President Museveni's dishonesty on northern poverty

BLAME GAME

While northern Uganda has totally transformed through its twenty years of conflict experience, clearly, Museveni’s scheme for the North has not changed even one bit. His intentions to grab land, enslave the people on plantations, and subjugate northerners, are revealing.

Many people, including Kilak County MP, Gilbert Olanya, were shocked when the President blamed the MP for causing poverty in Amuru (DM, July 23, 2015). Hon Olanya was probably 8 years old when the NRM came to power in 1986. He was there when cattle rustlers ransacked Amuru. Probably, he was one of the survivors of internment or abduction by LRA. To grow up in conflict and become an MP, Olanya demonstrated unimaginable resilience. He emerged from the traumatic upbringing in which threats of death, deprivation and humiliating poverty dominated his formative years. The experiences of poverty and a desire for social justice are probably Hon. Olanya’s inspirations.

Typical as Amama Mbabazi said, the President excels at apportioning blames to others, for his pitiful failures.

I have always wanted to write a book titled, "The 10 Commandments of Failures" that explores the collapse of the NRM's 10-points program. The failures of those programs would reveal the duplicitous nature of NRM and its leaders. One of the highlights of the NRM's botched promises was to transform Uganda from a pre-industrial society (primitive) to industrialized nation with modern manufacturing (advanced modes of production). Over the years, we have heard about programs like "Modernization of Agriculture", "Rural Electrification", "Wealth for All", "Operation Creating Wealth", etc. For all purposes and intents, the living conditions in the countryside have regressed even with these programs. People are still poor that they confirm a decline in human civilization.  Instead, we have de-industrialized, and now exporting human labour to Saudi Arabia!

The pervasive nature of poverty in the countryside is embarrassing such that some NRM MPs just wail over it.  In Mawokota North, Hon. Amelia Kyambadde felt dizzy one day and sobbed uncontrollably when confronted with the ugliness of rural poverty at Namabo Primary School in Kafumu Parish. Mawokota, like the other 250 plus constituencies, that elects NRM endures humiliating poverty with broken down social services just as Amuru and areas that are pro-Opposition. Ms Kyambadde wondered why her government’s efforts were not materializing for her constituents.

Moreover, Mawokota constituency is in Buganda - a place that was peaceful since 1986. The South and Western Uganda have been economically productive since and people lived in their homes, cultivated their gardens, educated their children, and voted for their government that brought sleep, at 99% rate. They are still as poor, deprived, and disenfranchised. This story is constant everywhere, even in places like Bunyoro, Toro, Busoga, Ankore and Kigezi where the NRM scores over 90% at elections. Adverse poverty beckons viciously at every ordinary Ugandan alike.

In contrast, North and Eastern parts of Uganda that suffered war of attrition for twenty years, remained unproductive, and will remain so for quite a bit. First, the cattle rustling broke their economic backbone. Then the indiscriminate bombing of villages that led to Mass displacement and subsequent internment of the entire population. Now we hear that nearly 1.5 million lives were lost in the 20 years. There could be more, but the regions lost majority of its productive middle-aged population that will take a minimum of 50 years to reconstitute. After the war, northern Uganda was reduced to post slave trade era Africa. The survivors were weaklings that became dependent on handouts from benevolent foreigners. Now the President exploits this fragility with brown envelops and mockery to coerce them into endorsing his life presidency project.

The tragedies of Northern Uganda are too fresh in our minds to contort it as if we are referring to distant French revolution. The current generations of youths who are now of voting age, are first generation survivors of the policies of acrimony pursued viciously by the Museveni's regime that made every ordinary Ugandan poor. Blaming the MP for poverty in Amuru is dishonesty.

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Dr Kiiza Besigye's fate depends on the change we want

UGANDA ELECTIONS 2016 

The debate whether Rtd Col. Dr. Kiiza Besigye should contest, after three previous unsuccessful attempts in 2001, 2006 and 2011 is now immaterial. Going by the mass response to his candidature, Dr Besigye is officially the President of the people. The feasibility of his candidacy squarely depends on how we define the change that we want.

