May 2011

The lunatics are in charge of the asylum.

Saturday, April 30, 2011 at 1:50pm

Dear Nina,

When people are appointed to offices because of technical know who and blind loyalty to put their behind behind the president, you get incompetents who walk into traps and react with predictable consequences.

The evolution of this whole thing was very predictable. I predicted the way it would unfold and the idiots who make decisions in government exercised their neanderthal reflexes in exactly the way I predicted to produce the outcome I predicted.

Image is everything. One photo can make or break you and you guys have given your opponents so many you should shoot yourselves in the head. The difference between Mugabe and Museveni is simply marketing. One day can make a difference. Look at the buffoons that speak for this government on FB and in state house.

One day, Ghadafi’s sons were dining and wining the glitteratti of Europe, the next day, they were hunted men with each having a tomahawk missile with their name engraved on it.

The days when Museveni could control the flow of information by imposing a media blackout while panda gari was going on are over. If he is not ready to take the step of becoming a Gbabo or a Ghadafi, its in his best interest to start sorting out an exit strategy both for himself as well as his son and daughters. He really had better be ready to kill lots of people something he should have thought about before he released the dogs of war onto the street.

The world has changed. The masters of the business world are teenage and young people in jeans and laptops. Museveni would not recognise them. He is stuck in an old world where brute force is king. Where the threat of violence or actual violence decides conflicts. Where the most violent man wins. He does not have the reflexes to fight this new war. And neither does his son. You were all caught flat footed because you believed that a 68 percent majority insured you against challenge and life would go on as normal. Because you won a big victory, you guys felt invincible. Feel you could get away with anything. You will notice that I say you because you are still a card carrying and active member of the NRM as is your father and many of your family. There is no way that you are going to be able to distance yourself from this short of cutting up your party card and standing with the people.

I did say that this was going to be a pyrrhic victory, didnt I? And a pyrrhic victory it is. Yet I have a feeling we are yet to see a lot more.

I said before that Besigye and the opposition did not have the power to ignite the masses. I still remain correct. But I also said that there was an increasing radicalisation, an increasing discontent with corruption and prolonged incubence. All that the masses needed to unleash mayhem was a spark and you willfully provided that spark when you so publicly humiliated and beat up Besigye while demonstrating that you were no different to the goons you replaced. This is the sign to the populace to once again clean house.

The absolute control that Museveni and the NRM have on the state of patronage that is Uganda whose resources they use to enrich themselves or buy support enrages people who can only watch this greed and impunity.

When Besigye started these walks, he cut a lonely figure with a backpack on his back. He would have fizzled out within a week. Do you see all of those substantial ladies walking to work for any period of time Musumba, Mugisha, Maama Mabira? Or their male counterparts in their suits and paunches? I doubt that he would have been able to walk to Najjanankumbi twice a week.

But you guys had to send your goons out to rough him up like a common criminal, beat him up, humiliate him, stuff him under the seats of a pickup. You would not even accord him the respect of a political leader, one who had attracted more than 2 million votes and one who was the face of the opposition. You demonstrated absolute contempt of the significant minority that did not vote for you.

Democracy that your party president and his lackeys and footmen parrot all of the time, means that while the majority rule, they also undertake to respect and protect the rights of the minority who lost. A government rules with a shadow government from the opposition.

The opposition has a role as a critic of government to keep it on the straight and narrow. It is the role of the opposition to highlight the neglect that is leading to high food prices. It is their job to highlight the wastage of public resources as has happened in the lat few months -650 billion to finance Museveni’s re election which essentially comprised of handing out brown envelopes using state funds, 6.5 billion to bribe LC’s who have never been voted for more than ten years but guarantee the grassroot campaigns, another 6.5 billion to finance the re election of a rubber stamp parliament under the insulting “ supervising government programs”, 1.7 trillion to buy fancy new and utterly useless fighter jets unless your people are planning to start new wars -I hear one useful idiot on your board who sets himself up as a spokesman for the NRM suggested they be used to fight Al Shabaab.

There used to be an idiot in Ethiopia who presided over an arms race in the horn while his people starved and ended up needing emergency Aid from the rest of the world. WHO estimates that less than 2 percent of Ugandan farmers received seeds from the government despite parts of eastern and northern Uganda being at risk of famine. There is abundant evidence that despite warnings, this government has done nothing to cushion its citizens against the risk of starvation and high commodity prices. And then out comes a government idiot stating the obvious -that Uganda is not a welfare state. There is a story from the bible of Joseph in Egypt who having predicted a famine was put in charge of planning for and mitigating the effects of the famine on the population. Thats what governments do. They dont just decide that its not their problem and everyone should fend for themselves while continuing to tax and abuse taxpayers money. A government for the people and by the people empathises with the people. But this government is like aliens just came in from space with no kinship to the people or empathy for their cuffering.

Thats is why Walking2Work is so brilliant in its simplicity. Think about it, this was a perfect moment for the middle classes of this country to bond with and show solidarity with the people who have to tighten their belts and walk to work everyday even when their meagre pay is stretching less and less everyday. You am sure watched that stupid video of Musumba walking to work with one lone young man, past people bustling along their day to day lives and then being stopped by a police officer and literally being arrested for walking to work. she had no crowd behind her. Few were paying her any attention -until the police stopped her. Lukyamuzi played hide and seek and walked to work and the world did not end. Otunnu walked to work thanks to the quick thinking of a professional police officer -and the world did not come to an end. Contrast that with the response of the hired goons in police uniforms following orders from above and one sees clearly where to place the blame for the chaos and bloodshed -on the incompetent police and government response. The very confusion with which Kayihura dealt with Mutabazi tells its own story. First he praised him, then he suspended him, then he reinstated him but then transferred him all in the space of less than a week.

If this was not so deadly and affecting my country, I would have said pull out the popcorn and dim the lights and lets enjoy some circus baboons perform. But this is not funny. it is sad. those people who died are real people. Am sure rubber bullets cost less than mambas. Do you guys realise just how bad those photos and videos look? Of smoke on the horizon and battle ready troops arayed against an unarmed population? Am sure you would love for them to come with guns so that you could shoot them all. But tehre again is the brilliance of W2W. Guns aren’t needed except by fools. And when those fools exercise their trigger happy fingers, they create martyrs. Nothing recruits more for a cause than martyrs and brutality and bullies. All those nasty photos will be in every boardroom of every country that has business in Uganda who will have to evaluate the cost of their association with thugs. And they have already hit every news outlet. And they are being queried in the white house and int he commonwealth. And Museveni is going to have to answer questions in Perth whenhe goes to CHOGM and be compared with Mugabe and Ghadafi and Gbabo and Ben ali and Mubarak. Not exactly great company right now.

Museveni was meant to be different from the others -the ones he called swine. Unfortunately he is now one of those swine. Ghadafi deployed irregular troops to kill protesters. See how quickly that morphed into a real resistance army complete with a sopisticated airforce that destroyed his fancy hardware before it even left the ground.

You guys have already lost the battle for hearts and minds. In the very public beatings and humiliation that was meted out on Besigye, you showed yourselves for what you are. It is obvious that all of the fancy suits and fancy words such as democracy and constitution really just hide plain old thugs. The ones who believe that if they are challenged, the dissent can be settled by cracking some heads.

And the worst part is that you are losing moderate opponents as well as undecided voters. Remember of 14 million eligible voters only about 5 million voted for the NRM despite it boasting of having almost 9 million card holding party members. Essentially your own party members chose not to vote. The radical opponents will not change their views. these images have just increased their resolve and offered them even more or better ammunition than the lies and distortions some of them used to peddle before. Nothing sells like a picture of injustice meted out by a bully. Uganda is run by bullies.

The NRM just crossed aline invisible as it may seem -just like Ghadafi crossed one. The next few weeks will show us just how much damage has been done. We may even know sooner when the cancellations of Kaguta’s inauguration start to come in. Didnt you guys expect 32 heads of state.. LOL

The blood of innocents will never go unpunished. As people who came to power on the back of the blood of innocents one would have thought that you understood this very well. If your guys really have any sense, they need to call the dogs of war off and send them back to the barracks. You will never win a battle where your opponent is civilian and unarmed with guns armoured cars and live bullets. And get rid of dead wood like Kivedhinda, Kabakumba and Mirundi. They just cause you more damage. And Kayihura -send him to staff college in Siberia, he needs to hide from the public eye for a while. As for that Gilbert guy who effected Besigye’s most recent assault by state goons, you are going to have to find him another identity and another country to go to. Even Luzira maybe too dangerous for him.

Those who the Gods mean to destroy, they first run mad ….

President Museveni’s address to the nation

Monday, May 2, 2011 at 10:33pm

Nina,

My last letter to you was so popular, I have decided to write another one to you. I hope that you are going to share it with your powerful uncles and aunties and let them know that their country needs them to exercise leadership right now. I assume that you still belong to the NRM so I will address you as such.

Mao is playing your people.

They were stupid enough to accept his refusal to apply for bail instead of refusing to accept and letting him go free. The longer he stays in jail, the more his political capital goes up. Remember people love the underdog. A few years ago, Uncle Besi [do you still call him that?], was a relative unknown until your Uncle Kaguta decided to frame him for a rape he did not commit.

Granted the man was poaching his wifes ward but we will not talk about that now. I will allow the ladies in the mothers union to complain about that later. I know many men who have been in his position and others who would not complain. Given it was not the mans morality or fitness to stand for the highest office in the land that was on trial here, we have spent too much time on the issue but I couldnt restrain myself. After all the girl was of age and sound mind and Bill Clinton too got away with it -poaching you know and got forgiven by his wife and a whole nation.

But I digress, a whole president masterminded a smear campaign that read like a novel. A whole head of CID perjured herself on the basis of orders from above. I hope that she felt suitable compensated for her loss of face and reputation by that posting out of sight to Nairobi. That said given the fact that the same whole president had submitted himself to cross examination in another trial involving the same protagonists in order to prove that there is a “community diagnosis” of AIDS so as to support his accusations of Besigye having AIDS in order to block his 2001 presidentail bid, we shouldnt have been surprised.

Unlike Besigye, Mao lacked battle scars. Imprisonment and oppression has now given him bona fide freedom fighter credentials which he didnt really have before. trust me if you were to conduct a poll today dont be surprised if the NRM was forced into a run off and the longer this goes on, an outright rout.

Today a journalist who filmed Kampala MP Nabila has apparently been arrested and is being held in jail. Do you guys have morons making policy? Dont you have proper PR people? I thought that one of the first sons who was given billions for selling Uganda campaign and more during CHOGM would be useful but then I remembered that famous letter he wrote Mwenda when he was really pissed off, pardon my French. Am surprised that after he wrote that open letter he would be put in charge of any PR venture let alone selling our country but I forget technical know who beats technical know how every day in Uganda.

I did a quick check on FB for social networking sites for journalists associations and quickly found two from Uganda including one for human rights lawyers [Human Rights Network for Journalists in Uganda and Uganda Journalists Association]. I also found the International Federation of Journalists as well as the International Center for Journalists. For addictional measure, I also found a page social networking page for Amnesty International. How long do you think it will take for Ugandan journalists to find them? And how long will it be before Muzeyi Kirunda kivedhinda and Kabakumba come out to embarrass themselves and all of you? Those two really need to be muzzled. And the others like Mirundi and Nyago, need to face a firing squad or better still shoot themselves for all of the damage their arrogance has caused. As for commander Kale and Gilbert the ninja, I have no words. Their acts are short of treasonous. You see in these days of the internet, image is everything. 25 years just suddenly went down the toilet with all of the poisonous sound bites and vidoe clips these men and woman -I forgot Nabakooba, women have gratuitiously given to the world and uncle Kaguta’s enemies.

If I still supported Kaguta I would shoot them myself but since Kaguta declared himself life president by stealth, I prefer to watch his discomfiture as he undoes everything he has fought for and worked for without any help. You see I hate life presidents. Uncle Kaguta taught me well. I remember him saying that life presidents were swine and that the problems of Africa were leaders who did not know when to retire and overstayed in power. Can you imagine, he told the old fogey brained dictators at the OAU summit that when all of them were overdue retirement? I remember President Moi chastising him and calling him a young man. But President Moi did heed his advice and retired even though he needed a push to do so. As you know they say okuwangaala kulaba or something like that. I suspect I may have made that one up but who cares, it sounds good. The longer Kaguta stays around, the more he will see history remade. Unfortunately he does not listen to me -I told him to retire while he was still ahead. we and my friends would have been happy to buy him a rocking chair and invite him to our weddings and launching community pit latrines. But he thought all of that was beneath him.

I watched him chastise those poor bishops for daring to say their mind. Can you imagine, he told the men of God to go to hell? What blasphemy. Imagine he called them arrogant while acting all high handed and arrogant. But you know these days arrogant old men who have no issues with killing those who disagree with them no longer impress. Anti abaana benakuzino obamanyi. Kaguta yabakuza bubi. Can you imagine he used to call his elders swine when he was a young man of 40 odd years? Now the young men are calling him all sorts of names I will not repeat here.

I watched that other interview Museveni had in Nairobi yesterday. Oh how unconfortable being compared to Idi Amin? Did you ever think that you would see that ever happen in this life time? I didnt. Oh how hard the mighty have fallen. All at the same time that Uncle Gad is fighting for his life, Uncle Gbabo just gratutiously gave the world free photos of his indignity and Uncle Ben Ali and Uncle Mubarak are now no better than common criminals.

