By Mulengera Reporters
In a colorful event at the Uganda Management Institute (UMI), Kampala campus on Thursday, Professor (Prof) Rose Bakengura Namara delivered UMI’s first-ever inaugural professorial lecture as she takes up the title of Professor of Development Management.
The lecture, titled Reimagining the Future of Development: Social Inclusion, Social Justice and Alternative Pathways, set out a detailed roadmap for making development more fair and transformative.
Prof. Namara explained why current development approaches, in Uganda, often fail the poorest and most marginalized. She said that simple access or token participation is not enough; development must reshape systems so that power, resources and decision-making are shared more fairly.
In her view, development that ignores justice only reproduces old forms of exclusion under a new name. She urged a shift from counting beneficiaries to changing the rules that keep people on the margins.
The lecture drew on Namara’s long career in research, policy and practice. She traced her journey from Kitagwenda district to Makerere University and later to the Institute of Social Studies in the Netherlands. According to Namara, her work has taken her from grassroots projects in Uganda to policy tables across Africa. Rhe Professor explained how those experiences shaped her insistence on people-centred and context-aware development.
Prof. Namara reviewed a number of concrete studies and project evaluations that inform her conclusions, pointing to weaknesses in poverty-reduction efforts and agricultural extension that focus on quick results rather than structural change. Using examples such as the Parish Development Model (PDM) and referral transport work in Mbale, she explained how top-down designs, elite capture and donor-driven short-termism often leave intended beneficiaries still poor.
Her research on irrigation schemes in places like Lira, Kasese, Lamwo, Kabarole and Kanungu showed that projects that do not challenge local power structures tend to reproduce exclusion.
A major theme of the lecture was the limits and risks of rigid Results-Based Management (RBM). Prof. Namara argued that while RBM can boost accountability, when applied without flexibility it may favour easy-to-measure outcomes and exclude those who do not fit neat indicators. She described her work to refine RBM frameworks and to mainstream gender and social inclusion into design, implementation and monitoring so that results reflect real improvements in the lives of the people of Uganda.
Drawing on national studies and policy work, Namara also explained that many gender programs remain superficial, counting women’s attendance rather than shifting unequal power relations. Her role in developing gender policies and anti-sexual-harassment frameworks, and in supporting gender-responsive evaluations under government agencies, was presented as part of a long-term push to move from slogans to structural change.
Prof. Namara also outlined her policy contributions, saying she has worked with the Equal Opportunities Commission on national assessment guidelines, helped craft national guidelines on collaborative monitoring and evaluation, and supported the Cabinet Secretariat on policy implementation rules. She described co-creation and participatory policy spaces (where communities help design solutions) as foundations for more effective and just development.
Prof. James Nkata, UMI’s director general (DG) offered institutional recognition and encouragement, thanking Namara for her resilience and patience in reaching the professorial rank, describing the achievement as a high point in an academic career. Prof. Nkata urged Namara to continue producing work that shapes practice and policy.
The DG likened the professorial stage to a plane reaching cruising altitude, an achievement that should be followed by sustained effort and continued contribution.
The lecture attracted academics, policy makers from ministries including Finance, and Public Service, fellow professors, colleagues from development organisations, and Namara’s family, including her husband Mr. Godfrey Kateeba from Ministry of Gender, her son, her mother, among others.
The event marked a milestone for UMI as it hosted its first inaugural lecture and celebrated the appointment of a professor whose work bridges scholarship and practical policy change. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
