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Prove all things..(1 Thesa.5:21)
Test Spirits..(I John 4:1)
Like the Bereans, check whether things are so(Acts 17:11)
Friday 17 January 2014
When American dictatorial client regimes give no damn about the poor: Striving tooth and nail to please his master –Babylon USA: President Museveni uses Money of Poor Ugandans to finance UPDF soldiers’ fighting in Sudan
Uganda
has made it its business to seek to topple governments in the region or to
militarily protect those in its good books. The
motive behind all this is Museveni’s personal glory as the region’s kingmaker
and serving Western imperial objectives with a view of driving Western powers
into a conspiracy of silence about his tyrannical record. Thus, when
the West (America)
wants to kick out a ‘bad guy’, they have ready boots on the ground–UPDF. That
is why he can afford to invade, topple regimes, loot and kill (DR Congo)
without provoking retaliation from the international community. When Charles
Taylor did in Sierra Leone
exactly what we continue to do in DR Congo, he was hounded out of office, tried
and convicted by the ICC. On the other hand, our president, the ‘beacon of
hope’ is always selected to lead mediation efforts even when his fingerprints
are all over the crime scene or when he is clearly partisan and fuelling
conflict with unhelpful ultimatums. He does all this,
not because he is the regional military giant, but because he has the strongest
global power behind him. He has identified his role in the perpetuation
of the global American hegemony and is more
than willing to play the lackey’s part. He sometimes pretends to be promoting African interests by using Pan-African slogans to
hoodwink his peers so as to deliver them to his masters without much ado. His reward is an assurance that he will get away with his
crimes as long as he plays succor to Western imperial designs. His benefactors
will conveniently argue that whereas he is bad, they do not see a credible
alternative to run the country. What they
actually mean is that they do not see someone willing to do their bidding as
faithfully as President Museveni has done. Pursuing imperial designs
or being an agent of imperialism has a cost. It breeds hostility from the
dominated. There is no doubt that Ugandans are hated because of meddling in
other people’s domestic affairs. SAM MUGUMYA, Can Uganda Afford to Police the region,
The Observer, Thursday, 16 January 2014)
A poor Uganda School Child with hands infested by jiggers
Show me any project and I will tell you where the
money has come from. We have borrowed a trillion
shilling from China
for the Entebbe
express highway, borrowed $100 million from the EU to expand Northern by pass
and construction of Mbarara by pass, borrowed $80 million for Karamoja high
voltage line, borrowed over $100 million for the new Bujagali-Kawanda-Masaka
power line etc. Even these short stretches of Kampala roads like Bukoto- Kisaasi and
Kawempe-Ttula have been constructed on borrowed money. That is why our total
debt portfolio has skyrocketed to nearly $6 billion
having been reduced to about $1.5 billion in 2006. Uganda’s annual budget is about $4.5 billion. The bulk
of the money that we raise locally has been turned into pocket change by our
leaders. It is mainly local revenue that they pack in sacks and boxes and
distribute to various groups. Packing money in sacks
and boxes has become a full time job for Brig Proscovia Nalweyiso at State
House Entebbe. African strongmen don’t
respect fellow citizens but they respect white people. That is why
when donor money about Shs 40 billion was misappropriated under the nose of
Prime Minister Amama Mbabazi, our visionary leader repaid it using our taxes.
For many decades now, we have been ruled by guns,
by gunmen, and that is what we hoped would be dealt with by the NRA/NRM
struggle in 1981-1986. But as soon as Museveni came to power, he abrogated all
the arrangements that had been prepared for a transition and, instead, he
concentrated on how to perpetuate himself in power using the same means we
previously rebelled against. We decided to challenge him and it is the work
that I have set out to do, year in year out, until it is achieved. Dr.Kiiza
Besigye
Patients
on the floor of Mulago Hospital, the National Referral
Hospital. Photo courtesy
of williamkituuka.blogspot.com
Ugandan soldiers were killed and others injured when the UPDF engaged the
rebels just 90 kilometres outside Juba.
KAMPALA.
President Museveni yesterday revealed that the Uganda
army is actively fighting rebels led by Riek Machar in South
Sudan. He also disclosed that Ugandan soldiers were killed and
others injured when the UPDF engaged the rebels just 90 kilometres outside
Juba, just a day before Parliament approved Uganda’s deployment in the world’s
youngest nation.
A woman carries her children on her bicycle through a town.newvision
“Only the other day, January 13, the SPLA and elements of our army had a big
battle with the rebel troops about 90km from Juba where we inflicted a big
defeat on them,” Mr Museveni told fellow regional leaders in Luanda, Angola.
“Unfortunately, many lives were lost on the side of the rebels. We also took
casualties and had some dead,” he added without giving figures.
Claims confirmed
The admission by President Museveni that Uganda
is fighting on the side of President Salva Kiir confirms claims by MPs that Uganda was actively involved in fighting in
South Sudan and had lost soldiers in the crisis that started December 15 in Juba.
Patients
on the floor of Mulago Hospital, the National Referral
Hospital.
The army had severally denied it is involved in any combat operations in South Sudan.
Questioned about the developments, Defence minister Crispus Kiyonga deflected
the question to the army spokesperson, Lt Col Paddy Ankunda, who said: “Well,
the President has said it.” He added: “Details are scanty at the moment but all
I can say is that our forces had a very successful battle.”
Speaking at the International Conference on the great Lakes Region, Mr
Museveni said by yesterday evening, the government of South
Sudan, with the support from UPDF, had regained control of Jemeza.
He also accused former south Sudan
vice president Machar of planning and executing the failed coup. “… the
question is: “If Riek Machar did not plan a coup in Juba,
then why did his supporters capture Malakal, Bor, Akobo, etc?” ...”
Museveni condemns rebels
“In my opinion, if Machar had not planned a coup and it had all been mistakes
on the government side, he could have done two things: withdraw to a remote
area of the country to avoid attack and start talks unconditionally so as to
resolve the problem quickly and not to protract it,” said Mr Museveni.
An NGO volunteer treats a jigger infested resident in Busoga
According to President Museveni, the crisis is a result of power struggle
and “You detect ideological, organisational and discipline issues in this
situation.” He also blamed the fighting on the indiscipline of the SPLA
soldiers.
The SPLM party, the President said, should resolve their disagreements
within the party structures, and advised that those dissatisfied should form
their own party. The conference attended by presidents Uhuru Kenyatta of Kenya, Paul Kagame of Rwanda
and host Eduardo Dos Santos of Angola, also discussed the fighting in the Central Africa Republic
and DR Congo.
The President’s remarks drew condemnation from the Shadow Attorney General
Abdu Katuntu.
Mr Katuntu said the MPs will task the Executive to explain and account for
Ugandans they put in harm’s way by engaging in combat.
Pupils on a boda boda to
school. newvision
By taking sides, he said the government had pitted Ugandans against ordinary
South Sudanese.
“As Parliament, we need to take steps immediately now that we know we were lied
to. We want the Executive to account for Ugandans they took in and put in
harm’s way in the conflict because they got our approval fraudulently,” said Mr
Katuntu.
Comment > From Barbara Among
President Museveni’s revelation, a day after our Parliament overwhelmingly
stamped a motion tabled by Defence minister Crispus Kiyonga, to retrospectively
ratify the UPDF deployment in the world’s youngest nation has once again left
the MPs holding the can.
One wonders how irrelevant our Parliament continues to play on issues that
need its oversight.
The MPs passed the motion on the premise that the deployment was for peace
enforcement purposes, with the responsibility of evacuating Ugandans too and
concerns about the dangers of taking a partisan stand raised by Mr Wafula
Oguttu, the day’s Leader of the Opposition, were casually brushed off.
President Museveni’s position, however, reveals a long known public secret; Uganda has taken a stand against Riek Machar and
his group - a matter that will worry many a Ugandan with or without interests
in South Sudan.
But is South Sudan’s conflict a military one that Uganda’s
army can resolve or a political problem that Uganda will now aid to quickly turn
into a military problem?
The current crisis was destined to befall South Sudan.
A chronology of events that preceded the December 15 alleged coup attempt
indicates that President Kiir had long fallen out with his then deputy and
several other top SPLM leaders.
The brewing dispute was a time-bomb waiting to explode. The grudges went
public before the much celebrated July I, 2011 independence. It is noble to
have solution to the problems in one of our strategic regional partners, but by
taking drastic partisan military action, Uganda stands to lose in many ways
in the long-run.
Ms Among is the Daily Monitor’s Diplomatic Affairs Editor, responsible for
Regional and Foreign content
For God and my country or For my stomach, my
family, relatives and friends: The paradox of Museveni’s 2 billion Car amidst a
dead health sector, increasing poverty , youth unemployment and struggling
economy
A belated admission of UPDF’s active combat role in South Sudan by
President Museveni, hours after Parliament approved the deployment
retrospectively, has stirred angry emotions across the political divide.
Defence minister Crispus Kiyonga, his
junior Gen Jeje Odongo and Chief of Defence Forces Gen Katumba Wamala
had successfully persuaded Parliament that the army was deployed in the
volatile South Sudan largely to rescue trapped Ugandans and provide
humanitarian services.
They fervently denied allegations of combat operations and roundly dismissed any suggestion of causalities.
On Tuesday, Kiyonga invoked memories of
the 1994 Rwanda genocide and told MPs that the Ugandan army had moved
into South Sudan to prevent such a scenario.
But hours after securing Parliament’s
approval, President Museveni told fellow heads of state attending the
International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR) in Angola on
Wednesday that the UPDF was playing a more active role than MPs had been
told.
“Only the other day, January 13, the
SPLA and elements of our army had a big battle with the rebel troops
about 90km from Juba where we inflicted a big defeat on them.
Unfortunately, many lives were lost on the side of the rebels. We also
took casualties and had some dead,” Museveni said.
Reacting to the President’s confession,
some angry MPs yesterday resolved to summon Kiyonga and Attorney General
Peter Nyombi to explain the UPDF’s role in South Sudan. Parliament’s
committee on Defence also learnt yesterday, following a review of the
Status of the Forces Agreement Uganda signed with South Sudan on January
10, that Uganda is bearing all costs of the war.
Apart from being exempted from South
Sudanese taxes, the Ugandan contingent is meeting all its liabilities,
including medical expenses for injured soldiers. During a heated
committee meeting yesterday, the deputy chairperson, Peter Eriaku, said
the minister of Defence and the Attorney General had been summoned.
“I hereby direct the Clerk [to Parliament] to send out invitation letters to both of them,” Eriaku said.