The world is turning upside down. That ka boy embarrassing him on TV and him taking the bait. Thats not the Kaguta I knew. The old Kaguta had international journalists eating out of his hand. He played them with finesse. He charmed them or chastised them with a benign smile. And many a time he virtually got away with murder. But not this time. He is increasingly losing it and getting snappy. I told you the man should retire but you lazy NRM guys refused to stand up to him and tell him he was tired. Now he is going to get whipped and embarrassed by meer children who were running around in diapers or born when he was a president?

Why can’t people retire when they are still ahead and avoid such indignity. Mandela is an elder statesman. Mbeki has found himself a new role -as a statesman too. But statesmanship eludes Uncle Kaguta. I know you are still on talking terms with him. Didnt he just praise you not too long ago? Could you whisper to him that the emperors cloths are invisble and his buttocks are waving in the wind and that small children are laughing at him and pointing? Me I wouldnt try after seeing the way he treats his friends. You saw how his goons roughed up Besigye and put him in hospital. And the man is so mean, none of his hospitals are fit enough to provide care for you after his goons are through with you. I hear they are death traps.

You remember that Uncle Kaguta was in charge the last time it was Mugabe’s turn to get roasted. But really, Museveni only differs from Mugabe in fancy marketing. Plus Museveni did not dispossess or beat up white people -only Ugandans. In addition Mugabe has no oil. He may hobnob with the chinese but he has no oil to give them. Plus he does not have troops in Sudan or Somalia fighting uncle Sams wars or mercenaries in Iraq allowing Uncle Sam to outsource his wars.

You know today Mao is due to appear in court and already its drama. Not even the rain and floods in Kaguta city Kampala prevented things from getting interesting. You know I use the word interesting for lack of a more suitable word. DP youth are restless. Makerere students are buzzing like bees. I know you never went to Makerere but attended the fancy Nottingham together with Muhoozi but beneath the calm exterior and petty superficiality of Makerere university students lies a violence just ready to erupt at short notice. Mbarara is on fire for walking to work while Rukungiri is on fire for refusing to walk to work and staying in their homes.

All over the internet and on youtube, I can see fire in Nakivubo, Kisekka market, Bwaise, Kasangati, Kasubi, Mulago, Wandegeya, Namasuba, Gayaza, Mbale, Masaka, Gulu, Mbarara, Rukungiri and virtually every major town in Uganda. The men with guns are all over the place. They dont sleep. I wonder how long you will continue to rely on those hungry abused nd poorly paid dogs of war? And now Osama Bin Laden has been put out of action, those other dogs of war outsourced to Iraq and Somalia are about to come home too. I wonder how you are going to keep them under control when they savagely turn upon you as that too is just a matter of time. The lawyers have already gone on strike so there will be no courts to go to I know you people are shortsighted and will use the military court martial but I can guarantee that that will backfire. But you never listen to me. I can guarantee that I will watch you making predictable mistakes and be able to say, I told you so. Not that that makes me happy when my country is being burnt by incompetents who act like they came out of Godfather movie.

Less relevant but given am on a roll here, I may also tell you that I found the Commonwealth Secretariat as well as the website for the next CHOGM in Perth. Together with this I found that Ugandan journalists have at least two social netowrking sites on facebook while the International federation of journalists and others have pages with several hundred thousand fans. together with the lawyers, do you want to bet how long it will take for them to link up with the W2W forum on facebook? I know you will try to block facebook but that too is doomed to fail. I say this because your goons just arrested a journalist who filmed the arrest of MP Nabilah today. Do your guys really follow orders from above or do they make up things in whichever way their villagers minds tell them. I hear that Kayihura has been recruiting from Kisoro and Janets village, Surely he didnt recruit goatherds who do not know the possible repercussions at this stage of arresting a photo journalist. I would have thought that whoever is giving orders from above has enough intelligece not to fall into these so obvious pitfalls.

You know, one thing Kaguta maybe thanked for is demystifying the gun but not in the way that he thought he did. Being a violent man, he believed that the gun could be demystified by people being exposed to it. But he forgot his military strategy. though shall not fight a war on your opponents territory using your opponents weapons. This Walk2Work thing completely disarmed him. If he shoots them he is smoked. If he doesnt he is smoked. And the biggest problem is legitimacy, he has been in power so long that when it comes to people dying for power, it is quite easy to see who is the greedy one for power. Bug guns don’t mean anything unless you are stupid enough to use them. And if you are stupid enough to use them, you still lose. Whichever way you look at it, he comes off looking like the bully. But the world and apparently Ugandans too are getting tired of tired blood thirsty power hungry old men which category he now finds himself in.

But I should come back to the mulamwa. I really set out to write to you about how I felt about Uncle Kaguta and Aunty Janets recent speeches on the so called riots. I think they both got it wrong. The people who they call rioters are not actually the ones who were rioting. All of the videos I have seen show clearly that Kaguta’s soldiers were on riot and terrorising the population. So much for a professional army.

I really would have loved to deconstruct these two speeches word for word but will restrain myself as I have already written quite a lot. But I will give you my overall impression.

I read the transcripts of both Uncle Kaguta and Aunty Janets. To say that I was unimpressed would be to put it mildly. As a matter of fact, I was quite dissappointed. Museveni’s interview in Nairobi as well as his outburst when addressing bishops and religious leaders clearly show that he has lost it and is no longer the old Museveni who had journalists eating out of his lap. At this rate if you guys do not muzzle him, you may find yourselves going down with him.

I instead decided to look back in history to my notes after Museveni’s visit to Kasubi last year and killing of three people. He again gave an arrogant address to the nation instead of expressing what I called at the time “humility in the face of sadness and death of Ugandan citizens.” I thought at the time that the appropriate response from our leader at the time was sadness and humility. Instead we were treated to what we have come to expect from him -arrogance and threats of crushing, killing and dealing with enemies.

I will here quote myself from the 224th March 2010 “A little humility in the presence of sadness ….. -you could say that again!

3 people are dead in one week -at the hands of the very same people who are supposed to protect them. 40 dead a few months ago again at the hands of the same people! Sadness and humility are the only appropriate response -not arrogance! Anything less is bad manners, “obukoopi”!

Note here that both Museveni and his wife express little or no remorse for the dead rioters or not. Their emphasis is on blame and revenge. There is no self introspection at all. it does not occure to them that they may in some way have something to do with all of this.

On the 23rd of March 2010, I wrote the following;

“It is stupid though to assume that everyone who died at Kasubi deserved to die or was even involved.

Obviously you have not been involved in a riotous situation if you are not aware that in the melee and confusion, standersby can and are often victims!

Museveni’s guard and intelligence detail is not well trained if they allowed the president to get himself involved in such a situation!

From a political perspective, you and Museveni can spin all you like!

As Museveni very well knows from his war with Obote, the death of civilians is a vote loser and radicalises the public!

There are no winners from last weeks Kasubi debacle, least of all Museveni and his soldiers! The battle for hearts and minds if Museveni really cares about how he is viewed was lost with a point against Museveni except in the dimmest of minds!”

If you were somehow caught in the wrong place at the wrong time or happened to die, then in the eyes of Museveni and his people you were a rioter. Even in the face of the rampant and videotaped unprofessionalism displayed by the police and army, Museveni has no doubt that everyone jailed is guilty. He goes on to demonstrate his contempt for the rule of law by proposing not for the first time laws to prevent people’s constitutional right to bail and the chance to defend themselves. Museveni seems to believe that the courts just like the police under Kayihura and the so called national army as well as the rubber stamp parliament should be his tools to use as he wishes.

On the 23rd March 2010 I again wrote this, “Any death is to be regreted. Thats the bare minimum that is expected of a president whose own guard kills his countries own citizens.

Have you ever in any of Museveni’s speeches heard him regret the death of Ugandans at the hand of his soldiers? Or ever take responsibility for anything?

Museveni always passes on the buck to someone else!”

In his most recent speech, Museveni as usual passes the buck and takes no responsibility at all even after people have died.

On the 22nd of March 2010, I wrote that;

"”During the 1966 crisis when Obote was quarreling with Mutesa, Obote’s army massacred many people. If Mutesa is having a political quarrel with Obote, what does the population have to do with it and why kill them? I do not agree with the proverb that when two elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers. If the people are rioting you can arrest them and put them in prison. The government has a lot of power to deal with rioting people and means to control crowds without killing them.”

By Y. K. Museveni. Speech to elders in Gulu at Acholi Inn, March 12 1986.

“As for rioters, I assume you speak as one who was there?

If three unarmed people were killed, thats 3 people too many!

And no intelligent person walks into an incendiary situation without advance intelligence. If Museveni’s men had done their job as they should, there is no reason the president would have walked into such a predictable situation.

Museveni set himself up as being better than Obote. Thats the standard by which he shall forever be judged and thats the standard he has to live upto!

And as you can see from his own words, he does not live upto that standard! Not once, but several times.””

Museveni’s bodyguard made the mistake of taking the president into an incendiary situation at Kasubi. He arrogantly defended that decision even after 3 people died at his mens hands. They have since shamelessly claimed that someone in the civilians must have shot and killed those people despite phot and video evidence clearly showing him, his son and their bodyguards and soldiers with guns aimed at unarmed people as well as firing.

The note that really summarises my feelings about Museveni’s speeches to the nation both after the september 2009, March 2010 as well as last weekend is this one I wrote on the 22nd March 2010. Please replace Buganda with Uganda and you will see how it applies to the current situation.

Kasubi March 2010 -when a president shot and killed his own people but still remained defiant!

authored by Ddembe on 22. March 2010 at 18:21

The arrogance!

People are dead at the hands of his men and the command of his son! Instead of mourning for the double tragedy, all he can think of is the tired old militant rhetoric! He seems to believe that it is him and his family who ‘fought”! Yet his victory is due to those who laid down their lives for him -many of them Baganda. Almost certainly the majority combattants and non combattants were Baganda!

It is a small thing to show respect to ones hosts for accept it or not, Museveni’s governments are guests in Kampala/Buganda! Symbols have a lot of power over men -which is why he is dishing out “medals and honours” Symbols that have stood the test of 800 years have roots in the hearts and minds of people -something the less than 50 year old central government has failed to do and he himself has failed to do in 24 years.

The mistake that Museveni and many of his predecessors make is to act like and assume that they are occupiers!

Whatever popularity that Museveni may have had in Buganda is not really due to his likeability as a person. The more Baganda suffered at the hands of obote’s troops, the more recruits and logistical support Obote’s enemies got.

The less difference people see between Museveni and his predecessor, the more radicalised the populace becomes.

This fire if arson could have been started by anyone. But Museveni can only blame himself for acting predictably. The death of innocents shall never go unnoticed!

The police and security organisations have become predictable. If they really want to have the upper hand they need to act with less predictability.

Museveni’s enemies want exactly the type of images that Museveni is giving them so gratuitiously!! Makerere, Kasubi, Rukiga -all in one week yet we still have a few months to go to the next election!

A more discerning president would have demanded that Kayihura takes one for the team and resigns, apologised for the harm done to mourners advertent or inadvertent, offered compensation to the aggrieved families and lectured the police and security organisations on how to deal with the civilians they are paid to protect!

Someone needs to remind Museveni of the man who said the following words “Therefore the security of Uganda is their right and not a favour bestowed by any regime. No regime has a right to kill any citizen of this country, or to beat any citizen at a roadblock. We make it clear to our soldiers that if they abuse any citizen, the punishment they will receive will teach them a lesson. As for killing people -if you kill a citizen, you yourself will be killed.”

That same man said the following during another speech to elders in Gulu at Acholi Inn, March 12 1986 , “During the 1966 crisis when Obote was quarreling with Mutesa, Obote’s army massacred many people. If Mutesa is having a political quarrel with Obote, what does the population have to do with it and why kill them? I do not agree with the proverb that when two elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers. If the people are rioting you can arrest them and put them in prison. The government has a lot of power to deal with rioting people and means to control crowds without killing them.

Both of these were said by Y. K. Museveni but am sure not even he himself would recognise them now!

Am sure now you understand why i think uncle Kaguta needs to stop speaking off the cuff, and employ better speech writers with a bit of grey matter between their ears rather than raw arrogance. I am very sure that you and many others in the NRM are cringeing after this speech as well as many recent pronouncements by Nabakooza, Kabakumba, Kintu Nyago, Tamale Mirundi and most of all kirunda Kivedhinda.

I do understand why you have all kept silent and left it to these outsiders to do all of the talking and of course embarrass themselves while you practice plausible deniability.

Museveni’s rioting soldiers and policemen

Tuesday, May 3, 2011 at 3:27pm

Nina,

Writing you letters is becoming a habit! At this rate am about to claim that am a seer like Pastor Kayanja or that other guy (or is it a woman) that Timothy Kalyegira talks to! I need to talk about that man of God (or is he?) another day. At least my predictions do come true unlike his! Kayanja is MIA! I wonder whether he would like to give us some new fake predictions! I know that the pentecostals would like to be recognised up there side by side with the Catholics, Protestants, Orthodox and Muslims in Uganda but do they have to be ensconced so far up uncle Kags bottom just so they can be recognised? What happened to separation of the church and the state?

Now they are the recruiting agency for the government through Pastor Natasha and her mother or is it the other daughter! i hear Kayikura and Arinaitwe were recruited by the pastors and vetted by the first lady to confirm they were saved. But judging by Arinaitwe’s recent performance as well as the circumstances in which Kayihura’s saved boys with guns brigade the SRPS was wound down for torture nad humnan rights abuses including deatsh in custody as murders by security services are euphemistically called, the saved formula doesnt work. And this is before we go into those allegations of pederasty against the man of God or those of smuggling truckloads of wine!