Given the constraints imposed on the Opposition, and on Dr. Besigye himself, he has demonstrated that jumping the traps of the tyrant requires perseverance.

Since 1999, Dr. Kiiza Besigye showed consistency and insistence, which affirmed his resolve to cause change. By challenging the status quo, Besigye exposed it adequately. In the process, Besigye paid the price, but gained rhythm with the disenfranchised masses.

Besigye has the mastery of invoking this sense of vulnerability in President Museveni that renders the President helpless, aggressive, and morose. Each time Museveni gets a competent opposition, he panics, to respond by mobilizing violence against the opponent. Besigye's public humiliations - flogging, teargasing, curtailing, detaining, violating, false charges etc – attests to this rudimentary anti-democratic tradition. Even with those adversities, Dr Besigye showed inconceivable resilience to stay afloat and relevant to the causes of the people. It is such qualities that the masses admire about him!

In the last fifteen years, Dr. Besigye endured torture that became the trademark of the partisan Ugandan Police. By torturing Dr. Besigye, the state was creating a Messiah – someone whose experiences allowed the masses to witness and understand the excesses of a dictatorship. Torture made Besigye stronger and more resolute in his mission.

Despite all these, Dr Besigye talks about his experiences without acrimony in his voice. If Dr. Besigye were that angry a person, surely, his supporters could have attacked the likes of Arinaitwe and Afande Omalla. Instead, Besigye always explained that these Officers are pandering for survival, a condition he plans to change through the ballot. Under Besigye’s situation, it would be easy to understandable getting angry with the Police and State agents for their violation of human rights. It is even harder to understand Dr Besigyes exercise of self-constraint. Ugandans must embrace those revolutionary traits.

Then there are those who discounted the impact of Dr. Besigye's activism and self-sacrifice in the struggle against dictatorship. For them, wresting power from a tyrant is equitable to a romantic affairs complete with bouquet of Red Roses and dinner.  If theirs is not an illusion, then what is it?

Dr Besigye's activism is yielding him unrented support during these nomination campaigns. While the Musevenists are renting the crowd and using photoshop to enlarge the crowd size, Besigye’s are an organic mammoth crowd. Besigye has even set a new milestone with a massive and unexpectedly donations of food and money to support their President.

This is a new phenomenon in Uganda's politics where voters were undermined with petty bribery of little money, salt, sugar, soap and empty promises. The strong show of the crowd to Dr Besigye wherever he goes signifies the admiration for the man as an instrument of change. The masses are saying openly that they will collect from the corrupted State and fund their revolution. After all, President Museveni steals money from the poor to lavish the rich. This is how you know that the zeal for change is no longer an abstract, obscure agitation - it is real.

The major task of the Elect Besigye Team now is to design and communicate to the masses concrete strategies to avert election rigging from the polling stations. With the era of social media, the opposition can have an on-the-spot monitoring and reporting of vote tallies by way of text and video. The people should be guided to protect their votes from the NRM vultures by any means possible.

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Without Electoral Reforms, 2016 is Meaningless

UGANDA ELECTS

The news that the NRM dominated Parliament rejected all the seventeen (17) proposals, containing the core areas recommended for electoral reforms, leaves this country in a dire strait. It also offers no credibility to the current Electoral Commission, and does not guarantee that the 2016 general elections will be free or fair elections.  Without dialogue and reforms to the electoral laws, the 2016 elections are meaningless.

Going into 2016 for the Opposition looks like a free man willingly ceding his freedom to a tyrant. Let us not mince words; without elaborate and widely agreed upon electoral reforms, there is no pretence about the quality or manner of conduct of any elections in Uganda.

I envisage tough times coming ahead of Ugandans after 2016 if this elections were to be mishandled. These are critical moments for Ugandans to rise up in defence of the ongoing peace and tranquil. One needs to understand that the concept of national security is not about the presence of armed men loitering villages and manning major highways with weaponry. It is about the conviction among citizens, that their living conditions are just and tenable. When citizens feel that they have control over their destinies, and can freely negotiate for common goods and to share liabilities, then we, as a nation, will enjoy stability.