Summoning the two officials was mooted
by Muwanga Kivumbi, the Butambala MP, who said he was privy to official
information indicating that fighters loyal to Riek Machar, the former
vice president, had killed some UPDF troops in battle last week.
“The minister of Defence should be
summoned to explain what they (UPDF) are doing in South Sudan. It seems
that they lied to Parliament before approving their deployment. They
told us that they were going to be impartial but the commander-in-chief
is saying that they are involved in battles and our soldiers were killed
and that UPDF killed Machar’s fighters,” Kivumbi said.
He added that the Hansard should be
analysed to establish beyond doubt what the motion was about. The MPs
also queried the authenticity of the agreement Uganda signed with South
Sudan, especially after they failed to establish the name of the South
Sudanese official who signed for Juba.
“We would like to know who is committing
the country to this mission and its scope and we need to know exactly
what they are doing there [in South Sudan],” Bubulo East MP Simon
Mulongo added.
On his part, Kyadondo East MP, Ssemujju
Ibrahim Nganda, who had engaged Gen Odongo in an exchange before
parliamentary approval was granted, said Kiyonga had told “lies” to
Parliament but that is all he knew.
“I don’t have anything to demand from
Kiyonga because I highly doubt he has full details of what is
transpiring in South Sudan,” Ssemujju said. “He told Parliament what he
thought was the right information, yet he had been told lies by the
people who know the truth.”
Ssemujju added that only Museveni and “some few people around him like his son [Brig] Muhoozi” have an idea what is going on.
“Kiyonga is also looking for information
like any other Ugandan and some of us have more information than him,
so I’m not angry with him because when you try to [dig] much about
military issues, Museveni will bury you six feet [under],” Ssemujju
said.
Shadow minister for Defence Hassan Kaps
Fungaroo told The Observer that it was unfortunate Parliament was not
being taken seriously. He called on his colleagues to exert themselves.
Besides summoning top government
officials, the committee asked Parliament’s Legal Department to
scrutinise the Status of the Forces Agreement, which some MPs said was
unfair to Uganda, and report to Parliament on Tuesday next week.
“The visiting forces will be responsible
for meeting the cost of medical, optional and hospital treatment for
members, for arranging evacuation in the event that suitable medical
treatment is not available,” reads article 10 of the agreement.
Army Spokesman Lt Col Paddy Ankunda confirmed in an interview on Thursday, that “the UPDF is obviously in full combat.”
Asked about the casualties, he said: “We
wouldn’t tell you how many they are until we have informed their next
of kin, but the truth is that we have lost some soldiers and we also
have some few who were injured.”
Last week, Aruu MP Samuel Odonga Otto
said some of the dead Ugandan soldiers had been sneaked in from South
Sudan and buried in parts of northern Uganda. He claimed the army had
lied to relatives of the deceased, that the soldiers had died in a fatal
accident on Masaka – Mbarara road.
Otto, who says he attended the burial of
Sgt Santos Ocen at Onywana village in Omoro, Gulu district, and Pt
Richard Oyaka at Ongako, adds that he had crossed-checked with traffic
police and there was no such accident on the said road.
When Ugandans wake Up to the reality that it is the USA that is supporting Museveni's dictatorship in order to further its imperial interests. Check this article below
President Museveni’s recent ultimatum to the rebelling SPLA soldiers was laughable but not funny.
To many, it was an utterance by someone consumed by self-importance
and one that never ceases to poke his nose in other people’s affairs
believing that it is his God-given duty.
Our engagements in foreign lands have
been clothed in high-sounding motives like Pan- Africanism (SPLA), war
on terror (Somalia), protecting our borders (Congo and Central African
Republic), helping our ‘brothers’ to return home (Rwanda) or African
solutions to African problems (Mali and Libya though in this case forces
were never deployed).
A microscopic examination is, therefore,
required to establish the truth behind the stated motives and resolve
whether such an aggressive foreign policy is in the interest of our
country and whether it should be done in our name.
Uganda has made it its business to seek to topple governments in the region or to militarily protect those in its good books.
The motive behind all this is Museveni’s
personal glory as the region’s kingmaker and serving Western imperial
objectives with a view of driving Western powers into a conspiracy of
silence about his tyrannical record.
Thus, when the West (America) wants to
kick out a ‘bad guy’, they have ready boots on the ground–UPDF. That is
why he can afford to invade, topple regimes, loot and kill (DR Congo)
without provoking retaliation from the international community.
When Charles Taylor did in Sierra Leone
exactly what we continue to do in DR Congo, he was hounded out of
office, tried and convicted by the ICC. On the other hand, our
president, the ‘beacon of hope’ is always selected to lead mediation
efforts even when his fingerprints are all over the crime scene or when
he is clearly partisan and fuelling conflict with unhelpful ultimatums.
He does all this, not because he is the
regional military giant, but because he has the strongest global power
behind him. He has identified his role in the perpetuation of the global
American hegemony and is more than willing to play the lackey’s part.
He sometimes pretends to be promoting
African interests by using Pan-African slogans to hoodwink his peers so
as to deliver them to his masters without much ado. His reward is an
assurance that he will get away with his crimes as long as he plays
succor to Western imperial designs. His benefactors will conveniently
argue that whereas he is bad, they do not see a credible alternative to
run the country.
What they actually mean is that they do
not see someone willing to do their bidding as faithfully as President
Museveni has done. Pursuing imperial designs or being an agent of
imperialism has a cost. It breeds hostility from the dominated. There is
no doubt that Ugandans are hated because of meddling in other people’s
domestic affairs.
Our traders in South Sudan have been
singled out for harassment and murder by our ‘pan-African’ brothers whom
we supported during their war of independence. Our railway line was
uprooted in Kenya because we were perceived to have meddled in their
elections in 2007.
Our citizens were brutally killed in
Kampala because of our involvement in Somalia and our citizens were sent
packing in Tanzania because we are considered ‘the neighbour from
hell’. Uganda is supposed to pay war reparations to the tune of $10
billion for the looting, killing and rape that we occasioned in Congo.
While there, we have fomented trouble
and armed rebels but today we condemn a section of SPLA for trying to
use ‘unconstitutional’ methods to acquire power. What a contradiction!
Whereas Museveni uses foreign wars to maintain internal stability in the
UPDF by having soldiers busy all the time thus entrenching himself more
in power, the ordinary citizens bear the burden of his ‘community
policing’ programmes.
Ugandans must, therefore, oppose these
designs after all when we had the LRA, no neighbour found reason to
intervene. If we treated ours as a domestic problem that did not call
for external intervention, there is no reason for us to seek to
regionalize other people’s problems to rationalize our intervention. It
is not our duty to police the region and besides, tyranny, which is the
cause of strife in this region, is very much alive here.
If we have failed to resolve it at home, how can we purport to exorcise it abroad?
We have neither the reason nor the
resources to police the region. Let the Sudanese, Somalis, Congolese,
etc. strive to solve their own problems as we have been struggling to
solve ours without their direct military intervention.
The army will not reveal details regarding the numbers of Ugandan troops
killed in South Sudan as well as identities of the casualties in the
ongoing conflict between SPLA government troops and soldiers loyal to
former vice president Riek Machar.
UPDF spokesperson Lt. Col. Paddy Ankunda said that revealing the number
of casualties and troop deployments could be ‘tactical suicide,’ if the
information is released and ends up in the hand of opposing forces.
“We don’t reveal casualties before we inform relatives. It can be
devastating to learn about the death of their people through the media.
At an appropriate time, government will be brought to account and reveal
those numbers,” said Lt. Col. Ankunda.
Ankunda was on Thursday addressing a press conference at the Uganda Media Centre in Kampala.
On Tuesday while in Angola, President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni that the
Ugandan army is engaged in direct combat with rebels fighting against
the South Sudan government of President Salva Kiir.
Museveni while speaking at the International Conference on the Great
Lakes Region (ICGLR) Heads of State summit in Angola, said that UPDF
incurred casualties and deaths during a battle about 90 kilometers from
Juba.
Narrating the circumstances under which UPDF was attacked; Lt. Col.
Ankunda said that UPDF soldiers fell in an ambush laid by the rebels
loyal to Riek Machar. However the UPDF was able to beat the ambush.
Ankunda said that Uganda could not stand by as a removal of a government
using unconstitutional takes place and UPDF troops would not hesitate
to put themselves in harm’s way in order to ensure and prevent a
likelihood of genocide in South Sudan.
He said that by Monday, the UPDF has repatriated a total over 40,000
people who include Ugandans since the fighting first broke out in South
Sudan.
He said that following the approval of UPDF deployment by parliament
recently, the deployment will be formalized with the ratification of a
Status of Forces Agreement between Uganda and the Government of South
Sudan. The agreement spells out how the UPDF troops are supposed to
conduct themselves.
“We are under a bilateral mandate and troops were deployed on the
invitation of Kiir who requested Museveni to deploy troops. Salva is
frustrated with regional leaders who did not respond to his call.
Familiar: President Museveni (L) with South Sudan President Salva Kiir
We are not in full charge – SPLA admits
The United Nations Secretary General, Ban Ki Moon has asked President
Museveni to mediate an end to the fighting in South Sudan, hours after
the South Sudan’s army (SPLA) acknowledged that it was “not in control
of Bor (Jonglei’s state capital)” after forces loyal to renegade Gen
Peter Gatdet Yak overran military bases on Tuesday and took over the
town on Wednesday evening.
Speaking at a news conference last
evening, Fred Opolot, the Foreign Affairs ministry spokesman, confirmed
that Ban Ki Moon spoke to President Museveni by telephone on Wednesday
and asked him to intervene.
“The UN Secretary General had a phone
conversation with President Museveni and asked him to intervene by
finding a political solution to the problem,” Opolot said at the news
conference at the ministry of Foreign Affairs offices.
In response, Opolot said, President
Museveni has asked Okello Oryem, the minister in charge of International
Affairs, to join the African Union team that left Addis Ababa last
evening en-route to South Sudan.
The AU team heading to Juba is led by Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn, who is also the AU chairperson.
Opolot said the situation in South Sudan remained tense and appealed to Ugandans in Sudan to be careful.
“The airport, main highway and the
official border points with Uganda have now been opened. In addition,
some businesses have resumed normal operations,” he said.
The ministry appealed to anyone with
information on any Ugandan casualties to notify the Ugandan embassy in
Juba. Meanwhile in Juba, SPLA spokesperson Col Philip Aguer said the
national army was meeting to discuss its next move in light of the rebel
takeover of Bor amid growing international concern for the humanitarian
situation in Jonglei’s state capital.