But I digress. My prediction in my last letter to you was that it wouldn’t take very long before the lawyers and journos linked up against Uncle Kags bully boy tactics. within hours of my saying so, a magistrate decided she wasn’t going to be used any longer in the rape of the courts. Another threw out the case against Mao, and you now have the lawyers on a 3 days strike ironically in support of the people you chose to call criminals! Didnt I say that the lawyers and journalists wouldnt take long before joining the fray collectively? Now the newspapers report that they have joined the fray. See what your village idiots have done! They have united the lawyers and the journalists against your government. Am starting to suspect that your people in the police and army are working for the opposition and trying to make you guys look bad!

I wonder when those lazy workers MP’s like Lyomoki and his friends are going to come out and walk with the people they claim to represent. For twenty years they have been sitting in the rubberstamp parliament collecting allowances and getting fat! i think its time they now came out and spoke on behalf of the people they are paid to represent! At this rate I can see teachers walking in solidarity with those other teachers you tear gassed and their pupils. Taxi drivers are about to walk in protest too since you guys are now interfereing with their livelihoods. People no longer want to travel and stay in their homes. I can see all sorts of other professions joining the fray. You know my mother chose to retire from the civil service during Idi Amin because she could not stand having to go through an army check everytime she went to work. She worked in one of those sensitive government offices. I can therefore understand why Ugandans may chose to stay at home and hate you for having unleashed the dogs of war onto the streets. You know the police and army had started to shed the name “basirukaale” but the last 2 or 3 weeks are quite rapidly undoing that!

This is going to make for a very interesting swearing in! Uncle Kags or is it Sevo these days may end up getting sworn in like Kibaki -like a thief in the night! I wonder how your people will be able to account for the billions they stole from our taxes if all of those 32 heads of state stay away! You know thats a very distinct possibility! My intuition tells me that those videos of your goons in action compounded by the village idiots you chose to speak for the government are right now causing problems in many state houses around the world. For sure Uncle Bob maybe able to come. He doesnt get to get out much these days to inspect a guard of honour and stretch his very old bones. As you are aware he is very arthritic including in his extra bone -you know the one that women don’t have. I hear his missus when she is not shopping in Singapore, has been examining the funny bones of other men younger than Uncle Bob! For many other heads of state whose governments are accountable to the people and sensitive to criticism and negative publicity, those images are going to keep them away!

I gather now you guys have a new tactic -if the people wont walk2work without a permit so that your goons can exercise their neanderthal reflexes to crack some heads, they are now lobbing tear gas into their homes so that they can be forced outside and frogmatched to town! That kid of reminds me of all of those villagers your guys rounded up from their gardens in northern Uganda and frog matched them into camps for the next 20 years! I wonder where you will build the camps this time. The protests are everywhere. Gulu, Mbale, Masaka, every surburb of Kampala, Jinja, Mbarara and rukungiri. The strange thing is that you guys have always claimed to win with 90% majorities in these last two towns. Who was that guy who rounded people up in the north? Tinye? I hear he rounded up some balaalo in Buliisa as well who thought they could squat over some few million barrels of oil and claim royalties! is he also involved in this operation?

If ever there was evidence that your people are tired and don’t have any new ideas, it is this crisis. All that your goons understand is kill, beat, crush, eat like a samosa! What violence? Did your mama’s deny you breasts or what? Why can’t your people think of anything else other than fight and kill. I hear your uncle Kaguta wears his ability to kill like a badge of honour. When told he has been fighting for 25 years he gets insulted and reminds all that he has actually been killing for 45 years! I wonder what makes him think that people have got to keep dying for him so that he can continue remaining in power indefinitely.

Yesterday I had a brain wave. Must have been the excitement of writing to you -are you married? It suddenly occurred to me that Museveni is now a “life president by stealth”. Am not sure what it was that I was smoking but I sure need to try it again. Am getting confused -couldn’t have been smoking anything as I dont smoke at all. Couldn’t have been drinking anything either as the strongest drink I take is coffee just like Uncle Kags! must have been someone walking past and blowing smoke my way! boy tha was some pretty good stuff if it suddenly made me creative! You see am not creative -I remember you trying to tell me exactly how I was a nobody! this stuff could change that as I may even copyright that statement as I surely haven’t seen it before in print. Wouldn’t you agree?

That Museveni who lost an election miserably in 1980 level field or not is the one who felt aggrieved enough to wand to start a destructive war? I hear that even in his own constituency, he lost miserably! That he successfully wrestled the animal from the swine and then “reluctantly” as was his claim in 1986 agreed to be president for 5 years but has since then repeatedly kept shifting the goal posts just so that he can remain in power suggests that he has stealthily become a life president! But don’t take my word for it. I looked it up and apparently anthropologists allot a duration of 25 years to ancient an ancient kings reign or era. As a matter of fact one can roughly estimate how old Buganda is by multiplying the number of kabaka’s by 25 in this case 36 kings each ruling for 25 years makes Buganda approximately 900 years. So Museveni is a king -one who has already ruled for an era! But he wants to go on! Is that greed or what? He even thinks its worthwhile for people to get killed so he can continue to rule!

If ever one needed evidence that your NRM people are unsuited to leading our country into a modern world, it is their failure to do battle in a modern world with modern tools like keyboards, social media, and boots on the ground chanting keep walking! They have exercised all of the wrong reflexes since this started a couple of weeks ago. Mistake after mistake!

You know I have a soft spot for you even though you hate my guts! So I will give you some free advice to pass on to the strong men of the NRA. This here thing is going to end badly if they continue posturing and bullying. They are going to either have to get rid of the tired old man in a hat or to prevail on him to sit down and talk. And when I say talk, I dont mean talk in the condenscending manner he is used to. Talk with respect looking for a mutual solution to this problem and most of all looking for a way of healing our communities. But I can guarantee that the stickler is going to be term limits. And some people are going to have to commit seppuku -like kivedhinda. its time he retired anyway. And that soldier masquerading as a policeman, he will have to go back to the barracks and get redeployed. You are also going to need some people with real conflict resolution credentials and am not talking about that thug in NAirobi who was previously the spokesman for the LRA. I know that he is attractive to you guys as you love people you can buy!

You can of course ignore me but you know by now that am a seer -there I just said it! How long do you think it will take before the traders in Kampala decide they are tired of having police and soldiers rioting in the city and messing up their business.

You am sure notice that i have deliberately used the term rioters to describe the so called government security agents in the city. They have been rioting since before the 18th, making people uncomfortable in the city and disrupting business. I wonder how much money has been lost since they were released from their mama ingia pole’s in the barracks! These guys are going to bring the economy down! I wonder how you trust people who are so poor to guard you and your healthy looking wives and children. Me, I wouldn’t trust them at all!I was starting to think that I was the only one who had noticed that Museveni’s soldiers and the police were rioting and destroying the peace and people’s property in Kampala.I almost even thought of copyrighting that too -you know “Museveni’s soldiers on a riot”! But I found that Dr Ian Clark beat me to that. “Although it is the duty of the Police to keep civil order and prevent, or control rioting, one wonders, as they watch television and read newspapers, if these are anti-riot Police or rioting Police.” – Dr. Ian Clarke (Mayor-Elect, Makindye division). Prof Jjuuko also thinks that your soldiers are on riot. “What we have experienced since the start of the Walk-to-Work campaign are police riots. It’s like the police are telling the people ‘if you cannot riot then we will riot’,” says Prof. Jjuuko.

The old man in the hat is tired! I wonder how he will be when his MP’s join the walkers like some have already started doing at least in their comments, his cabinet starts splitting as you know its now blackmail season. Those he was planning to drop have suddenly received a shot of viagra and will be blackmailing him while the army may have to do a Mubarak on him.

Its time to make exit plans!

Nina -why can’t Amama lead the NRM and this country?

Saturday, May 7, 2011 at 11:55pm

Dear Nina,

Its been a few days since my last letter. You know unlike some of you who were born into the movement, some of us have to work for our keep. Big contracts do not fall our way, you know. I know you have been ignoring my letters. Is it because I was not nice to daddy dear? I hope I did not bruise him too much when I brought up Temangalo. You know Temangalo was a blot on a man who had hitherto kept his nose out of scandal. That of course does not mean that nothing was happening behind closed doors but as you know image is everything. I even got your sister Rachel distressed and have had my friend Patu unhappy with me for a while now.

I had promised I wouldn’t mention daddy dear today, but I could not restrain myself. Actually haven’t in a while. I do sometimes wonder what he thinks of his very selfish friend who has refused to share the chair with him. Binaisa said that “entebbe ewooma”. I must say that I admire him for his blind loyalty. I cannot imagine maintaining loyalty to a man who only wishes to eat alone. Didn’t he use to be considered to be second in the queue? By the time Kaguta is through and hands over to his son, I wonder where the Mbabazi’s will be in the queue. When you guys claim Museveni is the only man with a vision, do you actually believe yourselves? Do you frankly see any reason why your father Temangalo aside, cannot lead the NRM or this country? You know a true revolution is like a relay -the baton has got to be handed on for the revolution to survive.

You know your dad is not the only man who has found himself in this position. Gordon Brown over in the UK had to jostle in an unseemly manner and expose the party dirty linen when his pal Tony Blair got too intoxicated with being in the limelight. Ultimately the party faithful decided Tony had eaten enough things and needed to go. Nowadays he occupies himself advising strongmen like Kagame and now deposed dictators like Mubarak.

John Howard, the third member of the “War against Terror” trio who posed as the ‘leaders of the free world’ against Saddam and terrorism also had a lady in waiting who got tired after 13 years. Can you imagine a paltry 13 years. So Peter Costello, that was his name, -he too rocked the boat and challenged Mr Howard. The party faithful fearful of losing power if John Howard did not lead them, failed Mr Costello but the people decided that Mr Howard was being greedy and terminated him. You have watched those shows on TV where they terminate players. Interestingly Australia has no term limits and neither does the UK yet no one stays in power for 25 years. Do they know something that Ugandans do not or are Ugandan figures being massaged? Or is it just ignorance at work in Uganda? No truly democratic nation even without term limits has got one leader in power for 25 years going on thirty.

You know the above two men Gordon Brown and Peter Costello in the UK and Australia respectively alleged that there was a queue and Tony Blair and John Howard were refusing to leave the queue so others could join in and share the cake too. They both even said that there was a gentlemans agreement that the incumbent was now reneging on. The constitution says that bukenya is second in line yet the party says your daddy is second in line. The whole country knows that the real second in line is Col. Muhoozi. So tell me, how does it work? I hear the NRM had a queue. As a matter of fact I remember your father accusing Besigye of violating the code and trying to jump the queue where presumably he too was in line. At the time I thought he was protecting his own position in the queue. But as time goes by, it becomes more and more obvious that Kaguta has no intention of following the queue. Instead there is a good chance they may even skip the queue like in Eyadema land and annoint the son, Muhoozi. I hope you are on good terms having gone to Nottingham like him and being brought up in the family business. But thats not the reason why I brought this up. I have asked you before what the mechanism for retiring Museveni in the publics best interest is.

You see the man is tired but he does not seem to be able to see it. Plus this personalising of the state is quite irksome. The whole clan is in the government -is this some sort of family business? Now I hear that you too are being asked funny questions about whether you work for the family firm. It must be that Stephen. He has been trying to compete with me. He doesn’t like the fact that my letters have been so persuasive. Naye am getting lost -my real question is what is the mechanism for challenging Museveni? The only man who ever tried has been harrassed, charged with having HIV which I didnt know was a crime, charged with having committed rape with a consenting adult -that sounds like an oxymoron, been run off to exile, and been beaten and humiliated puting him ino hospital for a week! Am starting to think thats why your father is afraid of challenging Kaguta for surely he does not plan to be a lady in waiting all of his life. I hear you were counting your chickens before they hatched and the wikileaks idiots leaked the news. I would be very careful if I were you and make sure I have on some leggings underneath. You never know these people might decide to bundle you onto the back of a pick up and worse still shove you under the seat for plotting treason. The other day they were trying to undress Ingrid Turinawe in front of parliament! You see how they treated Besigye the man they spent five years with in the bush fighting mosquitos. Actually he was the one saving them from the mosquitoes with his busawo obutendeke! How do you think they would treat those of you who in their opinion were in Nairobi and Sweden eating sausages while they were suffering? You could see real nugu and kamanyiro in their actions. I think President Museveni calls it “bukyayi”!

Now there is that woman Janet Kataha. First she annoys the Rubindi’s, almost causing that woman Alice to go on strike, then she fails to show compassion to the nation and now she is questioning Besigye’s leadership skills. The things that Alice was saying after the elections were treasonous -I hope you reported her to the security boss. But I forget, you too were saying funny things at the time. What was it with Hope’s losing? Was she created in office that she was not allowed to lose? Is she one of these people who think that they were born in cabinet or parliament? I got the impression that there was some family linen being laundered in public. I have actually heard that there maybe some interesting family linen there to do with a menage a trois in cabinet but am not one to repeat rumours! You must tell me more about that some day. Surely its no longer a menage a trois when there are four people involved -thats a menage a quatre!

