By Our Reporter
KAMPALA – The First lady and Minister of Education and Sports, Janet Museveni has urged Ugandans to consider work as an act of worship, noting that it is unfortunate that many people see work as a necessity of survival, a curse rather than a blessing.
The wife to the President was speaking during the fourth Annual Women’s Forum at Hotel Africana in Kampala on Sunday.
The event was graced by the Speaker of Parliament, Rt. Hon. Alitwala Rebecca Kadaga, Justice Catherine Bamugemereire, MPs-Margaret Rwabushaija, Jovah Kamateeka and Kampala minister, Betty Kamya and several other women political leaders.
The theme of the Forum was; ”All labor brings reward.”
“God calls us to see work as a ministry, an opportunity to use our God given creativity. Work well done contributes to our self-realisation and self-worth and it adds value to our word,” Ms Museveni said.
She noted that the nation should look beyond the financial rewards that comes with work in the temporal world, and perceive it as an act that pleases God.
Ms Museveni challenged women to take advantage of Uganda’s weather and invest in agriculture.
“Work well done irrespective of the amount of reward contributes to self-realization and self-worth and gives meaning to the world,” said Janet Museveni.
On her part, Speaker Rebecca Kadaga called on activists to advocate for social justice saying much of advocacy has been realized in the field of Politics.
“We see a lot of advocacy in politics but I don’t see substantial advocacy about the social life” said Kadaga adding that, “I do not hear people talking about the rights embedded in article 40 of the Constitution”.
Article 40 of the Constitution provides that “every person has a right to practice his or her profession and to carry on any lawful occupation, trade or business.”
Kadaga noted that Uganda still struggles with discrimination especially against people with disability saying, “there is a law almost 10 years old which requires that an employer who employs people with disability takes a tax incentive, but in this country no one is interested in it; many employers don’t want to employ people with disability”.
Justice Catherine Bamugemereire, the Head of the Land Probe Committee, called on Parliament to consider legislating on ‘equal pay for equal work’ giving an example that housewives do much more than the prescribed office work and thus a need to reconsider their pay.