The Uganda that is evolving under the NRM regime is that nurturing intolerance and greed around safeguarding power. The People of Uganda are feeling the emptiness associated with disempowerment. And yet, we have a regime that is constipated with power. These disparities are the ingredients that feed the seeds of violence and instability in society, however sophisticated it is.

I prophesy that, if we continue on this path, Uganda will slide into a graveyard in the near future. Unless Museveni wants to transform Uganda into a prototype of North Korea, there is no way he will continue with this belligerence. The Civil Society and the Opposition have endured the pain of providing alternative policy proposals to government. At least they have played their roles. A healthy democracy is adjudged by the vibrancy of its opposition and civil society. 

A government which fears competition will also thwart any possibility for highlighting its oversights.  Without these options, a balancing act in governance cannot obtain for public good. No one has monopoly over righteousness and no one person, least for a corrupted regime, to be right at all. The essence of democracy is that dissenters are treated with decency, humility, and respect for the beauty of diversity.

Rejecting the reform proposals also indicate that the Parliament is in contempt of the will of the people. It is becoming apparently clear that the regime would pander to reforms proposed by America or Britain, but will reject those from its own people. It just starts to feel that we are in the era of slave trade where the Chiefs conspired to sell its own people. By dis-empowering its people, modern slavery or savagery has become the novelty of the NRM regime.

Intolerance though, is a recipe for disaster because it alienates agents from the mainstream to the periphery, eventually excluding them. When the locus of dissent realigns itself, and finds a new shape outside the shades of the state, then other forms of liberation modalities may be chosen over a stale democracy.

The problem of a military dictatorship is that it is inundated by its investments in the industry of coercion. History has shown to us that no amount of weaponry and coercion can restrain a critical mass with full consciousness of their repression.

President Museveni is a legend of a revolution with contempt for democracy and elections. He scorns the ballot for the bullet. Demanding for free and fair elections is a waste of time. The fear of internal democracy within NRM demonstrates that the Presidency is up for grabbing, forcefully.

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No-Term Limit debate: What really is Africa's problem?

No -Term vs Term Limit

The debate over term limits has taken a new twist in Rwanda where the Parliament is debating whether to remove or retain it. If, it were removed, President Paul Kagame will have a free ride as President for many more years to come. Rwanda’s Presidential terms are seven years long.

Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame has exceeded expectations of a new breed of leaders of Africa. He has done a tremendous job in piecing together a country that was fragile - broken apart by the 1994 genocide. Rwanda’s economy is now a class apart, compared to that of Uganda. Public institutions in Rwanda functions; healthcare systems address the health needs of its people, and so, are the schools, and transportation system. Most, or all of Rwanda’s public services function to near efficiency, compared to its regional neighbors. Should term limits force Kagame to retirement?

The problem of Africa is not term limits. In fact, President Museveni’s credibility underscores his assessment of Africa’s problems as that of leadership. His stinging attack on leaders who stay in power for too long was the mainstay for the justification of term limits in the 1995 Constitution.

Africa is the only continent that has inexhaustible resources, having been exploited for nearly 1000 years. On its own, the continent has shown tremendous resilience. Paradoxically, Africa is also the continent that accommodates the poorest population in the world. Most of them are sickly, dying young and living precariously in degraded environment.

This begs the question: what really is Africa’s problem?

The case for term limits, or no-term limits to me is immaterial. Africa has had leaders who have ruled for life and died as Presidents. Their records should argue it out for the no-term limits’ proponents. Africa has also endured its brand of democracy, where countries have changed leaders very often under strict term limit; Tanzania, South Africa, Rwanda, Burundi, Zambia, and Kenya. There are enormous opportunities in those countries for us to study and draw a conclusion either in support of, or against term limits.

While we may turn to term limits as a panacea to some of our problems, let us also examine whether its shortcomings emanates from our brand of democracy. If not, then we have to take a conscious exploration of whether, as Africans, we do fully understand the art and science of governance as a whole, and the value of the wealth, Africa as a continent, has for us.

The glaring convergence of the term vs no-term limit debate is that the predicaments of all these states are nearly the same. All African states are susceptible to incurable poverty, death from avoidable diseases, broke-down public infrastructure, widespread corruption, sectarianism and nepotism,and untenable environment. More-so, historical blemishes from slavery and colonial era, remain etched in the conscience of these nations, indelibly.

The proponents of term limits have valid points, given our circumstances: Term limit allows a break in a vicious cycle of bad governance and warped ideologies. One of the theories of healthy public policy posits that, policy opportunities usually arise by the punctuation of the equilibrium after a period of stasis. Without a disruption in this stability, policy modifications are disenchanted. This gives rise to the “No Change” sloganeering of NRM. Term limit allows for fair distribution of resources because African leadership inherently attracts nepotism. Today, the Banyankore, or “westerners” are viewed as people who have “eaten things”. A change of government would shift the locus of benefits to areas that are perceived to be deprived. Term limit allows the nation to experience peaceful change of regime. Such, is a strong indication of a nation’s stability or cohesion. Term limit allows the nation to discover from within it, limitless possibilities. By drawing from its talent pool of innovators, a nation nurtures competent and patriotic leaders. It is also a guarantee that access to top leadership is open to everyone, not ring-fenced. The people’s power materializes when they are able to cause, witness, and experience peaceful change in governance and their realities. Therefore, term limit is critical, but merely part of, not the solution in itself, to Africa’s problems.

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Tipping the moral scale: Forgiving the Amins

FORGIVING AMIN

 

The colorful return and burial of Sarah Kyolaba Amin's remains few days ago attracted attention globally. The Iddi Amin name still turn heads around the world. Where I live, people I interact with still identify Uganda by evoking Idd Amin's name. People here in North America do not really know much about the outside world. A tiny country like Uganda falls outside their TV radar. The world is known only through the screens of the television propaganda. The various portrayal of Idd Amin in movies makes Uganda visible in that light - of cruelty.

 

Sarah Amin lived a humble life in London, where she operated a small restaurant and later a saloon. Her humility and motherly pose attracting many Ugandans, some of whom, lived in exile since the 70s in fear of her husband. But in Sarah's company, they found convergence given that she spoke very little about her past life as wife to a tyrant. Her customers showed that they have transcended past traumas associated with Amin's regime.

 

Iddi Amin Dada might have been that monster as he was portrayed. People now see and appreciate that Amin, with all his flaws and cruelty, left legacies of both horror and comedy. In typical Shakespearean presentation of Macbeth,true life is, after-all, defined as tragedy, and where fantasy be-gets comedy. But we also appreciate Amin now as an incomparable nationalist in light of other Uganda's Presidents.

 

The homily that President Museveni accorded Sarah's family; the pledges to pay tuition; and offers of land to allow the return of the family, are all gestures of goodwill. It reaffirms a tipping of the moral scale, where we forgive without forgetting.

 

However, whatever gestures we, as Ugandans offer the Amin's family, ran short of depth of the trueness of humanity if we are unable to forgive their deceased father. Forgiving Idd Amin is good, not for reconciliation's sake, or for letting the past go. It is good for our conscience and well-being.

 

The more we hang on to our dark past, the more we relive those traumas. And yet, in forgiving Amin, we take the courage to sober recollect, to reflect on the tragedies of the past as a whole, not in bits. Uganda has not been a well governed country. It is rich with traumatic moments. Each leader comes with his solution to such problems, but degenerates quickly, into a problem, and a burden, to the country. It just shows that history is not our teacher. We exploit our dark history but learn nothing from it. Somehow, that past has found a place in our psyche where it torments us, and cripples us from developing prudence.

 

I, therefore, take this opportunity to request the Museveni regime to retrieve the remains of Idd Amin and bring it back for burial at home. The man is dead. His remains should not be punished and treated with contempt. The remains have nothing to loose, but we, who are survivors of his cruelty, do. The more we keep his remains far away, the more we retain a looming cloud of unnecessary importance to his brands.

 

Strangely, no matter how President Museveni sells Uganda abroad, people do not care about his gorillas or brand of pseudo-democracy. Returning the remains of Idd Amin to his ancestral home, will attract more attention to Uganda, than all the Gorillas and tourism endeavours.

 

But for the President, such a gesture must be profitable to be pursued. It must endear the Kakwa people to him, as a President. This is how the government hijacked the noble efforts of the late Bazillio Okellos' children to retrieve the remains of their father for a descent reburial in his final resting place, in Muchwini. Maybe the Amin clan should ride on this wave to begin the process, just before the 2016 general elections. Who knows how the President will react!

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Elect Kiiza Besigye 2016 #KB2016Reloaded!!

UGELECTS2016

When the minders of the Democratic Alliance gather to select their united Presidential candidate for 2016, I will have made my choice known. In the process of making this choice, I have considered several factors, for which, a background may suffice.

On Saturday, June 27, 2015, I hosted a group of young African scholars for a sobering debate. The discussion that started with the discourse on modern tyranny in Africa culminated into debating two questions: should Ugandans forgive, trust, support, and promote JPAM if he is genuine in his opposition to President Museveni? The second question was; have we done justice in judging Dr Kiiza Besigye (KB) as a failure because he did not ascend to the Presidency in three successive elections in a period spanning 15 years?

This debate started with a scholarly dissection of the contours of Uganda's body politics in the last 40 years. Several references were made to works of renowned Ugandan scholars such as Samwiri Karugire, Oloka Onyango, George Kanyeihamba, Mahmood Mamdani and so forth. An inspiring 2011 work by Angelo Izama and Michael Wilkerson, “Uganda: Museveni’s triumph and weaknesses” in the Journal of Democracy, was handy with its analysis of Uganda’s political development from 2001 to 2011, covering Rtd Col. Dr Kiia Besigye’s 10 years of active participation in elective politics.

The AfriGroup2016 resolved as follows: In 2001, when KB declared his interest to contest against President Museveni, he had covertly mobilized a number of his comrades in the army and government. Interestingly, JPAM and the rest of the establishment violently resented the challenge by claiming among other things, that KB was jumping a queue. Besigye’s candidacy in 2001 was a shock even among the opposition and it indeed galvanized the political space, leading to a two-man contest, between President Museveni and KB. The outcome of that fierce contest remains a landmark in our recent history. It also cemented the place of KB in our political history. At the time when Dr. KB emerged, people were suspicious and doubted the real intentions of KB. The regime portrayed it as a fight over Ms. Winnie Byanyiima, and a case of a sore disgruntlement. Fifteen years down the lane, KB has won over sceptics and critics alike. His courage and resolve to cause change in the governance is uncontested.

Therefore, for 2016, JPAM should not jump the queue ahead of KB. He should support Kiiza Besigye, if elected Democratic Alliance unity candidate. The AfriGroup2016 team hereby urges Dr. Kiiza Besigye to contest for the Presidency in 2016.

The NRM propaganda machine has falsely claimed that KB is too aggressive, angry, vengeful, a serial looser of elections etc. Evidence shows the contrary.

Dr. KB has demonstrated extraordinary trait of resiliency amidst state brutality. Everyone is angry at the brutality meted against KB. Strangely, he is not! Through activism, KB has become legendary, to the levels of Martin Luther King Jr., and Nelson Mandela of our times. KB may not have won the 2001 and 2011 ballots, but he won hearts and trust. #KB2016reloaded is required to rise with the momentum of enduring public trust to restore sanity in our corrupted government.

Further, KB’s activism has scored many successes; it has inspired JPAM to reawaken that NRM is taking us nowhere; now than ever, independent MPs are rejecting being "herded" like imbeciles to tow improbable Party lines; multiparty politics was redefined, with tolerance; northern Uganda has now become a game-changer, for a government that bayed to alienate it, etc.

The role of Amama Mbabazi in perpetuating corruption in Uganda requires more time for scrutiny. His sadistic ideology of tapping into people’s phones, employing preventive arrests, policing people’s private life through POMA, widespread corruption and so forth, needs reconciling.

Rtd Col Dr Kiiza Waren Besigye remains the most formidable candidate for this generation for the President of Uganda in 2016. He is ready now!

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Undermining Afrocentric Values

VALUING AFROCENTRICISM

Stories of cannibalism in modern days are hard to narrate in mainstream media for fears of stigma. However, in Uganda, cannibalism still exists. In fact, the Ugandan version of Cannibalism is even a less advanced form because it is inspired by poverty and ignorance. A more advanced form of Cannibalism was found among the natives of Papua New Guinea where the brains of the dead were eaten by the family members during a burial ceremony to show respect to the dead.

This article is inspired by the increasing negative attitude of young people of this generation towards Africanism. The main thesis is that anything African or traditional is backward and not worthy celebrating or referencing. To the contrary, all the western values that our people clamour for, are actually similar in content and practice but with a different presentation.

Two weeks ago, Andrew Mwenda wrote an article in the Independent News-Zine challenging our beliefs that valorizes anything western and subvert anything Afrocentric. He observed that we undermine and place no value in the conducts of our leaders, and praise western leaders for dramatized acts of valour, even if it were for gaining political capital. Likewise, there is no culture or ritual in the world which is distinctive and separate from the other but we value western cultures over ours. Whether it is burial, marriage or observances. All these cultural process and traditions mimic each other but with various modifications to suit different circumstances. Culture is fluid.

Now, there is this cheap and misplaced talks that sorcery and witchcraft are evil acts, and that, any African tradition, whether belief systems, medicinal practices, or traditions of marriage, etc., are backward and evil. People only feel contented when married in church, in total disregard for traditional marriages; It is now normalized to seek treatment in a biomedical setting; praying to Jesus and western Gods are the only validated spiritual nourishments. At school, facts about Africa as a continent, and those attributable to each country have remained largely unchanged in textbooks since the collapse of the colonial administration, even with glaring developments, such as  the advent of globalization and internet.

By dumping African values and traditions, Africans have learned what we call self-helplessness. That socially learned inability to care for the self and continent; to reason as autonomous being and to decide on course of action. Every major decision for Africa is made in London, Washington DC, Paris or Beijing. From the basics of soil analysis, mineral evaluation, oil prospecting, to major decisions like invading a foreign country, changing government, and whether to industrialize, or not.

Witchcraft and sorcery are not bad practices at all. In fact, any trade in which the human mind and body are subject to agents for external intervention, such as chemicals or psychic manipulations, can be devastating in equal dimensions if not regulated rigorously by moral agents. In my study on cultural practices, I have concluded that Africans are in their predicament because they live in self-denial, pretence and self-condemnation, a violent and yet subtle form of self-affliction that immobilizes.

Further, because we are scared of our natural existence, we have developed fractious emotional processes that perpetuate conflicting realities of us in the world order. Emotions and identity are cultural constructs that pertains to normative social values. Without a firm cultural identity, we become incoherent and appear reduced.

As such, we have allowed our African identity to be expunged. Without a cultural identity, we are empty.  As such, we place little value in what is ours, but steal to afford alien innovations, resources, and values. For instance, western medicine, devoid of stringent ethical/moral requirement and measurements, is as culpable to abuse as African traditional medicine. In that regard, we fall short on many fronts; African lacks the concept of measurement, accuracy, timing, consistency and above all, moderation, which characterizes western medicine.

Whatever passes as a dangerous traditional practice, simply lacks in rigor, measurement, quality control, understanding of side effects, moderated dose, and consistency of prescription.

Otherwise, how do we explain that most of the western medicines have major components extracted from common plants that naturally grow in Africa? How come the Mzungu exploits the fibrous African mango for weight-loss while we suffer from obesity and hunger? How can we explain the difference between the highly valued Psychologists and Priests, from the estranged African traditional medicine man? To me, it is just rigour, moderation, consistency, science, quality control and presentation.

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