But I must get back to this Kataha woman and her claim that Besigye had no leadership skills. People really have very short memories and do not know how far they have come. Baganda say, that “akivaamu yakiyita ekyato”. He who has finished the crossing is the only one who can afford to call it a crap ferry. Has she really forgotten how her husband looked in 1986. In ill fitting long sleeved shirts under a kaunda suit, watch on the right hand and gum boots? He sure didn’t look presidential at all. Only those of us who were young and idealistic, some would say naive actually believed in him while the grown ups were busy fighting him! All that government by trial and error like batter trade? All the getting ripped off by petty businessmen from the streets of Mumbai and jumped up “nouveau riche” goatherds without due diligence. Even she herself was claimed to have been coached through university, with claims of her dissertation having been written by a “mu cuba”. Her getting a leg up in the family business through nepotism -isn’t that what the NRM used to call it when one in power employed all of his relatives in government? I hear Kaguta said she was the only one patriotic enough to want to go to Karamoja. Me I would be quite happy with the pajero nebigenderako considering I wouldn’t even have to live there! The problem with people who get to where they are because of family “know who” is they start to delude themselves that their positions are by virtue of their superior intelligence, acumen and leadership skills. So someone gets elevated from being a housewife to being a minster simply because she is married to a president and she suddenly can see who has and who does not have leadership skills?

Did you see those dishonourable ministers in parliament? I wonder what happened to Minister Kasaija? Such a nice man. When I watched him presenting that doctored video, I was reminded of another nice man presenting a doctored video full of lies to the UN security council, Gen Collin Powell. The poor man has since gone underground and can no longer hold his head up because he failed to resist orders from above and show leadership. This business of following orders from above is going to destroy a lot of good people. I notice you tried to spin things a different way and blame junior IT boys who doctored a video and briefed their bosses including the president falsely. But the problem with this autocratic behaviour is that people start to tell you what they think you want to hear -you know that old story about the emperor and his cloths! So you guys want to hear that Besigye is desperate because he received lots of money from abroad and has to account for it. And that he had hooligans camped in his home whom he brought out to terrorise the people. I even read the spy chief Tinyefunza repeating this! So much for security in this country! How can you depend on people who are delusional? Even President Museveni dismissed their assertions as crap! Do you guys really believe yourselves? How about all of those billions Museveni spent on getting re elected from the tax payers pocket? Is he going to account for it? At least whoever gave Besigye money knew that he could lose while Ugandans money was taken without their permission.

Now I have been following this debate of where you lie. Apparently people are not convinced you are really setting yourself up as the conscience of the NRM. They think that you are the SG’s daughter through and through and on assignment here. They cite a big corner office and a big car as evidence. I told you you were going to have to do a Buddha to attain true salvation. People cannot trust you when you have a big corner office and a big land cruiser. Jesus said it too -it is harder for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven than for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle. To my simple mind he actually said it was impossible! We know all of the people who have those things -the big cars and the big corner offices and military guards are not friends of Ugandans. They all belong to la famiglia. I cannot blame you anyway as in Uganda, all of the cake is owned and eaten by one family and their house staff -the butlers, the maids, the cleaners and the enforcers etc. I do wonder sometimes, if Bukenya is the butler, where do the others fall -I won’t mention any names.

I told you before, if you had ignored Uncle Besi and company, there would have been no chaos. Your people can assert all they like but the onus is upon them to prove that their prediction was right and until then Besigye and anyone else have the right to walk anywhere even if people are bound to follow them. I hear the other day Col. Muhoozi went into a nightclub. Now that is bound to cause some commotion but does it mean you are going to curtail his movements? Instead your people sent all of these rioting soldiers and policmen to ravage the towns and everyone in it. They committed economic sabotage. I wonder how much the government lost in taxes. Remember Lukyamuzi played hide and seek and got to his office without the world coming to an end, Otunnu walked to work with Afande Mutabazi’s help and nothing happened -except Afande Kayihura sacked him, then redeployed him! Now I hear afande Muntu walked to his office and even got saluted by a policeman and Kampala is still standing while Mafabi too walked without a permit and again nothing happened. You should get a discount on all of those idle anti people machines you equipped the police with. Kayihura should really be charged with trying to bring down the government. At the very least charges of causing dissaffection among the public, “bukyayi” as president Museveni calls it, should be preferred. Am sure there is ample evidence.

In the interests of time I will end my letter here. I will of course be awaiting your response. Please do not trust that Stephen chap.

Who exactly is in charge in Kampala?

Wednesday, May 11, 2011 at 12:14am

Dear Nina,

This is becoming a habit but one that is bringing great dividends. You would not believe how many people are reading our letters. I keep getting inboxes and online chats from perfect strangers excited by our letters. One of these days you too may respond and then I can guarantee there is going to be a lot of excitement.

I hear that you too have been getting attention of the negative kind with various characters purporting to belong to the NRM calling on your father and President Museveni to muzzle you. Mbu they even made a presentation at Rwakitura. Banange this village chief mentality. At this rate, you may even get canonised. There is no doubt that there panic in the city. The poor bush boys just don’t know what to do in the city. They are trained to look for kony’s saucepans and kaunda suits in fancy places like Garamba and CAR. Its a wonder they are not shooting each other. these days they have graduated to looking for Al Quaeda from under the hijabs of somali women. But someone forgot to tell them what to do with unarmed civilians who had lost their fear of death. It kind of reminds me of my childhood. You see we grew up hearing the sound of bullets everyday -all because of Museveni who couldn’t be happy with being a loser but had to cause caos just so that he could be president. Interestingly, he now finds it treasonous that anyone else could have the enfrontery to dream of doing what he himself did years ago.

Today I chose to brush up on my Frantz Fanon as I haven’t read him in a long time. In “Black skin, White Masks”, Frantz Fanon stated that, “Sometimes people hold a core belief that is very strong. When they are presented with evidence that works against that belief, the new evidence cannot be accepted. It would create a feeling that is extremely uncomfortable, called cognitive dissonance. And because it is so important to protect the core belief, they will rationalize, ignore and even deny anything that doesn’t fit in with the core belief.”

In many ways this reminds me of the confused NRM leaders and politicians. They are so confused right now they do not seem to know whether they are coming or going. For years, they have held the core belief that they are indispensable to Ugandans that they now cannot believe what is going on in the streets. No amount of intimidation appears to be making a difference. Helicopter gunsips, jet fighters, battle hardened mean looking soldiers armed to the teeth, lying ministers, incompetent policemen -nothing seems to scare Ugandans anymore these days.

In September 2009, one of Museveni’s very junior soldiers without any claim to royalty was annointed a king by Emperor Museveni. Immediately he was annointed, he started to grow wings as my late grandmother would say. According to him, the Kabaka of Buganda his overlord needed a visa to cross the line into his imaginary kingdom. Can you imagine the precendent? Should the Kabaka now demand visas from the Omukama’s of Bunyoro and Toro before they can come to Kampala? Should every chairman of a cultural institution now be declared a king regardless of whether they have a historical claim to royalty or not? How representative are cultural associations and how are these chairpersons elected? Should the clan heads of each clan in Buganda or Bunyoro each clan bigger than the whole fictitious kingdom of Kayunga now be declared kings? After all they are bona fide cultural leaders with pedigrees going back 800 years.

But I digress. I was talking about the point at which Museveni overcalled his hand and forever lost the power to cow Ugandans. Unless he is willing to use thiose guns, they really are just providing negative publicity. I now hear of 32 heads of state you previously boasted were coming to Kampala, only 7 are showing up, among those Uncle Bob and that guy from Djibouti whose people want to remove. I understand you are getting so desperate that you are asking Al Bashir to come to Kampala too. Obviously Uncle Gad will not be coming as he has a little problem with protestors whom he ordered shot dead and they refused to ide -or at least more seemed to come out of nowhere to replace them. You see for as long as no one was challenging Museveni except Kony, he could continue to pretend that he was a democrat. I did however warn you that should protestors go out into the street Tunisia style, that Museveni would respond like Ghadafi. And boy did he not? But contrary to the response he expected, people seem to be more and more fired up. Now he understands what our childhood was like. We used to call gunshots popcorn and virtually danced to them. People used to walk towards gunshots rather than away from them. Its because people lost their fear of death that he was able to get support for his war.

This of course brings me to those stupid little districtets that you guys have created? What exactly possessed you to pander to every whim and fanciful notion that every village should have a district? I know that in Uganda the state has all of the resources and the incumbent uses them to control support. is it any wonder that each time you extend your patronage to a new “district”, you add new seats to the NRM side of parliament? Is this not some sort of gerry mandering or could it be better called bribery? Today, I READ Afande Mugira’s response to accusations that the hammer man who broke Besigye’s car windows works with CMI and is former interahamwe. His response was quite frankly ashaming. Now I understand why Museveni does not trust or respect the security assessments of his security chiefs. Together with the interview with Tinyefunza on the same topic, one wonders who really is in charge of our security. I always thought that one had to be sharp to be put in charge of security but obviously not. Afande Mugira suggests that the hammer man was Besigye’s supporter trying to give him a hammer. Really, surrounded by a ring of five police cars, and numerous battle ready dogs of war armed to the teeth which suicidal idiot would break the cordon? And why would the police allow him to anyway? Worse still why would he break the windows of Besigye’s car in order to pass him a weapon, the hammer?

Is there some illegal stuff passed around in security circles because quite frankly the statements coming out of them are apalling. Commander Kale seems to have been muzzled as has his girfriend Nabakooba. That will not be enough though. He really needs to resign before he gets pushed. Even old man kivedinha was now shut up. Hopefully the new cabinet reshuffle will retire him for good. As for Kayihura, one wonders how he is going to redeem himself. Now I hear your boys are lined up ready to do battle with protesters at City Square and harvest meat for sumbusa to be served to the guest tomorrow. Actually am told they are already busy cracking heads. Who exactly gives the orders to your troops? One would be forgiven for thinking that the opposition are the ones giving the orders in order to ensure that the innauguration on Thursday is a shambles. You know this is going to come back to bite your collective bum, dont you? The police is under a microscope and you are going to cope plenty of flac whether you realise it or not. Human rights Watch has already done its own investigation and concluded that at least ten people killed in the recent protests need further investigation. A previous report by Human Rights Watch again found at least 13 innocent people were killed by your forces. Of course you and I know what happened at Kasubi when Museveni ill advisably arrogantly walked into a beehive causing the deaths of 3 people. Interestingly despite abundant photo evidence, the governments security forces denied having shot those people. In an insult to the intelligence of all Ugandans, they brazenly suggested that the shooter was a member of the public and not their men. The commander that day was none other than Commander Muhoozi. You do know that the buck stops with the commander? I can predict that these deaths are not going to go away. The deaths of innocents will never go unpunished. Besigye returns to Kampala via Entebbe tomorrow. Its going to be interesting watching your security forces stuff their feet into their mouths.

In 1980, people gathered along entebbe road to welcome back Prof Lule who had been rumoured to be returning that day. Instead of Lule, the minister for Defence drove through the crowds who were unhappy to see him. His guards shot in the air. Two people died that day. That Minsiter for Defence was Yoweri Museveni.

You know, the more things change, the more things remain the same. There is money to be eaten on Thursday. Did you too get a contract? IT, catering maybe? It is rumoured that those who are close to the kitty reward themselves with contracts that quite frankly are no better than air. A few years ago as a student, I came across this mafia at a conference organised throught the presidents office. I was appointed to the French desk because I do speak kifaransa. A few girls appointed tot he French desk too, did not speak a word of the language. I soon found out that they were all related to the lady who run everything. At the end of the day, I also found out that they were being paid more than me who actually spoke French. The guy who had the contract for IT services also provided registration services for several thousand delegates. His sole employee was his wife. He was the son of an NRM bigwig. His service was so slow it wasn’t funny … I know as I was the one coping the flack from delegates. I know that little has changed since. the transcipts of GAVI and CHOGM tell the story quite clearly.

I am sure if you did not get a contract to supply sumbusa to the delagates, you must be the only one. I wonder whether the taxpayer gets a refund on all of that money budgeted for 32 heads of state if only 7 turn up. I do know however that i for one will not be holding my breath.

A golden oldie; do you guys have any analysts?

Wednesday, May 11, 2011 at 7:29pm

Dear Nina,

A friend reminded me of this letter I sent to you after the elections. In it I predicted the exact scenario that would lead to protests in kampala. At the time you returned it to me return to sender.

At the time I said, quote;

“The question has been asked as to whether Uganda is ripe for the Jasmine revolution. I personally don’t believe it is yet but I have no doubt that it will be! Uganda has all of the hallmarks but at the moment does not have equipoise! These elections are unlikely to be the trigger! https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150092832897681 .

Something else say Somalia spilling over into Uganda, another attack on the Kabaka or Omukama, A MISJUDGED HEAVY HANDED TREATMENT OF A PEACEFUL DEMONSTRATION or just about anything could trigger one. Certainly Otunnu cannot trigger one even though am sure he would love to! Only Museveni can prevent a Jasmine revolution by learning from Egypt and Tunisia and pre emptying it by making clear and activating his retirement plan!”

http://www.facebook.com/notes/drew-ddembe/2011-elections-quick-thoughts/10150101608607681?notif_t=note_comment

Do you guys really have any analysts? Because as it is I seem to be doing better than all of your overpaid hacks.

You know that I do really have a soft spot for you. So I really hate to tell you I told you so. Butas usual you and your government always ignore good advice.

While I am saying i told you so, I will remind you that I predicted riots once Kayihura announced his strategy for combatting those who sought to walk to work -and like robots programmed to fail, the NRM machinery proceeded to self destruct.

http://www.facebook.com/notes/drew-ddembe/igps-press-conference-kayihura-needs-a-refresher-course-on-crowd-psychology-and-/10150150846997681

A victory all up in a puff of smoke.

Friday, May 13, 2011 at 12:29am

Dear Nina,

Am sure you have now left Kololo where our money has just been spent feeding tyrants like Mugabe. I know I shouldn’t be reminding you but i just cannot help telling you that i told you so. This is a pyrrhic victory. All of Museveni’s joy at winning just went up in a puff of smoke just like the billions spent at Kololo today.

I remember you and your aunt Alice assuring all and sundry that you yellow girls would rub the noses of everyone in it on this day. That all of Museveni’s critics would slink off into the sunset and that you would have the party of all parties.

Today, I actually pitied you. Most of all I pitied poor Museveni. How can you be robbed of victory in your moment of triumph. When you are powerful, have mean soldiers, have all sorts of hardware designed to cause pain and humiliation. Yet its you who ends up getting humiliated.

You are a lady so am sure you understand the feeling of a girl who gets humiliated by her fiancees ex turning up to her wedding better dressed than the bride. The enfrontery. The rudeness. The arrogance. Many a bride has jumped across the high table and tackled the offending female. Am sure that today, Museveni felt like starngling someone.But you know the monsters one creates do rise up to bite you. I did warn you that Besigye who was destined for his farm to rear ducks and goats has now been given a big shot of political viagra ironically by President Museveni himself. Thats what you get for putting a boy in charge. You do know that he sent his boy to take care of things but all just backfired. If you are going to assassinate a man do it properly -so dont send a boy who has never made his rocks to kill a man who has been to hell and back. Ugandans have been to hell and back and now they see you taking them back to hell in a basket.

The NRM and Museveni have this simplistic notion that they are the annointed keepers of the constitution. They seem to forget that no one has got a monopoly on protecting the constitution and Museveni will not be the last man to claim that he went to the bush to do so. Of course as we now know that claim hides lots of self seekers whose only goal is power for the sake of power itself. You recognise them from their inability to understand that true powr lies in being able to let it go … that a man or woman who is unable to give up power voluntarily is a slave and not the master of power.

I really wonder how long it will take those soldiers now whipping people expressing their right to fete and celebrate whoever they want, that they are being used. Used by the very same people to blame for their unfortunate circumstances. Isnt it surprising that the people protesting can actually afford the necessities of life much better than the average soldier. Could you ever contemplate living in a mama ingia pole with all of your brood? And am not talking the two and a half children. The poor who include police officers and army men have lots of children many times from lots of women. Its not unknown for two women to share one man in one mama ingia pole. I dont want to inagine the kind of sexual education their children get … unless of course their mothers choose to bite their tongues. But you do know nature .. these things sometimes overwhelm one.

Besigye is rejuvenated. Who could say what a few beatings and broken bones could do to a mans fortunes. even Mao has obtained a few kudos points as a result of getting arrested while poor Otunnu is now trying to stand up there with the big boy. He too has a headache apparently from that dye your boys were dishing out. If they can avoid tripping over their ego’s this is going to be one hell of a rocky five years for the son of Kaguta -if he last the course. There will be no shortage of politicians offering themselves to be beaten up and arrested. Unfortunately like trained Pavlovian dogs, Kayihura’s boys and Muhoozi’s boys will have little trouble granting them their wish. I must admit if I were Kaguta I would relieve those two of their duties as their activities in the last three weeks have brought him a lot of “bukyayi”. They are virtually sabotaging him.

You know bizibu come in doubles. President Museveni had to lose face in front of his invited tyrants. He showed then that he was not in charge of his household. I wonder what comrade Mugabe was thinking on the way back when stones were raining on his convoy. I understand he was so bored at Kololo he slept trough it all or was it just his age. You know at that age, the flight from Harare is no mean feat. even more worrying is the virus he inadvertently took back to Harare with him. Ugandans have been displaying to the Zimbabweas who were always doppy anyway how to do it. I have never seen people as sleepy. Even Zim robbers are polite. Not like Ugandan ones. Can you imagine Zim security men turn up to the scene of a crime with batons. Which self respecting Ugandan robber would be armed wth anything less than an AK47. Trust me if Uncle robert does not do himself a favour and have a coronary, his people are going to be picking up some cues from Kampala. As for the man in Djibouti ..talk about dead men walking. I hope your boys are not going to accuse me of sedition. You know that stupid law got struck off our legal statutes.

Am still interested in knowing if the taxpayer will get a refund on their money for that pathetic display at Kololo as less than a thrid of the invited guest actually turned up. You refused to tell me if you got yourself a little contract with good njawulo. Am not allergic to a woman of means you know. Who cares where the money comes from. As for those with nugu, wama where were they when you guys were fighting and they were hiding under the bed.

Unfortunately Ugandans have refused to hide under the bed any longer and leave the show to the guys with guns alone. The sight of those people defying your military goons and thieving police to escort Besigye back home while eclipsing what was supposed to be the biggest party in the land kind of gives one a taste of things to come. Life is not going to be easy and a wise one would start finessing their exit strategy.

Now the second part of the circus is about to begin with the blackmail, intrigue and greed. Am talking about sharing the national cake aka appointing a cabinet. I hear Old man Kaguta in addition to handing over to himself for the umpteenth time wanted to sneak in all of the old codgers without allowing them to sweat before the appointments committee in parliament. I can only imagine the bitchiness and blackmail going on behind close doors. Is daddy dear going to survive? Plus a few more useless ministries were created like that for Kampala, Bunyoro etc to add to that of Ethics and Karamoja. Why cant all of these just be departments in the same ministry if there really is any need to grant them a special status. Of course we know that one for Bunyoro was designed to distract them while their oil is carted away to enrich everybody else but Banyoro.

Poor foreign journalists were confused today. They didnt know whether to go to Entebbe or to attend the boring ceremony at Kololo. The poor local stations were barred from showing anything but the kololo events. But the world has changed. SMS, twitter and FB gave upto date minute by minute accounts together with photo and video footage. The old heads in cabinet don’t quite get it. this thing has got a life of its own. Its a medusa. If you cut one head off, it will sprout another five.

As the French would say, a tout a l’heur

We need term limits back

Saturday, May 14, 2011 at 8:22pm

Dear Nina,

I can see that you remain loyal to daddy and his master Museveni and hope that you can prempt their inevitable demise. I must say that you are on to a losing battle. The NRM has for long perfected the art of corrupting dissenters. they didnt always beat them up like they did Uncle Besi owamaaso. The bought them, gave them commissions of inquiry whose results would never be published, sent them overseas on scholarship or posted them to obscure embassies. if you doubt me wait for the cabinet list next week. As you know it is silly season with every politician begging and blackmailing to get onto that list. If you really seek change in the NRM, and are not wobbly, you are going to have to sing from outside. i told you Buddha only got real enlightenment when he left the palace and walked among real people in the city streets.

Its true that many of us from the Museveni generation had great hope in the NRM. You will be surprised to know that most of those on the internet speaking out against Museveni are his children born or brought up in the NRM be it in Kampala or Gulu. Those who saw violence under his watch in the north may express their rage but it is the same rage that abused children express towards an abusive father while those who were supposed to just be happy because daddy is in charge are not happy because they are now adults and can see that daddy was never perfect even if he may have appeared to be so when they were children. That he is slipping, he has lost his touch and is getting senile.

I formed the opinion a long time ago that it was impossible to change the NRM from within. As an organisation it took on a life of its own. Paranoid. Rejecting anything that did not fit the official narrative. The body whose only role is to serve its head Museveni.

No one has expressed a clear disagreement with the NRM and stayed. And those who have stayed have become choir members. The body is there only to feed the head. If any part of the body takes on a life of its own, like a cancer it is rejected and cut out and thrown away. The only thing that protects Nina is who she is. even then there are petitions.

Until I see a clear challenge within the NRM for the party presidency not the orchestration that we have become accustomed to, I do not see any evidence that the NRM is independent of Museveni. Museveni is the NRM and the NRM is Museveni. In its current form without internal reform, it will die once he dies and in desperation they will have to seek another of his blood in an attempt at keeping it alive.

We have been bashing the opposition but the reality is that the weaknesses within the opposition can themselves be blamed on Museveni and the NRM. On principle I believe that for the country to be governed with accountability, we have got to have a strong opposition.

Museveni cannot claim to believe in democracy when he treats his opposition like dirt. When he allows the lowliest of his minions to bash and humiliate senior members of the opposition just days before his innauguration yet claims they were invited, does he really expect them to attend?

Museveni is a true herdsman. In a kraal there can only be one alpha male. But that form of government is a monarchy. In a democracy there are other power centres. Parliament. The judiciary. The speaker. The chief justice. Civil society. Each independent of the other, all working together towards a common goal.

It is the role of the opposition to critque the government and its policies. To question them. To demand accountability. Museveni constrains that role. He has come to believe that to question him is kamanyiro. Its to cause dissent and riots. He believes in controlling the flow of information. All news is supposed to be president Museveni yagambye. That is so old hat. even when children grow up while they may respect their parents as they should, they no longer believe that their parents are the fountain of all wisdom.

There is little evidence of the much touted collective responsibility of the NRM apart from show for the cameras. What Museveni wants, Museveni gets. And no one will stand in his way.

When term limits were removed, that was the biggest mistake Ugandans made. When idots like Kakooza are allowed to even suggest that term durations will now be tampered with to prolong term limits from five to seven or even ten years, one sees the hand of Museveni. For in 25 years there has been no evidence at all that Museveni wishes to relinquish power. I am very sure that short of pressure on Museveni, come 2016, Ugandans will be going through the same problem of one old man who believes that the country is forever beholden to him and his band of 27 trouble causers.For this alone Besigye deserves to be declared a national hero but I will not hold my breath. In a way his brutal treatment has served to temporarily gloss over the big problems with our opposition that i will not go into today. But if they can avoid tripping over their ego’s its possible that we could finally have an opposition worthy of the name. Museveni has no intention of giving power to ugandans so it will have to be taken from him, just like it was this week.

NRM members with a conscience owe it to Ugandans to reinstate term limits. It should be the first duty of the 9th parliament to discuss imposing term limits and if necessary going to a referendum. We cannot rely on an unprincipled parliament such as the one that passed the Kabaka muzzling bill or accepted 20 million shillings with unclear TOR’s to make this decision for Ugandans.

It is no coincidence that in South Africa Nelson Mandela set the pace by stepping down after his first term. With his history, and the ANC dominance of South African politics, he could have easily have stayed on till he was completely senile.

In America George Washington set the tenor by refusing to stand for a thrid term. He even had to be persuaded to stand for a second. The confederate states set their term limits at 6 years. President Roosevelt served for 4 terms dying shortly after his election for a 4th term. This led to an amendment formalising the term limits to two terms.

Museveni and the NRM were given virtual carte blanche in Uganda. The constitution making exercise restored confidence in government. Until Museveni and his colleagues raped Ugandans of their rights by amending a limit imposed by the whole country by horse trading among themselves for a mere 2000 coins of silver.

The events of the last few weeks demonstrate more the weakness of Museveni and his government than the strength of the opposition. It also demonstrates the strength and resilience of Ugandans. The willingness of Besigye to be a lightning rod for Museveni’s anger at being defied and humiliated despite his military strength and monopoly on instruments of pain and death has brought Ugandans together.

It has for so long been believed that power in Uganda lies in the gun. Despite evidence to the contrary in the many displays of the traditional leaders like Kabaka Mutebi whose ability to command a crowd is unrivalled, or the child king of Toro who had adults trecking miles to bow obeissance to a baby in nappies or those who go to the Omukama of Bunyoro’s palace. This power coalesced unbid into the so called Buganda riots when at the command of President Museveni his troops rioted killing 30 people and injuring scores more. Further defiance at Kasubi caused the further death of 3 people but even then, Baganda defied him to stage a day of mourning that ground budiness down to halt declaring an unofficial public holiday. All of these are the events that have led to where we are now. from here on Museveni will have to force his will by shooting people. And shooting people will bring him closer and closer to the ignominous end of his predecessors and he will forever be a hunted man.

The only recourse is to hand power back to the people. this is the only exit plan that makes sense. Museveni may try to go back to his old tricks of buying out enemies. He will offer minsitries to members of the opposition. Maleable people who are for sale to the highest bidder like Nasser. But this will only result in a bloated innefficient government that will be a further burden on Ugandan taxpayers.

Ugandans are already fed up with the wastage of their money on fools errands they were not consulted upon. Granted security is important but so is health. Baganda say that he who does not have teeth does not buy boned meat. Why did we have to buy fighter jets with capabilities that make them expensive toys? Capabilities we are not likely to need in the near future unless we anticipate going to war and getting anihilated by South Africa or Egypt?

Do we need a man who has made his lifes work war since his students days in the 60′s to continue send our children into senseless wars we do not believe in nor benefit from? the attempt to link the purchase of fighter jets to oil is even more alarming. Is this how our oil money is going to be managed? By spending it on modern baubles and glass beads before we even get any oil out of the ground let alone sell it?

The NRM has got to stand up and be counted. Those who joined the NRM because they wanted Uganda to be a better place need to show their hands. Those within the NRM have got to show their dissent. The debate on museveni’s future is a national issue that will determine whether hand over of power to a future leader will be peaceful or will involve war. This is not something to be left to Museveni alone for he has shown himself incapable of being objective in his quest for power. Hiding behind collective responsibility will not hide the fact that thosein the NRM are cowards who have sold our country. They have got to understand that we are on the brink of war and their actions will bring it upon us.

The events of the next few weeks will be interesting. People will continue to walk to work without permits. The best way of dealing with the problem ironically is to let them walk. To call the dogs of war back to the barracks. To recall the IGP back to the barracks and send him off to some obscure staff college where hopefully they teach about crowd psychology and crowd control as well as community policing. That is of course if he really fancies himself a policeman. And please do not send him to Somalia as that will only attract more bombs to Kampala if he deals with somali dissent the same way he deals with Ugandan protestors.

Since you insist on staying inside the kintu, convey the message to the eaters within that people want term limits back and will judge them if they cannot stand up to Museveni.

Why Museveni needs to retire, the NRM needs to die to grow stronger and Besigye, Mao and Otunnu need to talk.

Sunday, May 15, 2011 at 8:34pm

Dear Nina,

Today I chose to write to you a letter that may bring you some comfort to you -not much compfort I must say because it still calls for the ouster of the NRM from power. It was written in response to a submission by one of your NRM chaps to my letter to you on the need to bring term limits back. I suspect he thought he was coming to your aid given you still havent reaponded to my letters.Kanhertum, I thank you for your submission.

I find it interesting that you read from the same script as many other NRM supporters and operatives who assume that to suggest that Museveni should go is necessarily to support the FDC or to wish for your demise amid chaos.

Paradoxically while I would love to see Museveni go and pray for that everyday -am sure thats not treason, I do not wish to see chaos. And neither do i wish to see you killed or molested or exiled because you are an NRM supporter.

I think that the NRM needs to go. Its bloated, its corrupt, and it has lost sight of whatever ideals it ever professed to have. Its main strength right now is that it controls the countries resources and can utilise them to fund its continuing stranglehold on state power. Essentially it has got enough funds to bribe everybody including those within and without the movement.In addition the independence of the army is questionable as is the continuing involvement of soldiers in parliament. The militarisation of the police has been a disaster and Museveni is out of control. Soon it is going to be annouced that the firt order of business of the 9th parliament will be to pass an unconstitutional law making several political offences non bailable. If ever there was any doubt that Museveni has lost it, this is it.

I do not believe in single party politics. Effectively a strong ruling party and a weak opposition party equals bad government for the opposition unable to perform its role of providing an alternate government is worthless. am all for a powerful duopoly with a strong opposition ready to step in if the ruling party messes up or sleeps at the wheel.Many of these small single issue me too parties such as that one of Bwanika and Betty Kamya really need to die and be absorbed into stronger parties. UPC and DP as we know it are both dying and have been for a long time and its time to bury them and their mebers be co opted into anew party.

Do I think that the opposition has got its problems? Yes. But most of those problems can be attributed to the NRM and Museveni while others are organisational and internal. Museveni has in many ways been a cannibal who has cannibalised everything in order to empower himself and undermine all institutions in Uganda. Some are related to the big egos of the principles in the main 3 parties. The recent elections have already provided enough figures for the pecking order in the opposition. Alone, each one of them is weak. together as just demonstrated in the recent W2W protests, all of them are strong. there is no doubt that at present Besigye is in the lead but there is no way that he is going to do this without the others.

I do not like marriages of convenience. Its for that reason that i do not like the idea of coalitions of the NRM and the opposition. Such a government would be hoodwinking the general public and result in a large expensive government with little dividends except temporary peace.

What is needed is a mature process like the one that formed UPC in the late 50′s. A coming together of different political parties and factions into one powerful and cohesive party. And here am not talking about coalitions and marriages of convenience. Am talking about dissolution of existing parties. The only thing standing in the way of this is the ego’s of various individuals in Uganda’s opposition. unfortunately the three leaders all happen to have big egos, Mao to a lesser extent than the other two. Besigye has demonstrated himself to be still relevant to the struggle so he cannot be simply and easily pushed aside while Otunnu has shown himself to be a lot less useful than had been anticipated given his impressive CV but this does not mean that he is useless. i will mention Kamya who unfortunately chose to distance herself from the W2W protests. She demonstrated herself to have powerful organisational abilities in the Reform Agenda but her abilities got lost in the horse trading when FDC was formed. Quite frankly apart from th e muslim vote i personally believe she was a much better asset to Besigye than was the late Kiggundu who was tainted by the Greenland scandal. it would be prudent to consider ways of bringing her back.

This unfortunately means that the current formula of regional balancing taking a back seat to merit needs to be reassessed. That is the root of corruption. The horse trading that the NRM does and the blackmain is what has lead to the balooning of government and subnational administrative units. We need to bring back merit politics. Ugandans have been si distanced from government except during elections that the only way we have confidence that some gravy may fall our way is if we have a son of the soil from our very own village in government. So each village wants its own ministry and its own district.

Besigye is in his thrid term of office. He is not eligible to stand again as party president. As a matter of fact one could say that having stood three times he should go away and get a microfinance loan and rear ducks and goats like the rest of us. Fortunately or unfortunately, Museveni just delivered him a massive shot of political viagra. He has invested blood and pain into showing Ugandans that museveni can be defied. He has contributed to demystifying the gun. All those tough soldiers that Museveni put out on the street may hold instruments of death and pain, but they are powerless in the face of a population that has lost their fear. this is true people power. So far the temptation to take up arms and fight it out has been avoided which is good but one wonders for how much longer.

The NRM is in need of serious reform if it wishes to remain relevant to the future of Uganda. It is too bloated. Too corrupt. Too accomodative of mediocrity. Too behoden to one man and his family. in its current form it is not likely to survive beyond Museveni. Furthermore should it lose power, it is likely to end up in oblivion almost like the UPC.

That too is not good for Uganda. If Besigye ever comes into power, the very problems that bedevil the NRM and Museveni and contribute to their prolonged incubence will be the very same problems he will face. As a matter of fact it should not be left upto Besigye or any other politician to decide how long he can rule. Museveni has just put an end to the experiment and flirtation with unlimited terms and proven that he was right when he said that the problem of Africa was rulers who did not want to live power. Besigye too will need term limits to control him. He may wish to stand down after his term but why should we leave it to him to decide? He is only a man and men are weak.

The point here is that we need structures that are independent of the predidency and the executive. Parties too need structures by which they can control their heads just like the ANC was able to ask Mbeki to step down. The NRM has no such structure by which to hold Museveni accountable. they effectively all become lackeys working to his whim and benefit. Thats a recipe for impunity and is a bad combination when comined with a huge ego. Besigye’s ego is an asset to the opposition now but it will be a liability when he is president. Ditto Otunnu’s ego which is even bigger than Besigye’s. So they all need to be in a party that has independent structures that have the power to limit their powers and censor them when they are out of line. So term limits are required as are an independent judiciary, legislature etc. Term durations shouldnt be tinkered with either. the electoral commisssion needs to be independent and accountable. and the opposition needs to be institutionalised and strong too. thats the only way we can have stable politics.

I know that the west likes to deal with strongmen so they dont have to go through the red tape of having to deal with a country that has laws. But the interests of the west are not necessarily our interests and they will need to adjust and accept that too.If out children are going to die in Somalia, we would like to be consulted and discuss it in parliament because Uganda is not at war with somalia so the president does not have to exercise emergency powers. If we are going to buy futuristic jets, the defence comittees should be briefed by suitably qualified experts given the commitment of the countrs resources and defences. This was not an emergency purchase that required a supplementary budget. Oil contracts should be transparent as should any waivers of capital gains tax such as Tullow and Herdsman sought to steal from the Ugandan taxpayer. We should have no obligation to honour the contracts of companies that believe that there only responsibility is to their foreign shareholders when its our resources they are exploiting. If they do not have corporate responsibility and ethics they should not be doing business in uganda.

In summary, Museveni and the NRM need an exit plan for they are in trouble. The opposition needs to take this opportunity to create a powerful new entity that is organised from the grassroots to the national level and offers more than simplistic rhetoric or capitalises on agende. To begin with they should have polciy and position statements from suitably qualified experts using verifiable figures on Museveni’s recent promouncements on the solutions to fuel and food prices. The budget is coming up so this year i expect to hear a well reasoned response to the governments budget again using verifable figures. A position statement on our air defence capabilities and needs and critique of the governments recent purchase of fighter jets is overdue as is a well reasoned our foreign affaors obligations including our involvement in Somalia as well as our relationships with Rwanda, Congo, Sudan and the East African union. A policy and startegy statement on corruption and their alternate plans for manageing it once in power is long overdue too. There is no advantage to Ugandans of having Besigye in power without an opposition or a week opposition. Destroying the NRM completely is therefore not in the best interests of Ugandans. Public confidence in the police and judiciary will need to be reinstated.

A Besigye, Mao or Otunnu with absolute power and a weak opposition will too become a dictator. So we need to work on the institutions to control the power of the presidency now both within the parties as well as within government.P.S I wouldn’t worry too much about Besigye having served three terms if I were you. He is serving his third term as party president but the FDC constitution does not actually bar him from being elected their presidential candidate again. Having done him a favour and resurrected his political career, you only have yourselves to blame.

Banange whats with the panic?

Tuesday, May 17, 2011 at 12:31am

Dear Nina,

I know its that time of the year and all of you guys in the eating circles are jostling each other for a place at the eating table. Its silly season you know. All roads lead to Rwakitura. I hear President Museveni acknowledged your contribution to his success. Does that mean that a large piece of meat is likely to fall your way? Should I sharpen my knife and get ready to eat things? I am sure the usual suspects are busy selling their mothers for a piece of the pie. And this time the pie is bigger too as am told they added some extra slices.

To begin with the Banyoro were offered their very own piece of the pie marked and stamped Bunyoro not t be shared with any non munyoro. This one is ring fenced that oxymoron cined by Museveni to disguise naked tribalism. Its amazing how a government that came into power on antisectarian credentials and even created a few laws against it has so polarized our society that tribalism is worse than when they came in. And they have formalised it by balkanising every dstrict into small non finacially viable districtlets divided along ethnic lines. Do you remember that proposal for ring fencing MP positions in Bunyoro? I wouldn’t want to suggest that our president was smoking something so I will instead sugget that his advisors need to be breathalysed and also have toxicology screens for illegal substances. How in hell did they dream that one up? Monday has come upon us and true to form, Museveni’s army and police are providing comic relef. They really need to screen the IQ’s of their police recruits before inflicting them upon the unsuspecting public. I did expect a circus but this beats buffonery. Mbu they towed Besigye’s car without bothering to check the occupants and then realised it was Winnie on arriving at the station. Now one wonders why they towed the car. Is it because afande Tinyefunza suggested that thats what he would have done at Mulago? And the daft idiots took that as an order and the template for any future interactions with Besigye -attach and tow to the police station! Banange! My grandmother, bless her soul, would have said “embuzi zino” and I guarantee that would have been an insult to goats!

So whats up with that? Is Besigye now under house arrest? I can really understand why your guys pee in their pants the moment the guy steps outside his gate. Did you watch that display on Entebbe road when he humiliated and embarrassed poor YKM on the day of his own innauguration? If that was a wedding and YKM was the mugole, he would have banned Besigye from even so much as looking in his direction. Had it been me I too would have put him under house arrest. How could the man defeat the whole Museveni with battle hardened troops, nasty pain causing and death dealing hardware all the time with only one arm and no guns! Kale that is kamanyiro. and the man had only one hand the other bandaged up thanks to Museveni’s goons. But on the other hand, sevres Kaguta right. One would have thought he would have got it by now and called off the dogs.

One would have thought that your people were intelligent enough to realise that if you do the same thing again and again and always get the same result, you should not expect a different result the next time. I would have thought that if they were really bright, they would have got it by now. They are either going to have to go hammer and tongs and declare a state of emergency and panda gari or go back to the barracks. Their presence on the streets inflames the situation. The attitude of soldiers to conflict and offence is to give no quarter regrdless of the casualties the more the better. This is a perfect recruiting tool for the opposition as well as any armed insurgence that would be the inevitable result of continuing harrassment. Those youths who were ready and willing to receive kiboko last Thursday on Entebbe road would given a good reason and radicalised enough be willing to rise an army. But why am I telling you this? Didnt the NRM ride on exactly the same discontent to fight their own war?

You know I previously asked you who was in charge of Kampala? I think I should have asked who exactly is in charge of your government! Blunder after blunder, mistake after mistake. Poor understanding of communication and new social networking tools. Poor understanding of the law. Now I hear you have lost it and are going to pass a bill removing the right to bail and effectively the right to the presumption of innocence. You do realise that these are political crimes dont you? Anyone remember detention without trial? Am pretty sure Museveni said it was a bad law and one of the reasons he fought Obotes bad government. Of all the important things that parliament needs to do, you guys think this is the most important? It appears to me like you guys are on aslippery slope to nowhere. Howare you going to combat the inevitable comparisons with Amin and his economic crimes?Talking of symbolism, whats with the choice of the colour pink for the anti walkers cannons? Couldnt your fancy overpaid media and PR people tell you that that would immediately attract the gay lobby? Now you have them all over your backs. I even read one story that says that the protests were progay and the government deliberately chose that colour. Kale bano abazungu bamanyira. They were not even interested in the number of Ugandans killed by this regime.That however will not last very long. I can see moves to documents those killed in the 2009 protests and the 2010 Kasubi killings and now the many killings and the effect of rioting soldiers. These same goons were brought recently and te body count is mounting. This time each of those dead people is going to be documented. And those documents will not go away and will be added to everytime someone dies. I would really watch my step if I were your guys.

Now am not one to track in rumours but am starting to wonder whether there maybe some fire to the smoke that is buzzing around about afande Saleh. Mbu he is no longer with us. What exactly is going on there? At this rate he is going to have to show himself just to dispel the rumours.How could I go without mentioning that venerable old man Nagenda. I grew up reading newspapers. Each time my father came home I greeted him -not for the sake of greeting him but to get the paper pff him. Monitor, Topic, New Vision etc. I grew up reading Nagenda. I loved the way he used prose and played with words …until he became just another paid hack in his dottage. Granted he occasionally gets some brif flashes of consceince and writes sense but most of the time these days and for the last few years, he writes nauseating sycophantic crap and senile drivel when he is not using the column to fight his personal vendettas with everyone -Wildlife Board, Hospice Ugandan Board, talking up BAT stock, etc! Such sycophantic crap was his last piece in the New Vison. I hope he is well paid he makes me wonder what the price for a soul is for surely his couldnt cost too much.

Now I need to stop laughing and go do a rel job. Naye you people you need to stop offering comic relief.

If the Museveni of 1986 met the Museveni of 2011, he would have him shot on sight.

Wednesday, May 18, 2011 at 9:57pm

Dear Nina,

Its becoming apparent that your family do not like me writing to you. They are getting in the way of our blossoming love for which I have had to put up a spirited defence as you can see below.

Patrick, I believe we have already discussed Ssuubi. You have distracted me from writing to your sister in law Nina today. Am sure Nina will be happy for the reprieve.

Am not quite sure what your obsession with Ssuubi is as you keep bringing it up. I see no evidence that it is a national player nor has pretensions at being so. As far as am concerned it is just a lobbying group. Lobbying groups are acceptable ways of applying political pressure to achieve the goals of single interest groups and minorities. Museveni’s government pys lobbyists in Washington for that purpose. As such Ssuubi can deal with any political group that is willing to offer a quid pro quo.

I have not seen its presence in these W2W protests and neither have I seen any recent prominent headlines or comments attributed to it.

The fact that you keep trying to associate my stance with Ssuubi is interesting as the only link between Ssuubi and me is the fact that they are Baganda. I have never read their manifesto nor really followed their activities. And during the time that you knew me, I never even attended any Ganda activities including Nkoba zambogo.

But your obsession with them does tell me more about you. It suggests to me that you may have changed and no more be the Patrick that I knew and grew up with. That you are now wont to view everything with tribal lenses and are even willing to overlook the fact that in well over 1000 notes that I have written on FB, none deals with or mentions Ssuubi and that I only discussed it when you kept repeatedly bringing it up. In many ways it detracts from whatever point you may have been trying to make.

I have several times in my posts credited Museveni with being ahead of his opposition and chided the opposition for underestimating him. However this time things are different. All evidence suggests that Museveni has underestimated the current of dissatisfaction with his leadership. He has become predictable, even petulant. Say his recent pronouncements, lecturing foreign diplomats, declaring foreign journalists enemies, bashing up his opponents in front of cameras, bribing his rented parliament to pass laws against anyone and everyone who pisses him off etc.

The more things change, the more things remain the same. As one Frenchman said, “les vainqueurs prennent les vices des vaincus”! Museveni is day by day taking on the vices of those he opposed and fought. Quite frankly if the Museveni of 1986 met the Museveni of 2011, he would have him shot on sight. Shot because the Museveni of today isa traitor to the revolution that he purportedly ushered in.

The words “fundamental change” mean nothing today. When Museveni came into power, he suggested that driving a pregnant lady on Obotes Kampala roads could cause a miscarriage. But looking at Kampala today, its no wonder the miscarriage rate is so high. Mosquitoes should go on strike against him for they are blamed for nothing for all of those miscarriages they did not cause. He also stated that he disagreed with obote on his handling of Kasubi. “there is no need to kill people because they disagree with the government”, he declared! Today he is killing people for the same crime -disagreeing with him. Things like Grace ibingira’s “detention without trial” were declared by him as signs of a bad government. Today we have him trying to remove the presumption of innocence and the right to bail. He has previously attacked these same principles including the right to habeas corpus through his safe houses, the misuses of JATT forces to attack the high court house, as well as the misuse of the military court tribunal in order to bypass the traditional court system which does not play by his rules. In an address to African leaders during his innaugural address to that now defunct body, he dclared that the problem of Africa were leaders who overstayed in power (beyond 10 years). He presided over the country during a constitution making exercise that imposed a two term limit yet despite him sneakily resetting the clock and later when it suited him again bribing a heavily biased parliement into lifting terms. Now we talk about a third term whereas he has already served the equivalent of five terms and is now serving the sixth for which he just got sworn in.

Museveni has proven time and time again that he cannot let go of power. Interestingly a mans weakness tells one a lot about that man. In examining power we come to learn who or what Museveni is. A man enslaved by power, blinded by it to the point of failing to see that what is happening in Kampala now is a repeat of what has happened elsewhwre on the continent from Egypt to Libya. He fails to see that this is one battle he is not going to win. This is a problem of when …! He has a choice of either managing his own retirement while he can still manage that or waiting for those angry kids on the street to come and drag him out of a bunker.

Uganda has a large population of young unemployed youth dissatisfied with the status quo. They are unimpressed with development in which they do not share. while you Patrick and your children are enjoying the “progress” in this country, there are many who do not see their lot changing in the next few generations. Unemployment is virtually unrecordable and unmeasurable by any standardised means. even those who may report themselves as employed are really in disguised unemployment for surely the 20 or more tax touts at Wandegeya taxi stop couldn’t possibly be employed. Nor the 40 boda bodas at each stage. We wont even talk about the hundredes of thousands of graduates walking the street looking for an opening.

Many years ago I was a private student at Makerere. I will not bother you with the details but one day I talked to the late Dr Kisekka who was the then prime minister about how much university fees were. They have actually since come down significantly even though many Ugandans believe they have gone up -I was probably the first Ugandan private student and played a role in getting the senate and government to approve the scheme. Dr Kisekka told me about his younger days as a student and how he worked in a coffee factory to get his school fees. He suggested that i too should work in a cofee factory for wages to pay my fees. Of course the guy was so out of touch he couldnt even understand that what he proposed was impractical and completely unrealistic. But Ugandan politicians are so out of touch with the people they lead, they seem to believe that we view every word that drops of their lips as wisdom.

In many ways he reminds me of you guys who are so deep in the kintu that your repsonse to ordinary Ugandans plight is to ask them to eat cake aka Marie Antoinette! But we all know what happened to Marie Antoinette. But trust me, I would never wish what happened to Marie Antoinette on you or your family and thats why am willing to be the voice of warniing -you guys are sitting on a time bomb. And its ticking … tick, tock! And one day it will go kaboom and you will be wondering why no one wrned you! Anyway I went on and did my thing -without Kisekka.

A few years later, I sat in an office with a big Health ministry official in his classy well cut suits and perfect boots (I still remember his dress for I have an eye for nice cloths especially nice expensive boots), as he ordered the minstry accountant to locate money from any account including project accounts as his children had to go back to university in India. Ironically, he was in Mulago that day because internes were on strike for their backpay and an increase on their salary of under 200,000. He arrogantly told me that Uganda had more than enough doctors and did not need the interns whom he proceeded to evict from the hospital. Recruitment of doctors was subsequently frozen for 3 years. Clearly this person despite his position had no idea what he was doing. He hadn’t the slightest clue about the manpower requirements of his minstry yet he has since even been seconded to Geneva by this government. Talk about rewarding incompetence and mediocrity. Years later it dawned on the NRM that they really didnt have enough doctors but many of that group had voted with their feet and moved on to climes where they are better valued and not subject to the whims of incompetents.

You talk about corruption. True we should talk about corruption but we should start by cleaning house. this bunch is so corrupted by impunity, they dont even know what the word means. In 2006, Salim Saleh stated exactly that -that he did not understand the meaning of the word corruption and needed someone to explain it to him. Your own father in law was embroiled in a scandal that should remain on the records and the text books on what not to do when you are in a leadership position. Temangalo was so full of conflicts of interest, it wasn’t funny. He would have been much better off selling his land on the open market but of course would have had trouble getting a suitably loaded buyer offering him a reasonable price in the time schedule in which he needed the funds.

Of course we all know that the main culprits in the major scandals that this country has seen remain free -all because they are friends of Museveni in the kintu. Museveni has either pardoned them himself or condoned their behaviour or excused it. You would be very hard pressed to identify any single successful prosecution for corruption. How could this government claim to be tough on corruption? Are they deluded or do they take all of us for fools? As for nepotism, if the sheer number of family members from the Museveni and Janet clans in this government is any measure, God save us all.

You talk about winning elections. I have no personal knowledge of ballot stuffing but one can extrapolate from the Kampala mayoral race saga in which Sematimba a full pastor involved in vote stuffing but went on to be allowed to stand again instead of getting disqualified. If it happened in Kampala, it could have happened elsewhere. Museveni’s own polling station was disqualified as apparently the number of voters there were twice the registered number of voters. One place in Gulu had more Banyakitara names than you could find in Kabale! And we are not talking about metropolitan Gulu!

But more serious is the obvious abuse of office specifically the misuse of government funds to fund the ruling party and the incumbents re election. Surely you did not fail to notice that the president awarded himself 650 billion during campaigns thanks to a corrupted actually bribed parliament (20 million a piece). Surely you dont think the bills stuffed in those brown envelopes he was handing out came from selling cows at Rwakitura! Furthermore a further 6.5 billion was spent on buying LC’s in the form of an ex -gratia payment timed perfectly just before an election. Now given you say you have been involved in many elections, you would be aware that the LC’s are the gateway to the villages and anyone wishing to do “kakuyege” has to first knock on the door of the village headman and his councillors and in turn they will knock on the doors of the residents. In some cases, some of the residents will simply vote for whoever the “chayimani” suggested in this case the man in the hat!

Regarding numbers, Uganda has over 13 million eligible voters of whom about half voted. Of the 13 million, the NRM claims to have 9 million registered as NRM members. These numbers suggest that even among NRM voters, about half did not even bother to vote, while almost half of all eligible voters did not bother to vote at all. this of course suggests that that often repeated 68% tells a more complex story than you would have us believe.

We need to be serious. A government that has presided over such incompetence and corruption for 25 years surely cannot be expected to do better in five! We could all think like paesants and vote for whoever gave us some sugar and soap or some waragi or we can discuss these issues and justify all of that money that our parents spent on our fancy education. To do less would be to dishonour our parents sacrifices!

P.S:Disclosure my parents voted NRM as they always have and went to Kololo while the rest of my siblings went to Entebbe road. Do the maths.

Those who cannot learn from history, are doomed to repeat it!

Thursday, May 19, 2011 at 12:17pm

Dear Nina,

Now you are about to be declared my muse.

Todays letter has been inspired by two quotes from your FB page. One is about an event in Uganda’s history and a letter written in 1967 about events that perfectly mirror Uganda today. Given that those events led to chaos and disaster as well as hundreds of thousands of deaths and we are yet to recover, it behooves everyone to read that letter and the events carefully.

The 1967 constitution was illegal. It was written by two people in what Binaisa boasts was one night. It was introduced to a compromised (an illegal parliament) that was detained till they passed it. It was called the famous “pigeon hole” constitution!

The KY-UPC post independence government was a constituted as a coalition in the Westminster tradition. When differences emerged in 1966, it should have been resolved and the parties should have returned to the electorate to get fresh mandate for their new ideas and a new government.

Instead, Obote staged a parliamentary coup, deposed and exiled the head of state, unilaterally declared a republic without seeking fresh mandate to do so and declared a state of emergency. He subsequently abrogated the constitution and imposed the pigeon hole constitution. He then arrested and detained dissenting citizens and politicians. In the events of 1966 when sections of the country specifically in Buganda rose up gainst him in unarmed protests, he ordered them beaten and shot. As you are ware, Museveni has already repeated these events despite declaring when he came to power that Obote was wrong in all of his brutal actions in 1966 despite provocation.

This in effect made Obote Uganda’s first dictator. He went on to rule without seeking fresh mandate until he was deposed by his pet bulldog Idi Amin in 1971.

The main highlight of the 1967 constitution was consolidation of power into one mans hands. The lead up to that event was the destruction of other power centres the biggest of whom was the social giant, the Kabaka of Buganda. Other power centres like the opposition were detained and imprisoned. Of note is that Museveni passed the “Kabaka muzzling bill” in a rushed and incompetent process soon after bribing members of parliament, recalling them after recess for elections and rushing through the debates and extending the session into the late evening until it was passed -all in one day. This bill was primarily targetd at another social giant, the present Kabaka who happens to be the son of the previous “social giant” Obote’s actions were targeted at.

The powers of the presidency were made more absolute. All checks and balances on the power of the presidency were effectively removed. This needs to be remedied to begin with by returning term limits.

The 1995 constitution retained the same principle of an over arching overiding presidency with little or no checks on his power. In the presence of a toothless parliament not immune to financial and political coercion and the winner take all politics that can doom one politician to a life of political exile from the eating table and the exercise of power for life in what are virtually one party states in all but name maintained by political patronage using the power of the states significant resources put at the disposal of one man and his interests, its no wonder that its virtually impossible to dislodge a sitting president through the ballot. Virtually all politicians are too busy jumping over their mothers to get to the table while the rest who maintain a principled stand are humiliated and beaten up when they are not busy fighting state harrassment through the courts using repressive laws like sedition laws and other laws targeting political activism.