The SPLA said today that Gatdet, who was
a commander in charge of the SPLA’s 8th Division in Jonglei state, had
defected from its ranks. He reportedly fled over allegations that his
tribe, the Nuer, had been targeted in the current tensions.
Over the weekend, clashes erupted in
Juba between units of the presidential guard from competing tribes of
the Dinka and Nuer. The fighting spread throughout the city, which led
to the death of at least 500 people, with hundreds more injured.
In a TV appearance on Monday, President
Salva Kiir accused his former deputy, Riek Machar, who hails from the
Nuer tribe, of staging a coup attempt, along with other prominent South
Sudanese officials from the ruling Sudan People’s Liberation Movement
(SPLM).
Observers and independent analysts have
expressed fears that Gadet’s defection could complicate the security
situation in Jonglei where government forces have been battling to exert
full control in areas where rebel leader David Yau Yau has remained
active since 2012.
In a statement released today, the
United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) said the “security
conditions in the Jonglei state capital of Bor have deteriorated
significantly during the course of the day”.
“UNMISS has received reports that heavy
fighting erupted in the city in the wee hours of this morning and
continued for four hours. The violence triggered an exodus of civilians
out of Bor, and thousands have sought shelter at the mission’s compound
on the south-eastern outskirts of the city,” the statement said.
Ready for talks
President Salva Kiir has said he is ready for dialogue with his former deputy, Riek Machar.
“We are open for dialogue with anyone
who is willing,” Kiir told reporters in Juba, raising hope for a
peaceful resolution to the volatile situation.
The president, on
Monday, blamed the skirmishes on forces allegedly loyal to Machar, which
the latter denied in an exclusive interview with Sudan Tribune.
“There was no coup. What took place in
Juba was a misunderstanding between presidential guards within their
division. It was not a coup attempt. I have no connection with or
knowledge of any coup attempt,” said Machar.
He claimed that no official from the
ruling Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) had any connection with
the alleged coup. The United Nations Secretary General, in a phone
interview with Kiir, expressed deep concerns about the current situation
in South Sudan.
“I spoke to President Salva Kiir
yesterday morning, urging him to do everything possible to end the
violence and to ensure respect for human rights and the rule of law,”
Ban Ki Moon said in a statement.
“I impressed on him the need to resume
dialogue with the political opposition”, he added, in reference to
reports that Kiir was willing to talk with his opponents.
Hilde Johnson, the special representative of the Secretary General, also called for urgent political dialogue in the country.
“This is a political crisis, and
urgently needs to be dealt with through political dialogue. There is a
risk of this violence spreading to other states, and we have already
seen some signs of this,” she said.
It is essential to protect the human
rights of all those who are detained, Johnson stressed in a statement.
The UN Mission in South Sudan said it had received reports of many
people being killed and injured, with nearly 20,000 people reportedly
displaced.
“We are in the process of verifying the reports,” the UN said, raising possible fears of more displaced people in Jonglei state.
Meanwhile, a UPDF statement said the
Ugandan army had deployed troops at the border with South Sudan, to
ensure security on the Uganda side.
Despite stating that the UPDF will be given freedom of entry and exit, among
others, the agreement is silent on several critical issues on the rules of
engagement about the UPDF involvement in the war.
KAMPALA-Uganda could incur the cost of the war in South
Sudan, according to the status of forces agreement between the government of Uganda and that of South
Sudan.
The agreement availed to Parliament on Tuesday states that Uganda will
meet all medical costs and arrange evacuation of its troops whenever needed.
However, the agreement is silent on several critical issues on the rules of
engagement about the UPDF involvement in the war of world’s youngest nation. There
is no mention of scope of operations, duration of stay in South
Sudan.
Though it states that the UPDF will be given freedom of entry and exit, the
pact is silent on the duration of Uganda’s
stay in South Sudan.
The agreement entered into on January 10, last year bears the signature of
Defence minister Crispus Kiyonga on behalf of Uganda
and an unnamed South Sudan official, whose
designation is also not shown.
It also makes no mention of the signatories and witnesses by the commanders
and foreign affairs’ officials of the two countries.
A section of Members of Parliament had on Tuesday, while debating the
deployment in South Sudan, demanded that Uganda engages for a defined
period, suggesting a one-month stay.
The seven-page agreement is silent on who would meet the cost of the war but
mentions that Uganda would use its own military equipment and allow it to
freely move its military gear into South Sudan.
Uganda
also undertakes in the agreement to compensate any third party claims arising
from acts or omission by its soldiers. But neither South Sudan nor Uganda shall
make any claims suffered by its servicemen or for damage or loss of property
during the war.
It also makes no mention of compensation of families of the UPDF soldiers that
die in line of duty.
Immunity from prosecution
The agreement, however, shields the forces from being tried under the South
Sudanese law or their courts. “Member of visiting forces shall be subject to
the exclusive jurisdiction of the sending state’s law and courts in respect of
any disciplinary or criminal offences which may be committed by them in the
territory of the Hose state,” read the agreement.
“In case the host State establishes any member of a visiting force has
committed any criminal act in the territory of the Host State, the Host State
shall promptly inform the sending state of the alleged criminal act of its
member and avail the sending state material evidence pertaining to the criminal
act alleged,” reads the agreement.
It also says that any dispute will be resolved through consultaion between
the two countries. This means Uganda
could be shielded from referral of any cases to the international courts such
as the International Criminal Court or the International Court of Justice
(ICJ).
Uganda would also avoid a
scenario of 2005, when DR Congo sued it and the ICJ found that Uganda violated
the principles of non-use of force in international relations and of
non-intervention; that it violated its obligations under international human
rights law and that it violated other obligations owed to the DR Congo.
The Juba agreement between the two parties instead requires that south Sudan
reports any criminal case to it and hand over the evidence pertaining to the
criminal act alleged.
UPDF will be exempted from income tax and any other form of direct taxation on
their pay, allownaces, remittances and other emoluments and benefits.
Simon Mulongo, (Bubulo West): “In the agreement, I don’t
see issues related to resources accompanying the forces. There are only
administrative costs to do with their health .There are critical issues missing
in the agreement. “We want the principle, scope and projected duration and
whether it is to be extended.”
MP Saleh Kamba (Kibuku):“The Chama Cha Mapinduzi party in Tanzania moved a motion to debate Uganda’s
compensation of their forces in the 1979 war but our agreement is not
addressing the losses and compensation to families of the dead soldiers.”
MP Semujju Nganda (Kyaddondo East):“A love letter between
the two governments with no compensation for lives lost. We are buying the food
and uniforms for our soldiers and we find this very strange.”
Uganda parliament okays troop deployment in South Sudan
By YASIIN MUGERWA and MERCY NALUGO | Wednesday, January 15
2014 at
11:27
A special session of Uganda's parliament called to discuss the
deployment of UPDF soldiers in South Sudan. PHOTO | DAILY MONITOR
After vehement disagreement initially, Ugandan MPs on
Tuesday grudgingly okayed the deployment of the country's army in South
Sudan.
Weeks after Ugandan troops were rushed to Juba,
the MPs criticised the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM)
leadership over its response, which many said had not been endorsed by
Parliament.
Matters were not helped when the very motion
seeking House approval had to be amended on the floor after it was
realised that it had been made under the wrong legal provisions.
Speaker Rebecca Kadaga begged MPs to allow Defence
Minister Crispus Kiyonga to make the amendment, reminding them that
South Sudan leader Salva Kiir had personally asked Uganda to help
stabilise the situation.
Ms Kadaga told MPs that the purpose of yesterday’s
special sitting was not to seek approval as many MPs were led to
believe, but rather to update Parliament on the deployment and seek
support of members.
But speaking on behalf of the Leader of the
Opposition, Bukhooli Central MP Wafula Oguttu said the motion should
have been bipartisan. He was backed by Shadow Attorney-General Abdu
Katuntu who criticised the country’s leadership for treating an issue of
national importance as an NRM affair.
“We support the deployment as long as it is for
evacuation of our citizens from South Sudan,” Mr Oguttu said. “When a
country is going to war, leaders consult widely; we should learn to work
together. What’s happening in South Sudan is a result of bad
governance. We don’t have sufficient resources to maintain another
country in the neighbourhood.”
He added: “The government is killing and the rebels are killing but for us to get involved we must get a clear mandate.”
Conformity with laws
Opposition MPs appealed to the NRM majority to
take a conscious decision that will not be regretted in future. “The
UPDF (Ugandan People's Defence Force) have taken sides in the conflict
to the extent that once you identify yourself as a Ugandan, you’re
finished; that’s your death sentence,” another MP, Mr Kassiano Wadri,
said. “The motion is vague; it means UPDF may even stay in South Sudan
forever because there is no timeframe.”
Prime Minister Amama Mbabazi responded to
accusations that the army was illegally sent to South Sudan, saying
“there was necessity to act the way we did” because there was an
imminent threat from an “ungovernable South Sudan”.
Mr Mbabazi quoted Article 209 of the Constitution
which sets out the army’s functions, including preserving and defending
Uganda’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. He said under
international law, you can even defend your territorial integrity beyond
your boundaries.
“This is a case where unity must be demonstrated, this matter should not divide us,” the PM said.
But his submission also indicated a further
blurring of the official position on South Sudan. He reversed the
President’s recent suggestion that the deployment was for peacekeeping
and peace enforcement purposes. Mr Mbabazi said this was not the case,
although he emphasised that every action taken by the President is in
conformity with the laws of Uganda.
Dr Kiyonga said: “We are in South Sudan to evacuate our citizens but also close any gaps that may endanger our security.”
And the army chief, Gen Katumba Wamala, said: “The
situation in South Sudan was threatening our security and we had all
reasons to intervene. We have an obligation to see South Sudan stand as a
nation.”
Other MPs wondered how the Dr Riek Machar's
“rebels” fit into Uganda’s January 10 agreement with the government of
South Sudan on the status of forces. Ms Kadaga asked the committee on
defence to study the agreement and report when Parliament resumes on
February 18.
The MPs also noted that the government motion had
made no mention of the need to support ongoing peace talks in Addis
Ababa, Ethiopia. The scope of the UPDF’s deployment was also not
specified, they observed.
Now Museveni reveals Uganda combat role in South Sudan
By BARBARA AMONG | Thursday, January 16
2014 at
14:23
Uganda President Yoweri Museveni addresses heads of state during the
International Conference on the Great Lakes Region in the Angolan
capital of Luanda on January 15, 2014. PPU PHOTO.
Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni has revealed that his
forces are actively fighting rebels in South Sudanese territory, and
that the country had already lost some of its soldiers in combat.
The disclosure came after Uganda legislators had
retroactively backed the deployment of Ugandan soldiers to South Sudan,
on the premise that they were mainly there on peacekeeping basis and
helping to evacuate Ugandan nationals. (Read: Uganda parliament backs troop deployment in South Sudan)
But the Ugandan leader later said that the country's army was fighting alongside loyalist South Sudan forces.
"Only the other day, January 13, the [South Sudan
army] SPLA and elements of our army had a big battle with the rebel
troops about 90km from Juba where we inflicted a big defeat on them," Mr
Museveni told fellow regional leaders meeting for a summit in Luanda,
Angola.
"Unfortunately, many lives were lost on the side
of the rebels. We also took casualties and had some dead," he said,
without giving figures.
The admission by President Museveni confirms
claims by Ugandan MPs that the country was actively fighting in South
Sudan and had lost soldiers in the crisis that started on December 15 in
the capital Juba.
The Ugandan army had several times denied it was involved in any combat operations in South Sudan.
Asked about the developments, Ugandan defence
minister Crispus Kiyonga deflected the question to the army
spokesperson, Lt Col Paddy Ankunda, who said: "Well, the President has
said it."
He added: "Details are scanty at the moment but all I can say is that our forces had a very successful battle."
The President’s remarks drew condemnation from the shadow attorney-general Abdu Katuntu.
Mr Katuntu said MPs will task the Executive to explain and account for Ugandans they may have endangered by engaging in combat.
By taking sides, he said the government had pitted Ugandans against ordinary South Sudanese.
"As Parliament, we need to take steps immediately
now that we know we were lied to. We want the Executive to account for
Ugandans they took in and put in harm’s way in the conflict because they
got our approval fraudulently,” said Mr Katuntu.
Failed coup bid
Speaking at the International Conference on the
Great Lakes Region, Mr Museveni said by Wednesday evening the government
of South Sudan, with the support from [Uganda army] UPDF, had regained
control of Jemeza town. (Read: Great Lakes leaders hopeful of quick South Sudan deal)
He also accused former South Sudan vice president
Riek Machar of planning and executing a failed coup. "… the question is:
'If Riek Machar did not plan a coup in Juba, then why did his
supporters capture Malakal, Bor, Akobo, etc?'..."
"In my opinion, if Machar had not planned a coup
and it had all been mistakes on the government side, he could have done
two things: withdraw to a remote area of the country to avoid attack and
start talks unconditionally so as to resolve the problem quickly and
not to protract it," Mr Museveni said.
According to President Museveni, the crisis is a
result of power struggle and "ideological, organisational and discipline
issues." He also blamed the fighting on the indiscipline of the SPLA
soldiers.
The ruling SPLM party, the President said, should
resolve their disagreements within the party structures, and advised
that those dissatisfied should form their own party.
The conference attended by among other presidents
Uhuru Kenyatta of Kenya, Paul Kagame of Rwanda and host Eduardo Dos
Santos of Angola, also discussed the fighting in the Central Africa
Republic and DR Congo.
Kizza Besigye says protests can pre-maturely force Museveni out of power
Former
Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) President Kizza Besigye used the
funeral of the political comedian Paddy Ssali 'Bitama' to solemnly
declare that mass protests were the only sure way to cause change.
Speaking to mourners in Nansana on Sunday, Besigye urged those who
crave political to keep faith in 'Arab Spring'- style demonstrations,
which brought down dictatorial regimes in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya
between 2010 and 2012. Bitama died from cancer on Saturday.
Besigye rallied Ugandans to embrace the
Arab Spring kind of street protests, which brought down dictatorial
regimes in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen between 2010 and 2012.
"Dictatorships can easily be fought if
people decide," said Besigye, who has challenged and lost to President
Museveni in three previous elections.
He, however, ruled out supporting an
armed uprising. Accompanied by Kampala Lord Mayor Erias Lukwago to
Bitama's home, Besigye argued that while an armed struggle could cause
regime change, it would not necessarily guarantee peace.
"If all farmers decided to cut off food supply to Kampala, the government would collapse in a matter of days."
The former FDC leader assured mourners
that such citizen actions can be all-conquering even in cases of extreme
military might and big money, which he claimed President Museveni uses
to win elections. Besigye cited the example of former Egyptian President
Hosni Mubarak, who was ousted by people-power despite having an army of
one million troops.
Before he succumbed to cancer at Mulago
hospital last Saturday (January 11), Bitama, 34, had became one of the
consistent opposition activists battling the police in the Besigye-led
'Walk-to-Work' protests on Kampala streets. Bitama had declared himself a
contender for a parliamentary seat in Kyadondo North. Indeed, while
Batama's star as a comedian was on the wane, his political fame gained
momentum each time he was arrested alongside Besigye in the
demonstrations.
Besigye challenged mourners to
accomplish Bitama's dream by getting involved in the struggle through
demonstrations. Meanwhile, emotions ran high moments before Lukwago and
Besigye spoke to mourners, when electricity was switched off, allegedly
on the orders of area police chief Mohammed Kirumira, who was at the
funeral to monitor the duo's activities. Coincidently, power was
switched on after Besigye's speech, infuriating mourners further.
Frustrated: Kizza Besigye wants more elite participation in ousting President Museveni from power
After
Dr Kizza Besigye criticised the Ugandan elite for refusing to support
his grass-roots campaigns to challenge President Museveni’s hold on
power, many have responded in an equally strong tone, saying the former
FDC president’s protest-politics is both unfashionable and
unsustainable.
The standoff raises serious concerns for
those who would like to see Uganda transition from being ruled by the
same group of gunmen that captured power in 1986 to truly democratic
leadership.
Experts believe that such a change, as
has previously happened in Ghana, cannot come easily without the
involvement of the middle class, something that puts Besigye’s outburst
into perspective.
In a surprise show of frustration two
weeks ago, Besigye said: “The educated elite are extremely selfish. Each
one is trying to look for a share of spoils...Anybody called a
professor is a curse to this country. They are all hopeless and you can
name them, they are all nodding their heads to what the dictator is
saying. Museveni has become a tyrant because the people around are not
telling him what to do.”
But various political analysts and
scholars, while admitting a trait of self-preservation among the elite,
have suggested the problem is largely Besigye’s. Mohammed Kulumba, a
senior lecturer in Political Science at Makerere University, described
Besigye’s comments and strategies as misplaced.
“The elite and middle class in general
are not known for political activism. And, even when they are to
participate, they don’t do it like Besigye wishes them to do it. The
middle class only participates depending on who is dealing with them and
based on clearly drawn strategies,” Kulumba told The Observer recently.
Giving the example of academics, Kulumba
says they will not go on the streets to demonstrate. They may, however,
contribute to change through making critical analyses of the actions of
the regime – and, perhaps, contributing resources. And this, he argues,
they have done.
He might have had in mind people like
Joe Oloka Onyango and Mwambutsya Ndebesa, both Makerere dons who have
often published eloquent critiques of government actions.
Opposing Museveni
Kulumba believes Besigye can find some consolation in his own history of the anti-Obote rebellion.
“He was part of the NRM and he knows
very well how the middle class contributed. It was the external wing
that provided the artificial blood life to those who were in the bush,”
he said.
Besigye joined the opposition in 1999
after a bitter fall out with the NRM regime. He first challenged
Museveni’s presidency in 2001 and lost. He has since stood two more
times and lost. A recent survey carried out by this newspaper found that
under President Museveni, Besigye is probably the most hunted and
prosecuted opposition leader in post-independence Uganda.
The Observer reported that over the last
five years, the former FDC party president has been arrested at least
28 times, charged in court at least six times, and locked up in Luzira
prison once. Whereas Besigye’s political resolve is unquestionable, his
political struggles have not been overwhelmingly embraced by prominent
elite or the middle class, leading to his frustration.
Narrow middle
According to Dr Julius Kiiza, a
political economist at Makerere, part of the problem is the fluid nature
of Uganda’s class structure. For instance, doubts remain whether Uganda
has a middle class in the conventional sense of the term.
“How does it survive? Can it really be
termed as a middle class in the real sense? All these questions have to
be answered before anyone examines its viability,” Kiiza said.
The phrase middle class which finds its
expression in the works of a German philosopher, Karl Marx, has been
given a modern meaning to refer to a portion of the population that
includes businessmen and professionals, who have capacity to spend an
extra portion of their income on anything after paying for basic needs.
American political science professor
Samuel Huntington argues that in virtually every country, the most
active supporters of democratisation are the middle class people.
“A rising middle class unleashes a
constellation of social forces with the organisational capacity and
education to press for democratic governance,” argues Huntington in his
book, The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century.
In
support of his argument, Huntington cites the example of the French
revolution as well as Argentina, Brazil, the Philippines, Taiwan, Korea,
Spain, Peru, and Ecuador in the late 1970s and the 1980s, as examples
of societies whose political process and democratization has been
influenced by the participation of the middleclass in quest for better
things.
Kizza Besigye takes on police during the walk-to-work protests in 2011
It is believed that the Arab Spring,
particularly in Tunisia, Egypt, Algeria and Libya have been spearheaded
by the middle class. Kiiza argues that unlike in other societies, it is
unfortunate that Uganda has a narrow middle class that cannot influence
Uganda’s political agenda.
“We are very few who can function
independent of the political system. Majority of the perceived
middleclass in Uganda survives on the political oligarchy. And, this
cannot be a middle class,” he argues.
Kiiza argues that the business community
is also a product of the current political regime. “Majority of the
so-called rich business people became rich after 1986, which means that
the regime provided their foundation. So, they cannot survive without
the regime, which also explains [why] their participation in politics is
to support power consolidation for the regime,” he said.
This view is echoed by Asuman Basalirwa,
the President of Justice Forum (JEEMA): “Many professionals, scholars
derive their livelihood by winning contracts from government. So, it has
become difficult for them to ask for change as it will be self
destruction.”
Indeed, one former media manager has
told The Observer that he lost his job after the regime got to know that
he was sympathetic to the progressive forces. “When you participate in
the quest for political change there is a risk of losing your job and
not everyone is brave enough to weather the challenge,” he said.
Circumstances don't warrant
Dr Golooba Mutebi, a political scientist
and renowned researcher, argues that the middle class is not known for
political activism. They only get involved if their survival is gravely
threatened.
“There is sufficient freedom to warrant
the comfort for the middleclass. The situation is not like it was during
Amin’s or Obote’s time which pushed everyone to the front of seeking
for change,” Golooba said.
He argues that those who favour change
differ from Besigye on the means: “Some believe that there is need for
change but they don’t necessarily agree that change can come through
running battles. I don’t know Besigye’s ideology.”
Kulumba argues that Besigye’s strategy is not based on a reasoned plan of action.
“What is the strategy here? Have they
sat down to analyse why walk to work failed before they launched another
protest and others which they announce without focus?” he asked.
In defence of the protests, Basalirwa
says their activities are planned. “Walk to work was based on a plan and
everyone knows how the state machinery was deployed to make sure that
it does not do what it was formed to do.”
Strategies
In his book, From Dictatorship to
Democracy, Prof Gene Sharp, an American political scientist whose work
has guided many non-violent political struggles, says that spontaneous
uprisings often face serious limitations.
“Frequently, the democratic resisters
have not anticipated the brutalities of the dictatorship, so that they
suffered gravely and the resistance has collapsed,” he says.
Ultimately, Sharp argues that it is
prudent for opposition activists to always calculate the most effective
ways and times when it is ripe to bring down a dictatorship. One
important point is the vision and mission of democracy activists. Sharp
argues that movements that define their mission narrowly, in terms of
unseating a dictator, risk failure. Seizing on this point, Kulumba
argues that Besigye and group should gear their efforts towards
embracing democracy and transparency in their parties.
“The political parties should work
towards strengthening their structures as well as internal democracy and
transparency from within, as this would help in making parties
attractive. And, it is from then that they will have a critical mass,”
he said.
In addition, Kiiza argues, the
opposition should lobby for the state to improve services – building
good roads, hospitals, schools and a good economic environment that will
enable the expansion of a middleclass.
Others could argue, however, that
Museveni’s government is irresponsive. And how does the opposition make
an impression on an entrenched government? Besigye’s solution is street
protests – which the elite have shunned, leading to frustration.
On
Thursday last week, I travelled to Karamoja with the parliamentary
committee on the National Economy to assess the viability of four
projects which, if properly implemented, have potential to turn around
this sub-region.
These are a high voltage industrial
power line from Soroti to Moroto, rural electrification, paving the
Muyembe-Namalu- Moroto road, and establishment of an agricultural zone
with piped water, power, functional schools and hospitals – much like
the millennium model villages.
The government has presented to
Parliament requests to borrow more than $100 million to finance these
projects. (The loan for the road has not yet been tabled.) The committee
on the National Economy, of which I am a member, is responsible for
scrutinising these loan requests on behalf of Parliament but of course
it has turned itself into a rubberstamp.
The bulk of these loans will be obtained
from the Islamic Development Bank. Contrary to what our visionary
leader keeps telling the country, we are still a very poor country that
relies on loans for its major infrastructural developments.
Show me any project and I will tell you
where the money has come from. We have borrowed a trillion shilling from
China for the Entebbe express highway, borrowed $100 million from the
EU to expand Northern by pass and construction of Mbarara by pass,
borrowed $80 million for Karamoja high voltage line, borrowed over $100
million for the new Bujagali-Kawanda-Masaka power line etc.
Even these short stretches of Kampala
roads like Bukoto- Kisaasi and Kawempe-Ttula have been constructed on
borrowed money. That is why our total debt portfolio has skyrocketed to
nearly $6 billion having been reduced to about $1.5 billion in 2006.
Uganda’s annual budget is about $4.5
billion. The bulk of the money that we raise locally has been turned
into pocket change by our leaders. It is mainly local revenue that they
pack in sacks and boxes and distribute to various groups.
Packing money in sacks and boxes has
become a full time job for Brig Proscovia Nalweyiso at State House
Entebbe. African strongmen don’t respect fellow citizens but they
respect white people. That is why when donor money about Shs 40 billion
was misappropriated under the nose of Prime Minister Amama Mbabazi, our
visionary leader repaid it using our taxes.
And the features of corruption are
visible in Karamoja. Local MPs showed us some three bed-roomed houses
constructed using Peace Recovery Development Plan (PRDP) donor money
each at Shs 300 million.
Visibly, each of these houses cannot be
constructed at more than Shs 50m but the Office of the Prime Minister
spent Shs 300m on each. My hope is that when we finally approve these
loans, the scavengers will not feast on them.
This particular visit was my second to
Karamoja and the farthest I have ever moved into this sub-region.
Karamoja, until this government came into power, was a region of two
districts: Moroto and Kotido. It has now been chopped into seven
districts: Kaabong, Abim, Amudat, Napak, Nakapiripirit and the original
two.
The 2002 census put the population of
Karamoja at 882,881. The same census put the population of Wakiso at
907,988 and Kampala at 1.1 million. Today Karamoja is represented by
seven women MPs yet Wakiso and Kampala have one each. Obviously, you can
understand why there are more NRM MPs than opposition in Parliament.
That is a subject of a future article in
which I will explain how the visionary has used this constituency
gerrymandering to create artificial numbers in Parliament. This short
visit exposed me to some grave happenings in Karamoja that we must
address together as a country.
At Lolengedwat sub-county in Amudat
district, we bumped into a group of mothers who had taken their children
for immunisation. Each mother would be given some posho in return for
taking their child for immunisation.
I was then told that, actually, for them
to do the right things, Karimojong have to first be bribed. Children
who attend classes are given cooking oil and other items for them to
stay at school. And many of the Karimojong that you meet on the way
raise their hands to ask for something or point at their mouth to inform
you they want something to eat/drink.
No wonder Karimojong children have
become experts at begging on Kampala streets. I am no expert on Karamoja
and cannot claim vast knowledge just by one or two visits but I detest
begging. Project, project, project, is slowly becoming a Karimojong word
even by their educated leaders.
And because they vote wisely, nobody
should force them to grow food for their own consumption but World Food
Programme and UNICEF must provide. At a nearby UPDF unit in Lolengedwat,
soldiers have grown everything from watermelon, tomatoes, maize.
The neighbours are waiting for World
Food Programme to feed them. As a result, more than 50 people have
starved to death. Yes, someone has to go slow on Karimojong but we
better force them to grow food than encourage them to beg.
And we don’t have to be iron fisted but
must provide leadership and stop being opportunistic. Let the government
concentrate on paving roads, electricity and other social services. In
Karamoja, we are providing food and in other areas, sacks of money. We
must stop this nonsense.
In his 13th year of active opposition to President Museveni, Dr Kizza Besigye,
a three-time presidential candidate, has insisted that he can no longer
offer himself as a candidate in elections organized under the ruling
NRM government.
In a weekend interview with Deo Walusimbi, the retired colonel makes a case for civil disobedience as the only effective way of dislodging Museveni from power.
He also discusses exiled Gen David Sejusa, the option of war, and the dangers of UPDF deploying in South Sudan, among others.
Excerpts:
What are your plans for 2014?
This year, for me, is just another day
on the calendar. I don’t think it marks any drastic change and in the
last 13-14 years, my entire engagement in the opposition has been to
struggle for a democratic transition in Uganda. And by this I mean where
the people of Uganda would truly participate and determine what affects
them in their country.
For many decades now, we have been ruled
by guns, by gunmen, and that is what we hoped would be dealt with by
the NRA/NRM struggle in 1981-1986. But as soon as Museveni came to
power, he abrogated all the arrangements that had been prepared for a
transition and, instead, he concentrated on how to perpetuate himself in
power using the same means we previously rebelled against.
We decided to challenge him and it is the work that I have set out to do, year in year out, until it is achieved.
In the previous years, we have been
engaged on one level of awakening the people of Uganda to realize the
injustices that have been put around them and how captive our country
has become and that awakening their consciousness is aimed at empowering
them to reassert their rights as citizens to control governments not to
be controlled by governments. You are talking of people controlling governments, how many governments are in Uganda?
This [NRM] is not the first government
in Uganda, we have had many of them, even this one has been changing
within itself though we have the same faces in new governments but there
[is] supposed to be a new government, but most importantly, people
should be empowered to know that they are the ones to control
governments, to know that the governments are their employee and that
they must hold them to account, and that is the struggle we have been
engaged in through giving them information.
We have tried to do that using every
avenue, including participating in elections that we knew were
inherently fraud and would not be fair. Why did you continuously offer yourself in an electoral process well knowing it was a sham?
We had reasons; to mobilize our people
because it is a good platform, and to some extent we have had freedom to
make rallies and talk to our people. We wanted to use it in influencing
the formation of the political will of the people.
We also wanted to demonstrate what the
regime is because people will not have known that they have a
dictatorship in their country, a regime that is not fair, a regime that
does not respect rule of law, if we didn’t go to elections, and I think
we have achieved that.
The regime also may have appreciated how
discontented the people are, because sometimes dictators live in the
clouds thinking that everybody loves them and it’s through an election
that this might be demonstrated, and sometimes a dictator may reconsider
and allow some kind of transition and some dictators have done so. Have you achieved your objectives particularly in the awakening campaign?
I think the people of Uganda know, that
they have a rogue regime which is just stealing from them, which is
undermining their rights and that it doesn’t provide them with the
services the government is supposed to.
So, we have largely achieved on the
awakening campaign. The demonstration of what the regime is has been
achieved because everybody knows it. As a perennial challenger of Museveni; what have you learnt about him?
In the course of all the engagements, I
think we have also clearly established that Museveni is determined to go
down with the country, not to give the country a chance, unlike some
other dictators who realize that time has come and they leave the
country. I think Museveni has adequately demonstrated that he would
rather go down with the country.
But I think the stage is set now for
Ugandans to take back their country where it deserves to be, but no one
who wants freedom should think that it will come on a silver plate, we
must all stand up and fight for those rights and so in the last three
years, since the elections of 2011, our focus shifted from awakening the
people to know the kind of regime they are dealing with, to confronting
the regime, to bring it down, not through an election but through
organizing defiance with the people of Uganda. But the regime successfully foiled the demonstrations on the streets of Kampala and you were subjected to 24-hours-surveillance…
If they successfully foiled it, then
that surveillance wouldn’t have been there. I have variously pointed out
that you only fail when you fail trying; even when we had guns in
Luweero it took us five years; the South Sudanese took 50 years to get a
country to govern.
Struggles may not end as quickly as
people would want them to. What must be kept in mind is that as long as
the unjust regime is in power, people will continue to suffer; in fact
if they don’t struggle, they may become permanent slaves. Whether it
takes time, we have no choice but to struggle to reclaim our country.
But the defiance methods you are applying seem not to be working; some will say they only make people vulnerable.
Actually the people of Uganda are not
timid. The misfortune we have is that there are few leaders, especially
in the elite class of our country, who are grossly selfish and
optimistic. Even if they are not in comfortable zones, they aspire to
get there alone, not by helping the country to realize the fair system
within which all have equal opportunities.
They would rather betray their
communities in order for them to enter the comfort zone. And the regime
has been taking advantage of that; when you start to rally people into
action, they are easily compromised. That is a big challenge we are
still facing, the problem is not the people, but the leaders. Aren’t
you partly to blame for this, because ordinarily, the elite class
leaders follow ideologies. Have you presented one that they can follow?
The strategy we have taken is very clear and that is defiance, call it civil disobedience.
It is said the elite will generally not get involved in confrontational defiance….
If they can’t get involved, that means
that they are part of the problem which must be solved and by the way,
the elite during the NRA war were not involved in the large measure. The
people who fought were peasants.
Yet some of the fighters, like you, were elites.
Yes, but we were very few just as it is today. There are a few elites who are involved in activism today.
But with or without them, we must cause
change. The elites can continue to look for greener pastures within
Uganda or even abroad; when change comes, they will come but that is
none of our worries.
You sound like you are disappointed with a non-cooperative section of Ugandans.
I’m disappointed but not surprised
because it is the nature of our education that creates parasites rather
than people who have patriotic values that offer service to others.
You
have entered the 13th year of your struggle against Museveni; do you
still maintain your position that you won’t offer yourself come 2016?
My position has been very clear that it
doesn’t matter which year the elections are in, I said I cannot offer
myself for an election under the conditions in which we have been having
them. In other words, in an election which is organized by a military
regime. I have told you that the benefits we wanted in the elections we
have been participating in were well achieved. But there
are efforts to amend the Electoral Commission Act … in fact, they are
aspiring to call it Independent Electoral Commission...
You cannot have an independent electoral
commission under a military regime. You cannot have fair rules or laws
under the military regime. The other day the courts said that Lord Mayor
Lukwago is still a valid mayor. But why isn’t he in office? … the
dictatorship defied the rule of law.
So, it doesn’t matter whether there is
an electoral commission that is constituted differently, it cannot
achieve better results. And even if it was there, how would it stop
soldiers arresting candidates’ agents from the polling stations and
stuffing boxes? So, you cannot have free and fair elections under a
rogue regime which doesn’t respect its [own] laws and international
laws.
Is it your view that through an election you can’t eject Museveni?
These are not elections; it is a ritual
which is performed under the military, police, which always vandalize
polling stations, and stuff ballot boxes, etc… it’s not an election. And
for me and you, the time has come to confront the dictatorship directly
not through the elections that they stage-manage. Ever
since you started opposing this regime, you have never thrown a stone;
how do you hope to dislodge a state machinery armed to the teeth?
When the struggle is called for popular
defiance, the people use their power to reject the regime. No amount of
guns will stop them. Can you imagine if people stopped supplying food in
Kampala for two weeks, what would the regime do with their guns and
tanks?
People have power and they are ruled
because they have accepted; if they don’t accept, the regime is gone.
What we are trying to do is organize for that rejection to be widespread
and once that is done, the regime however much guns it might have, can
no longer impose itself on them.
But some say you are just fed up with challenging Museveni who has beaten you at every election...
Nobody has hired me. Nobody pays me, and
nobody feeds me, I do it on my own volition. If anybody thinks that
what I’m doing is not the right thing, they should do what they think is
the right thing.
They are Ugandans just like I am; they
have equal power like I do, so anybody who feels he/she can do it in a
better way, then they can come in because no one is stopping them.
Where would your non-participation in 2016 elections leave you politically?
Who says I’m not participating?
But you have just said that you will not offer yourself again?
Participating in a political process is
not only about becoming a candidate. My objective is not to look at 2016
but it is to end the dictatorship today or at the earliest possible
time. I don’t care about 2016; I care about ending the dictatorship
whenever it is possible to do so.
We are simply talking about different
struggles; there are people talking about a struggle of an election, we
are talking about a struggle of removing the rogue regime. And we are
saying that we shall not remove this rogue regime through an election;
we want to remove the rogue regime, even the people who will go to the
election hope that they will remove the regime.
So, I’m not seeking to get out of the
process, I am participating very effectively in trying to remove the
regime, only that the method we are going to use may differ; ours is
fighting day in, day out. Could that mean that as opposition you are busy preparing the candidates you will field in 2016?
I’m not a leader in the opposition political parties; I am not a leader whatsoever.
But you are an elder in opposition, particularly in FDC...
An elder yes, but I’m a former leader of
a political party who can offer my advice if they seek it, they can
take it or leave it. But what I will encourage the other parties that
want change to do, we must deliver that change and focus on it. We may
even take different courses.
Some people who still think that
elections can still cause change can continue and organize for an
election, those of us who think elections can’t do it, we shall continue
and fight outside the electoral process.
Of the two, Maj
Gen Mugisha Muntu (FDC president) and former VP Gilbert Bukenya, who
has offered you a cabinet position, whom would you support?
Bukenya declared that he would contest,
but General Muntu has not and I’m not going to focus my energies on
electoral processes under this regime but those who think they can focus
on elections can go on and do so.
I have never been engaged in this
business of fighting for a job in government and I have never applied
for any government job in my life. I’m completely capable of living
decently outside government. Even when this current regime is fighting
me, I can survive.
How do you assess the chances of a divided opposition dislodging Museveni?
What I have said in my own analysis,
whether united or not, you cannot dislodge Museveni through an election
he organizes, supervises and controls.
The issue is not unity or disunity. The
question is the system under which an election is conducted. If there
was a free and fair election, Museveni would need to get more than 50
per cent in the votes he wins. Even if you are 60 candidates and
everyone gets one per cent and he fails to get the 51 per cent, we
would go back for a re-run. To you, what explains the
weakness of opposition and in your view, is there an opposition in
Uganda or just individual opposition to Museveni?
What constitutes the opposition are
people who disagree with what the regime is doing. Everybody who
disagrees with what the regime is doing is the opposition and the number
of the opposition is growing everyday.
So the opposition is stronger everyday
since Museveni came to power and you remember Wasswa Ziritwawula in the
National Resistance Council publicly rejecting what was going on in
broad daylight, and there are those who have never supported NRM since
it came. Even when I challenged the regime in 2001, many of [my]
colleagues remained there [but] by 2006 they had all left.
What I mean here is that the NRM regime
is weakening and that is the strength of the organizations within the
opposition. But mind you, opposition organizations cannot be strong
under a dictatorship because a dictator has a lot of power to stop them
from doing their activities. FDC lost a senior member and founder in Sam Njuba; what is your view about his book which the state says you authored?
What State House says, that I wrote that
book, is ridiculous; we know the book could have only been written by
the author himself. And he had his personal experiences whether with
Museveni, Idi Amin and what have you, but as far as I’m concerned, the
strength of writing is a record to be referred to.
So for people in State House, the most
important thing would have been to look at the issues and evaluate
whether they are correct or wrong.
Having spent a good time in opposition politics; would you agree that there is a leadership deficit in opposition?
I think there is a leadership problem
not just in the opposition, but in the country. It is a cross-cutting
problem, be in it church, business and in politics.
Have you as a leader taken any effort to address this problem?
I think this is not a matter that can be
solved through one individual; it is a structural problem which we must
solve structurally. What type of education do we have, what type of
upbringing is in the families and some other aspects?
You cut your term short as FDC president to join the broader opposition politics; have you reaped any benefits?
Well, the idea I think is not to
determine what kind of benefit I have got out of the actions I have
undertaken when I left the party, I can only say that I have continued
to apply myself to the extent that I can, whether serving within or
outside the party, to bring about the change our country deserves.
So, I wouldn’t say that I’m achieving
out of the party, I think what is most important is that we all need to
do what we owe, to empower our people and through offering leadership
and this is supposed to be done whether you are in the party or outside
it. Do you in anyway feel frustrated that your energies have not borne any fruits?
I’m certainly not frustrated, the fruits
of our efforts, not me alone, because I am one of very many people who
have been sacrificing, struggling for change in this country. Some
people made bigger sacrifices than me. Some are dead; I am lucky I am
still here.
So, it is not a personal question
whether our efforts have had results. Secondly, the results of this kind
of struggle are incremental, they are not dramatic. When we started
challenging Museveni, there was a one-party state.
Everyone was required to participate
under the Movement state. It was our challenge that demonstrated that
there was no such a system, but it was simply a one-party state and that
is how we got evidence to take to court for it to declare that the
Movement was a one-party state and other parties should be allowed to
organize also.
So, ending the Movement system was one
of the earlier benefits we got out of this struggle. It is a process and
I am quite encouraged by the progress of the struggle. In fact, I think
that the struggle is coming to the climax when the regime cannot
continue. You see because of the pressure we have exerted on the regime,
it is now clear that dissenting views are increasingly coming out. The
term of office of the leader of opposition whom you actually appointed
instead of subjecting him to a vote has come to end. Are you content
with Nandala-Mafabi’s performance, would you want him replaced?
First of all, his [Mafabi] appointment
was done out of the party processes, not that I acted capriciously. He
was appointed through agreed party processes and I think he has tried to
do his work through offering effective responses to government
positions.
He has been challenging government on
various issues in Parliament, but I think it will be unfair for me to
evaluate his performance because in the last three years as I have said,
my focus has been in a different territory.
And secondly, I think it will be
prejudicial because the party leadership is in the process of evaluating
and determining the leadership positions they would want to have
without me and I am very confident that the party structures we have
will enable the leaders to make good decisions.
Why don’t you endorse the fugitive General Sejusa?
I don’t know whether there is any formal
process of embracing people who come to be in the opposition. When I
came to the opposition there was no ceremony by anybody to embrace me.
So I think anybody who opposes what is
going on is a positive voice. I think Sejusa did a very good job indeed,
pointing out various excesses. Many of them we had already talked
about, but the fact that he took the risk and made the sacrifice to come
out and talk, I think he is commendable and for me, I am now an
individual, I can’t speak on behalf of other people; FDC and others.
But I have no problem working with
Sejusa for change. If Sejusa made mistakes before, those mistakes cannot
be corrected unless we have a just system and the first struggle every
Ugandan is welcomed to, is to work for change and then if someone has
complaints about another one, I inclusive, he/she can subject them to a
just process.
At what point did your talks with Sejusa stop?
No… talks continued. I have absolutely
no problem coordinating with Sejusa to cause change; so, we shall
continue talking and doing whatever is necessary to bring about change.
Would you follow Sejusa if he chose war to dislodge Museveni?
I have never ruled out the use of
violence in causing change in this country. It is violence that brought
this government in power, and if Museveni believed that he used means
that are legitimate in coming to power then that legitimacy cannot
obviously end with his own struggle.
However, the means of struggle we have chosen for ourselves is the peaceful means and it is well considered.
First, we think that it is through
peaceful means that all Ugandans can participate in the struggle and
that all Ugandans must be empowered to cause change on their own because
if they do so, then that change is irreversible, but if we used guns
like we did in NRA, even if you succeed in taking power, the power would
remain in those holding those guns and it would be a matter of goodwill
by those who have the guns whether to pass over power to people or not.
And I think that is not sustainable. Could that mean that if Sejusa uses that path, you will not join him?
The use of force is also legitimate but
it is a choice I will not choose and it is inappropriate in our
circumstances. And my judgment call is to use peaceful means. What do you make of the sudden death of the renegade Col Patrick Karegeya whom you worked with during the NRA war?
Karegeya went away in 1990. What has
been happening in Rwanda, I’m not so much informed about, but also
situations within countries are quite unique to those countries, but it
is certainly sad that he died the way he died.
You got a chance to work with President Kagame and President Museveni; how do you compare the two leaders?
I have worked with Museveni as a
president; I have never worked with Kagame as a president, but I know
Kagame from a different perspective.
The issue I would have talked about here
is that there are a lot of debates about freedom and rights in Rwanda,
but one thing which is also indisputable is that the Kagame government
has delivered public goods in a shorter time despite the terrible
situation of genocide, but there is less corruption, there is a lot of
development yet Museveni has not done much in the so many years.
As a person who was in the bush; did you ever agree on the issue of succession with Museveni?
What was agreed on was the management of
the transition process. The idea was that the war had been waged to
remove a dictatorship and organize to transition to a democratic process
within four years, from 1986 to 1990.
The constitutional review process will
be undertaken, institutions of state will be reconstructed, and
democratic elections will be undertaken. But this did not happen.
Instead, it was sabotaged by Museveni. The constitution-making process
was sabotaged; the building of state institutions was sabotaged. So,
there was no transition and that is why we are still struggling that
that transition comes.
One would blame you as fighters for over trusting President Museveni?
I don’t know whether it is over
trusting. I think one certainty is that Museveni is not to blame, I
think those of us who were in positions of leadership are more to blame
than himself, for not stopping him from sabotaging those processes, but
he is to blame for executing things which are treasonable in this
country.
But we too allowed them because you had
leaders who could not stand up to him and in doing that, we facilitated
him in committing treason. It is not Museveni alone to blame on this but
lack of action on our part because people used to be bribed, and what
have you.
What is your view about UPDF’s intervention in the South Sudan conflict?
It is problematic from many accounts.
First of all, it was deployment of troops outside our borders which
requires parliamentary approval which was not sought though Parliament
was still in session by the time they went to Sudan. If government had
intentions to do it, it would have been able to do so.
And if Parliament had been on recess, it
would have been recalled following the law that gives them 21 days to
deal with it but up to now I have not heard of any attempt to recall the
House.
So, this is another act of a rogue
regime which does not respect the domestic or international laws not for
the first time but it has invaded many other countries like Somalia.
The more problematic one is to deploy those troops and take sides; even
in the deployment of UPDF in Somalia, my concern was to take sides yet
most times people fight civil wars.
I don’t think the deployment of foreign
armies solves the problems in those countries; it [creates] more
problems. And in the case of Sudan, it endangers the lives of Ugandans
there, and the government was saying that it had gone to evacuate them
but shortly after that, we had that they had gone with tanks, securing
airports and I think our own country is going to be sucked into that
war.
It undermines the security of Ugandans
in South Sudan, it undermines the security of our country and it
undermines the security of the region because all countries might start
fighting proxy wars.
‘At
least we can now sleep…,’ was the central justification for the first
decade or so of the NRM government and the leadership of Gen Yoweri
Museveni.
It was also the single most important
reason for the officially announced landslide victory in the 1996
presidential elections, and then carried forward as the flagship message
for Museveni’s reign in the 2001 elections.
However, by 2006, this refrain had
become somewhat stale, rather unappealing especially to Ugandans born in
the mid-1980s and after, who couldn’t identify with the overemphasized
narrative of a turbulent political past supposed to have been ended by
the 1986 ‘messiahs.’
Thus, we didn’t hear much of a
resonating campaign message in the 2006 elections. Instead, outright
intimidation, sustained violence and ballot stuffing were brought to
bear on the election outcome. Although many Ugandans defied
state-sponsored brutality to voice their dissatisfaction with the
rulers, in the end, as Joseph Stalin aphoristically stated, it’s not
important who votes but who counts the votes.
General David Sejusa, by far the
foremost player in fixing that election, has confirmed that indeed
Museveni never won the 2006 electoral contest. We also know that
pressure was exerted on the men on the bench, in the Supreme court, to
quash the presidential election petition, with at least two judges
reportedly revisiting their rulings at the eleventh hour.
Enter 2011. The ‘at least we can now
sleep’ mantra had long been forgotten. And the macabre acts of violence
had backfired in 2006. So, change of strategy was pertinent. The new
strategy was two-pronged.
First, it entailed what in old
international relations praxis was called gun-boat diplomacy: displaying
military might without necessarily unleashing it, thus sending an
insidious but chilling fear. In the run-up to, during and after the 2011
polls, Kampala had more than a passing semblance of a military
garrison. The second, and perhaps the more decisive, aspect of the 2011
strategy was to literally buy votes, one-by-one and at an unprecedented
fee.
The inevitable ramification, of course,
was that the Ugandan economy reached the cusp and the entire country
went into a tailspin, precipitating the walk-to-work protests. But the
2011 election strategy bathed a new political mantra, one that has
surreptitiously replaced ‘at least we can now sleep.’ Now we’re told,
‘at least the man does not kill his political opponents.’
They oppose him, go to bed sure they
will wake up and continue opposing. That he is more tolerant, less
brutal, takes a conciliatory approach and is more magnanimous than other
autocrats. While the old refrain may have sprung from the lived
experiences of ordinary people, the new minimalist narrative, hardly
veiled in its apologist tone, is the handiwork of a section of the
Ugandan intelligentsia.
We are basically told to be contended
with the status quo because elsewhere things are worse, or because we
came from a direr past. It’s because of this minimalism that, for
example, instead of demanding full and thorough value for money
accountability from KCCA under Jennifer Musisi, who earns a stupendous
salary, we say, well, at least things are now better. ‘At least now
there are no road-side kiosks in Bukoto,’ ‘at least there’s less garbage
around the city,’ and many other ‘at leasts…’
This minimalist reasoning is embellished
with the platitude that ‘we should give credit where credit is due.’ Of
course! But should we dwell on giving credit where it’s obviously due
or we should relentlessly and unfailingly demand fully what’s due to the
public?
It’s the same intelligentsia who,
through mainstream media and increasingly social media, consistently
ridicule the opposition as incapable of providing alternative
leadership, in effect saying Uganda is forever condemned to the misrule
of Museveni. One wonders if the alternative leadership we so desire
shall fall from heaven, or we shall import it, to pull us out of the
doldrums of the NRM rot.
For the vast majority of Uganda’s
intellectual class, and different strands of the middle classes
(including myself), our contribution towards wheeling a social force for
an alternative political leadership is zero. The best we do is standing
on the sidelines and pour scorn on those in opposition trenches. This,
we do, by appealing to the dubious claim of non-partisanship.
In essence, though, what we are actually
doing is being opportunistically apolitical and selfishly indifferent
in the face of blatant injustice and political decay. We look for quick
sources of income to supply individual solutions to otherwise collective
problems.
Instead of demanding for better
government, we reason that the status quo is bad but the alternative can
only be worse. Rather than speak truth to power, and tell Museveni and
the coterie around him that they are running down the country, a section
of the Ugandan intelligentsia is wont to worship the powerful.
Thus, it’s not uncommon to hear
name-dropping talk of general so and so being a friend and having a car
ride with minister A. It’s our cheap worship of those in power that
spurs the rulers to continue misruling us and wreck the country
unabashedly.
The author is a PhD candidate in Political Science at Northwestern University, Evanston/Chicago-USA.
See, how the American neo-liberal elite Andrew Mwenda
stealthily blames Museveni’s dictatorship on the opposition . Also see, how
Ugandans expose Mwenda’s hypocrisy in the comments to the article
How the
President’s success in retaining power rotates around his obsessive focus on
all threats to it.
A friend recently sent
me a text message saying: “Man, what’s up with the Mbuya and Bombo attacks and
an attempt on Kale. Ankunda’s answers in the Observer and Tinye’s incoherence
don’t inspire confidence. I hope I am very, very wrong.”
I told my friend that I
too hoped he was wrong adding that initially I had thought it was an inside job
by security organisations to create grounds for arresting opposition leader
Kizza Besigye and charging him with treason and terrorism. I told him that I
just cannot understand how any rebel would dare attack a UPDF military barracks
like Mbuya unless they are suicidal.
My friend answered by asking me if Besigye is still a factor in Uganda’s
politics. I told him that he was asking the wrong question. The right question
should be: Does President Yoweri Museveni still consider Besigye a factor in Uganda’s
politics? The answer to this is a big YES.
My friend retorted that
he had met and had a conversation with Besigye’s wife, Winnie Byanyima, and she
did not seem to think “there is any more headway.” I know Winnie as an
incredibly astute analyst of Uganda’s
politics. When she is not involved in a partisan fight but is slightly detached
and analytical, she gives the best insights of anyone I have listened to. If
she says there seems to be less headway for the opposition in Uganda today, she has her onions
almost about right.
The most important
thing is to understand Museveni’s mind. I get the sense that for whatever
reasons, Museveni is terrified of Besigye. That makes the president
overestimate Besigye and hence overreact to his every move – or even suspected
move. And I think this has been Museveni’s greatest strength which the
opposition is perennially blind to.
I think one major
source of the longevity in power is his obsessive sensitivity to threats to his
power. He leaves nothing to chance, takes no risks at all and spares no effort
to identify any real, potential or even imaginary threats to his power and nip
them in the bud.
Thus our president will
tolerate a lot of things in Uganda
– public officials that loot the treasury with impunity, incompetent ministers
and civil servants who delay dams and roads or build substandard or ghost hospitals
and schools etc. Thus, public investments suffer from unnecessary gridlock,
senseless public debates and eventually fail or succeed after a decade.
However, if anything
posed an existential threat to his power, Museveni will be quick, uncompromising
and decisive. The lesson from this is built in the military doctrine of
“identification and maintenance of the aim.” A successful commander must
clearly define the aim and whatever he does must seek to achieve that aim.
The legendary Chinese
military strategist, Sun Zhu, wrote in about 600 BC that wars are lost or won
before they are fought. By this he meant that it is the planning, strategising,
preparation, reconnaissance, training, logistical build-up etc. that determines
the outcome. If your prior planning on all these elements is poor, it is very
unlikely you can prevail in war.
The modern equivalent
of this Sun Zhu concept was stated by a business strategist I cannot remember.
He argued that champions do not win the title in the ring; they are only
recognised there. In other words, it is the effort put into training, studying
the opponent and mastering his strength and identifying his weaknesses that win
the boxing match.
This is exactly the
experience I read about the boxer Joe Louis’ first match against German’s Max
Schemeling in 1936. Louis had won all his previous 28 matches before he met
Schmeling, now aged 30 and considered by critics to be on the downhill of his
career. Louis thus underestimated Schemeling, spending more time playing golf than
training (a mistake Mohammed Ali made against Joe Frazier in 1971 leading to
his loss of the bout).
On the other hand,
Schemeling’s managers studied Louis’ boxing and noticed that whenever Louis
sent a left hook, his right hand went down, thus exposing his jaw. Schemiling
capitalised on this weakness and constantly jabbed Louis on the right. In the
thrilling match in the Yankee Stadium in New
York, Louis was stunned by this trick and was knocked
out in the 14th round.
I recently watched a
documentary on Real Madrid’s Ronaldo – one of the most naturally talented
soccer players of all time. However, the documentary makers showed that he
spends more time in training than other players. His managers have spent lots
of time studying the shape of his legs and feet, the pace and flow of his hands
and legs when he is running.
They have also studied
how he curves each of his feet when he is kicking the ball and the effect of
all these on how the ball moves towards the goal. So they design his boots to
reflect all these unique features thus giving him greater possibility and
probability to score. The lesson I picked from the document is simple but
powerful: Natural talent needs a lot of unnatural reinforcement to better its
performance.
I suspect the
opposition in Uganda
has failed to make significant progress in their struggle to wrestle power from
Museveni because of lack of proper assessment of their opponent. In every
single election battle, he has overestimated their capacity to defeat him while
they have underestimated his capacity to win.
They have therefore
mobilised less ammunition than is necessary to shake his hold on power. On his
part, Museveni leaves nothing to chance, using everything at his command –
money, coercion, subterfuge, mass media, and technology.
I do not see this level
of doggedness among those who organise resistance to Museveni. All too often,
they seem comfortable to lie to themselves that he is weak and wobbly. They
assume, quite wrongly, that the public is tired of the general corruption,
incompetence, inertia, indifference, apathy and incoherence in his government.
From this assumption,
they proceed to project that the public is ready for change. Yet I sometimes
feel that many of these dysfunctions are often functional for NRM’s politics.
Nothing has been more crippling to the opposition than this constant
underestimation of their opponent.
But Mwenda,you amuse! If M7 prints 2trillions of money to
buy an election, how can that be seen as the opposition underestimating him?
Where would you want them to get 2t from to counter him even if they take him
seriously, which I think they do? If m7 empties the barracks on election day
and deploys the army at polling centres, something you dont see in any other
country, what would the opposition do even if they take M7 seriously, where
would they get an equivalent militia even when their polling agents get
arrested?
Lets take the last election for example, the opposition
started calling for election reforms including changing the composition of the
election commission more than 4 years before the election, which m7 ignored.
What more serious can one be? What would you have wanted them to do? Kill
Kingundu so you see they are serious? If M7 fills the tallying centre with CMI
operatives with the consent of the same EC what would you like the opposition
to do even if they were taking M7 seriously? I can go on and on...
But the point Iam making is that as long as M7 uses all the
power at his disposal as you rightly stated, it does not matter how seriously
you take him, it wont give you victory. Actually for M7 the more you show that
you take him seriously the more brutal he becomes and the more illigality he
commits against you because of fear. Thats why the 2001 when Besigye showed the
serousness that shook M7, that year's elction was the most brutal election in
the history of the country. Even when Winnie says there is no light at the end
of the tunnel, she is just being realistic about a chance of removing a dictor
from power using civil means.
Andrew: In your apology for M7's overstay in power, you
metion, as we know, that he will do anything to retain power but equally will
close his eyes when public resources are being looted- that results in no service
to the electorate.He looks on impotently. The question I should ask people like
you is why does he need power, just for its sake? Why should you fight
ferocious battles for a beautiful woman you cannot impregnate or satisfy due to
your impotency? If she one day asked you what you want her for, what would be
your response? The answer to this will help me understand M7's reasoning
Dictators don't fall like ripe mangoes but they do
eventually fall by their own deeds. M7's swipe at the ICC was an exposure of
his inner most fears, because he is destined to end there and perhaps share a
room adjacent to his adversary Kony. The is no way for M7 escaping ICC, his
trail of atrocities, plunder of Congo, elimination of opponents and extra
judicial murders have an open trail traceable by even the blind. Ugandans wont
stand by M7 when this time comes, because his hand shake has extended beyond
the wrist and elbows, it is now a wrestling match. Now that M7 is swimming
against the ICC tide regardless of his destination, lets hope he has his
cyanide handy, because the higher you climb the heavier the fall.
How the President’s success in retaining power rotates around his obsessive focus on all threats to it.
A friend
recently sent me a text message saying: “Man, what’s up with the Mbuya
and Bombo attacks and an attempt on Kale. Ankunda’s answers in the
Observer and Tinye’s incoherence don’t inspire confidence. I hope I am
very, very wrong.”
I told my
friend that I too hoped he was wrong adding that initially I had thought
it was an inside job by security organisations to create grounds for
arresting opposition leader Kizza Besigye and charging him with treason
and terrorism. I told him that I just cannot understand how any rebel
would dare attack a UPDF military barracks like Mbuya unless they are
suicidal.
My friend answered by asking me if Besigye is still a factor in
Uganda’s politics. I told him that he was asking the wrong question. The
right question should be: Does President Yoweri Museveni still consider
Besigye a factor in Uganda’s politics? The answer to this is a big YES.
My friend
retorted that he had met and had a conversation with Besigye’s wife,
Winnie Byanyima, and she did not seem to think “there is any more
headway.” I know Winnie as an incredibly astute analyst of Uganda’s
politics. When she is not involved in a partisan fight but is slightly
detached and analytical, she gives the best insights of anyone I have
listened to. If she says there seems to be less headway for the
opposition in Uganda today, she has her onions almost about right.
The most
important thing is to understand Museveni’s mind. I get the sense that
for whatever reasons, Museveni is terrified of Besigye. That makes the
president overestimate Besigye and hence overreact to his every move –
or even suspected move. And I think this has been Museveni’s greatest
strength which the opposition is perennially blind to.
I think
one major source of the longevity in power is his obsessive sensitivity
to threats to his power. He leaves nothing to chance, takes no risks at
all and spares no effort to identify any real, potential or even
imaginary threats to his power and nip them in the bud.
Thus our
president will tolerate a lot of things in Uganda – public officials
that loot the treasury with impunity, incompetent ministers and civil
servants who delay dams and roads or build substandard or ghost
hospitals and schools etc. Thus, public investments suffer from
unnecessary gridlock, senseless public debates and eventually fail or
succeed after a decade.
However,
if anything posed an existential threat to his power, Museveni will be
quick, uncompromising and decisive. The lesson from this is built in the
military doctrine of “identification and maintenance of the aim.” A
successful commander must clearly define the aim and whatever he does
must seek to achieve that aim.
The
legendary Chinese military strategist, Sun Zhu, wrote in about 600 BC
that wars are lost or won before they are fought. By this he meant that
it is the planning, strategising, preparation, reconnaissance, training,
logistical build-up etc. that determines the outcome. If your prior
planning on all these elements is poor, it is very unlikely you can
prevail in war.
The modern
equivalent of this Sun Zhu concept was stated by a business strategist I
cannot remember. He argued that champions do not win the title in the
ring; they are only recognised there. In other words, it is the effort
put into training, studying the opponent and mastering his strength and
identifying his weaknesses that win the boxing match.
This is
exactly the experience I read about the boxer Joe Louis’ first match
against German’s Max Schemeling in 1936. Louis had won all his previous
28 matches before he met Schmeling, now aged 30 and considered by
critics to be on the downhill of his career. Louis thus underestimated
Schemeling, spending more time playing golf than training (a mistake
Mohammed Ali made against Joe Frazier in 1971 leading to his loss of the
bout).
On the
other hand, Schemeling’s managers studied Louis’ boxing and noticed that
whenever Louis sent a left hook, his right hand went down, thus
exposing his jaw. Schemiling capitalised on this weakness and constantly
jabbed Louis on the right. In the thrilling match in the Yankee Stadium
in New York, Louis was stunned by this trick and was knocked out in the
14th round.
I recently
watched a documentary on Real Madrid’s Ronaldo – one of the most
naturally talented soccer players of all time. However, the documentary
makers showed that he spends more time in training than other players.
His managers have spent lots of time studying the shape of his legs and
feet, the pace and flow of his hands and legs when he is running.
They have
also studied how he curves each of his feet when he is kicking the ball
and the effect of all these on how the ball moves towards the goal. So
they design his boots to reflect all these unique features thus giving
him greater possibility and probability to score. The lesson I picked
from the document is simple but powerful: Natural talent needs a lot of
unnatural reinforcement to better its performance.
I suspect
the opposition in Uganda has failed to make significant progress in
their struggle to wrestle power from Museveni because of lack of proper
assessment of their opponent. In every single election battle, he has
overestimated their capacity to defeat him while they have
underestimated his capacity to win.
They have
therefore mobilised less ammunition than is necessary to shake his hold
on power. On his part, Museveni leaves nothing to chance, using
everything at his command – money, coercion, subterfuge, mass media, and
technology.
I do not
see this level of doggedness among those who organise resistance to
Museveni. All too often, they seem comfortable to lie to themselves that
he is weak and wobbly. They assume, quite wrongly, that the public is
tired of the general corruption, incompetence, inertia, indifference,
apathy and incoherence in his government.
From this
assumption, they proceed to project that the public is ready for change.
Yet I sometimes feel that many of these dysfunctions are often
functional for NRM’s politics. Nothing has been more crippling to the
opposition than this constant underestimation of their opponent.
President Museveni’s recent ultimatum to the rebelling SPLA soldiers was laughable but not funny.
On
Thursday last week, I travelled to Karamoja with the parliamentary
committee on the National Economy to assess the viability of four
projects which, if properly implemented, have potential to turn around
this sub-region.
Former FDC boss insists he is done with elections
‘At
least we can now sleep…,’ was the central justification for the first
decade or so of the NRM government and the leadership of Gen Yoweri
Museveni.
