBCCo.