Emmanuel Tumusiime-Mutebile Born on 27 January 1949 died on 23 January 2022 was a Ugandan economist and banker. He served as the governor of the Bank of Uganda, the central bank of Uganda from 2001 until his death on 23 January 2022. He was always praised for being an outstanding financial manager.
Between the year 1979 and 1984, Prof Emmanuel Tumusiime-Mutebile was appointed to several government positions in Uganda ranging from deputy principal secretary to the president at State House in 1979, to undersecretary in the ministry of planning in 1981 where he rose to senior economist and then chief economist in 1984. In 1992, he was appointed permanent secretary to the newly combined ministry of finance planning & economic development, a merger that he had advocated while working under Minister of Finance Gerald Ssendaula.
He was the governor of the Bank of Uganda from 2001 until his death in 2022.He is the longest-serving chief executive in the Bank of Uganda’s history as well as the Africa’s longest-serving central bank governor at the time of his death.He is credited with many of the sound economic policies adopted by the Uganda government at the urging of the central bank during the 1990s and the first decade of the 2000s.
Since 2006, he was a visiting professor in the Department of Economics at Makerere University, the oldest and largest university in Uganda. Prof Emmanuel Tumusiime-Mutebile was the chancellor of the International University of East Africa, a private university established in 2011, with an urban campus in Kampala, Uganda’s capital.In 2009, Nkumba University, a private university based in Nkumba, near Entebbe, awarded him an honorary Doctor of Philosophy degree in recognition of his “great contribution towards the development of Uganda’s financial sector”.
Prof Emmanuel Tumusiime died in Nairobi on 23 January 2022, at the age of 72. He suffered from diabetes related complications prior to his death.
Prof Emmanuel Tumusiime-Mutebile attended Kigezi College Butobere for his O-Level studies (grades S1-S4). He then attended Makerere College School in Kampala, Uganda, for his A-Level studies (grades S5-S6). In 1970, he entered Makerere University, where he was elected president of the university Students’ Guild.
He was forced to flee Uganda in 1972 after he gave a speech publicly criticizing the expulsion of Asians from the country by Idi Amin. He fled to England via Tanzania, and was able to finish his studies at Durham University, graduating with an upper-second in Economics and Politics. In October 1974, he began his post-graduate studies at Balliol College, Oxford, before returning to East Africa. He entered the University of Dar es Salaam to lecture and conduct research while pursuing his doctorate in economics.
Prof Emmanuel Tumusiime-Mutebile took the risk to remind the brash and unapprised Amin how economics works, and paid a huge price. Yet many Ugandans then considered him a nationalist. A young Mutebile was conscious enough to comprehend Amin’s economic distortions and human rights violations, and risked to oppose them. Yet, like many budding economists of the time, Mutebile started as a socialist. He quickly mutated into a liberal thinker and went on to help Uganda to get rid of economic distortions.
Prof. Emmanuel TUMUSIIME-MUTEBILE served as Governor and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Bank of Uganda from 2001 till his demise in 2022.
A seasoned professional economist and reformer, he spearheaded the design and implementation of the Economic Reform Program that restored Uganda from the economic crises of the 1970s and 1980s to sound economic performance during his service as the Permanent Secretary/Secretary to the Treasury in the ministry responsible for finance, planning, and economic development.
He worked as a consultant for multilateral and regional organizations including the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Macroeconomic and Financial Management Institute of East and Central Africa, UK Department for International Development, the North South Institute in Canada, and for the governments of Rwanda, Kenya, Tanzania, Eritrea, and Nepal.
He was a member of the High Level Panel of the UNDP for the production of the Human Development Report of the UNDP; the Management Group for overseeing the evaluation of the implementation of the Comprehensive Development Framework of the World Bank in 2001; and the High Level Panel of Eminent Persons to advise the President of the African Development Bank on the strategic future of the African Development Bank in 2006.
He held Fellowships of the World Bank Institute, and Rotary Foundation of Rotary International.
He was educated at Makerere University, Durham University, and Oxford University.
He was an Honorary Professor of Makerere University, an Honorary Doctor of Philosophy of Nkumba University, a Companion of the Commonwealth Partnership for Technology Management (CPTM), and a Doctor of Laws (Honoris Causa) of Bishop Stuart University.
Makerere University honoured him with the establishment of the Prof. Emmanuel Tumusiime-Mutebile Chair of Monetary Policy, Banking and Finance; and the Tumusiime-Mutebile Centre of Excellence.