Now the bar is being set even lower to cover nebulous economic crimes, vague definitions of rioting and terrorism and even more vague definitions of treason! Basic freedoms like the right to protest or the simple rights to habeas corpus or the right to bail as well as the right to the presumption of innocence are being attacked.

There is a need to cut down on the powers of the presidency and bring the president back to heel in the service of the people. Like Mbeki, the people and the party should have a mechanism in which a president who becomes a serious liability to the state can be relieved of his duties. Museveni has become a liability to both the NRM as well as this country.

In the case of Mbeki, his long running legal battles with Jacob Zuma were interpreted as continuing harrassment and misuse of the states resources and the powers of the presidency. He was forced to walk the plank and had to resign after a national ANC meeting. The numbers were against him so he had to comply. He is now a private citizen.

In Australia when Prime Minister Kevin Rudd threatened the future electoral chances of his party through his high handedness and alienation of their voters in their local constituencies, a hastily called meeting of the party caucus saw his deputy challenge him behind closed doors. After showing him she had the numbers to deliver him a devastating defeat in the party caucus, he resigned the same day and she resumed power, then called an election within a few months. Kevin Rudd had defeated the powerfull and long running John Howard.

In the UK, when Tony Blair grew too big for his boots, he was forced to a showdown and had to step down. He now advises third world dictators for a living but the recent overthrow of Mubarak should teach him some lessons.

The point is that these countries that do not even have term limits have got mechanisms for controlling their leaders. In our case short of a major stroke, our leaders will continue abusing our patience until we have to go through a destructive war to remove them or their children from the centre of our politics. We keep leaders long enough for their children and sometimes even grandchildren to get a foot hold and even a stranglehold on political power creating political dynasties of parasites.

In this letter to Nina a few days ago I suggested that Besigye, Mao or Otunnu as presidents in a system without a functioning opposition as well as other semi autonomous and independent institutions of government and civil bodies would be a dictator too. https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150194162237681 They would be able to rule virtually unchallenged for decades, would have the states military and police at the beck and call to beat up opposition, and virtually be able to order the central bank governor to print money so they can buy votes to maintain the semblance of elections that are just window dressing to keep their handlers in the west happy. Using the states considerable resources in a state in a system of patronage that ensures that ones fortunes depend on their allegiance to the state as well as creating a class of cronies and relatives through nepotism reliant on the state ensures that there will be enough vested interests as well as enough fear of change due to the fear of prosecution or losing the lucrative contracts to a new set of political cronies ensures tht there will be people virtually willing to commit murder to maintain the staus quo.

But there is a point when the disenfranchised achieve the numbers and enough awakening of conscience and awareness to demand their rights.

What we are seeing right now is that awakening in some way ironically stimulated by the states barbaric behaviour in the last few weeks.

What this letter shows is that we have learnt very little from the events of 1966/67 that led us to the chaos and wars that have characterised Uganda todateAs for Museveni, he is very much a product of those times. Museveni was trained by Obote. In many ways he has now converged with his teacher. This letter was written around the time that Museveni was working with UPC/GSU/Presidents office.

The second quote from your FB page is of words attributed to Napoleon Bonaparte. He apparently said that, “Never interrupt your enemy while he’s making a mistake. That’s bad manners.”

I will continue to exercise bad manners and interrupt you and your uncles while you are all making a mistake. the mistake of continuing to allow one man to continue deluding himself that he is indispensable to the stability and future of Uganda despite increasing evidence that he risks taking our country back four decades!

Sir Winston Churchil paraphrased George Santayana, a spanish philosopher, when he said, “Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it!”. George Santayana’s original quote was, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

The ultimate truth is penultimately always a falsehood.

Saturday, May 21, 2011 at 12:06am

Dear Nina,

You couldnt have chosen a worse day for your outpouring of love, but I will try to rise to the occasion.

“The moment of truth, the sudden emergence of a new insight, is an act of intuition. Such intuitions give the appearance of miraculous flushes, or short-circuits of reasoning. In fact they may be likened to an immersed chain, of which only the beginning and the end are visible above the surface of consciousness. The diver vanishes at one end of the chain and comes up at the other end, guided by invisible links. “ Arthur Keostler

Girl, now we are getting somewhere. Am glad to see that you have stopped playing hard to get!

Many thanks for your long awaited letter. It will be my pleasure to respond to it.

To begin with you have just demonstrated that you agree with me on lots of things. you are just too afraid of stepping out of your confort zone. Having been born into and brought up in the kintu, I can appreciate how scary it has got to be to contemplate life outside in the cold. But hey, out there in the cold is where the rest of us who happen to be the majority have always been. If you wish to be called a leader, you are going to have to step out of your confort zone and walk with real people. This is what all great world leaders have done -the ones that are still followed by millions of people. Here am talking about leaders like Moses, Jesus, Buddha and Mohamed. People who had relatively priviledged lives but only came into greatness when they stepped out of their sheltered lives and walked with the masses. The same masses that old man Nagenda that once brilliant writer now refers to denigratingly as the great unwashed -the dregs of society! He forgets that its these dregs that sweat and die so that he and his cronies can live in comfort.

You suggest that I would be pleased to see you cross over to my side -what you call being a renegade. Actually I dont consider myself to be a renegade. I am that enemy who choses to interrupt you while you are making a mistake (actually your best friend). I see you making a mistake and feel the need to save you from yourself. For you see if you continue on the course that the NRM government has embarked upon, you will be destroyed together with your children. At the very best, you will have to return to exile. Trust me exile is not a picnic for upper middle class girls brought up with house servants and mod cons. But worst of all, the course that Museveni and the NRM have set themselves upon leads to war and destruction.

How do we know this, we know this by reading our history. You see those NRM kids you mentioned of which you are one are not all the same. There are those like you who were eating sausages in Nairobi and Stockholm and those like us who were hyperventilating when the bombs and bullets were flying. Those who had access to state house scholarships distributed under the bed and those who had to amke do with mango tree university. Those who are acustomed to walking to work and those who think that its a crime to walk to work. Those who get their uncles to send them to recruiting offices with chits for choice jobs and those whose CV’s grow yellow and mouldy while their shoes develop holes looking for jobs. Those who have access to choice contracts worth hundreds of millions to billions fall their way because they “fought” while the rest just died, and those they refer to as lazy, dregs of society, scum of the earth who are poor because they are lazy! Those who are entitled and those who should be grateful for nothing! Those who have babies on the floor in Mulago and and various other unmentionable places and those who go to Paragon and kololo hospital or even those who are flown to Germany at tax payer expense!We are at a cross roads. Indeed it would be the pleasure of many to see you cross over to stand ith the people who are now accustomed to standing on the outside watching you and your uncles enjoying the feast from the animal that we all helped you kill but you insists on eating alone.

Our sacrifices and those of our parents as well as our lives have been buried in the narrative of 27 men who with no help at all fought and overthrew Obote’s hordes while the rest of us were sleeping or hiding unde the bed. But I do remember a childhood shattered by guns used by bad men. Bad men who had been stirred up by a band of what Obote called bandits but we now call heroes! Oh how narratives do change!

Acknowledging that we are all of course Museveni’s children (NRM?) is a first step. But you make the mistake of assuming that when I say that we are NRM kids, I mean we are/were all NRM supporters of children of NRM supporters. I refer specifically to children and young teenagers who grew up and came of age during Museveni’s wars and his regime.

Many of these are under the age of 40 -45 and they now form the majority in this country. They constitute a mindset that differs from those in the NRMO or those who fought in the NRA. They also differ in mindset from those of their parents and grandparents generations who were adults in the 60′s, 70′s and early 80′s. As children, we knew what war and fear meant. We knew the sound of bullets and saw death at an age when children should not know death. We knew that adults were not fearless having watched them hyperventilate many a time.

In 1986, we listened to the fine words of hope for a better society that Museveni said on the steps of parliament and for the next few years learnt to chant the patriotic songs. In school and at university we went for muchaka muchaka. We marveled at this man who declined the trappings of power and espoused small and accountable government as well as people friendly security forces. He preached against backwardsness and a lack of development and was enthusiastic about helpng our country develop. He was apalled by the state of the infrastructure such as roads and observed that the potholes in Kampala could make a pregnant woman miscarry. This man who said things that we all agreed with like the problems of Africa is leaders who do not want to step down from power to people like Moi, Nyerere, Kaunda, Mobutu, Mugabe etc. A new breed of leaders had been born and the future appeared rosy and bright.We were the first generation to go out in the night dancing and walk back home from Ange and Silk at 4 am without fear of being molested. Some went for muchaka muchaka and handled guns. Talked back to soldiers and policemen and challenged unfair laws and regulations. Watched as our elders gave their views as the nation discussed a new constitution.

In between some of us had a our first beer. I am yet to have my first one but who knows. Others had their first girl or boy, got married and had children. all the while we cheered the fighters on even though we took very little actual interest in politics. We were too busy compensating for our deprived and bullet ridden childhoods. You see we grew up taking cover from all sorts of deadly missiles, jumping over dead bodies watching our elders hyperventilate. Many of us voted for the first time for we came of age during Museveni’s regime even though most of us simply couldnt be bothered. We left the voting to the elders. Ditto the talk about politics in which we had every little interest.

In between we occasionally heard of a conflict hidden away and often not mentioned for months. I first heard of this conflict in high school when a friend whose home was right next door to Layibi college, could not go home for his hollidays. He stayed in Kampala with his elder brother and we caught up during the school holidays. His elderly retired father had refused to leave his home. Later I saw him off when he went to America where he went on to college and University. He has never returned to Kampala and his home has never had peace since. Many years later, it occured to me that our society had really failed the people of Gulu. That our parliament was really useless for a campaign like W2W with people insisting on sleeping on parliamentary avenue would have ended the IDP camps years earlier.

Doctors are taught never to make the treatment worse than the disease they are treating. In trying to deny Kony a space in which to grow, the NRM government adopted a scotched earth policy of emptying the villages and detaining everyone into camps. My own grandmother who lived in eastern Uganda has never been buried by her family because she refused to move when Lakwena’s hordes came around. While the government argues that it saved lives by incarcerating its people, other sources of evidence incldung a paper written by Dr Olive Kobusingye on excess mortality in IDP’s suggest that the policy of IDP’s was responsible for increasing the mortality of residents significantly in comparison to all other parts of Uganda. There is no doubt that IDP’s caused death to the residents of Gulu and around. We may have had little conflict around Kampala over the last 25 years but conflict has never been far from us. Even when we try to ignore it it refuses to go away. It is becoming more and more obvious that unless something changes we are headed for the dreaded conflict of our childhood. Over 25 years, we have come to know Museveni and his men very well. We have followed their every word, their every contradiction, their every metamorphosis from men of apparent principle to men who are simply men -and now to men who are afraid of change. None better demonstrates this than Eriya Kategaya, about face when life on the outside proved to hard. Men who are greedy for the trappings of material wealth even when they did not earn it.

“Politics can be relatively fair in the breathing spaces of history; at its critical turning points there is no other rule possible than the old one, that the end justifies the means. “ Artur Koestler

You chose to differentaite between Museveni and the NRM. I dont. Museveni is the NRM and the NRM is Museveni. All of the rest including your dear daddy are just along for the ride to give Museveni the semblance of legitimacy. They are choir singers to be trotted out when it suits Museveni to legitimise his disguised life presidency. I see men and women who are weak. People who have grown soft. I no longer see any of the young men who fought for what they believed in even when the odds were clearly against them. Like in the old fable of the emperor and his invisible clothes, the courtiers of Museveni including daddy dear continue to alow him to delude himself that he is indispensable to this country. For allowing one man to hijack the dreams of 33 million people of this country, the members of the NRM are traitors to this country. indeed, the band of young men be it in 1980 or in 1986 who were willing to lay their lives down for what they believed in would have had them lined up and shot trough their fat tummies. But bullets were scarce in that war so the ‘kakumbi” would be even better. This was the penalty for traitors in the bush no? No bullets were wasted on them. Your fabled collective responsibility is only collective responsibility for the failures of the NRM which are many while the King Museveni takes all of the credit for the presumed victories.

People like my parents may vote NRM but they are not really NRM. Like many people, they have lived through all of the disastrous governments of Uganda. Each time change has brought death and more suffering to them and their families. Like many Ugandans, they are afraid of change. They have never been within the eating circles. They just want peace and to be left alone to do their own thing. It took me years to recognise that my mother has got undiagnosed Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) suffered during Obote II. At the end of the day they vote for the devil they know even though this does not blind them to his weaknesses. Of course they are outnumbered. You see they have seven children all “Museveni children” and none of them would vote for the NRM.

I have no doubt that the 1980 elections were rigged. I also have no doubt that that election was designed purely for window dressing. Stories are told of upcountry opposition MP’s who were detained at road blocks until nomination was over and their opponents returned unopposed. You see the weakness of a man tells one a lot about that man. Power was Obote’s weakness. He exalted in wielding it. Everything about his history suggests that he had to win at all costs and would never have allowed himself to lose. The presence of a client army led by partisan Oyite Ojok and the client caretaker government of Paul Muwanga was never going to allow for a free and fair election.

“The ultimate truth is penultimately always a falsehood. He who will be proved right in the end appears to be wrong and harmful before it. “ Arthur Koestler

I can see you attempt to separate the LC system from the so called NRM grassroot structures. The reality is that the two are one and the same. The LC system came with a stamp on it -NRM. It till exists despite its tenuous legality and controls access to the grassroots. Quite frankly it should have been dissolved in 2006 after the legal dissolution of the NRM and transition to multiparties. Its a system that the NRM built using state resources that no other party can duplicate. During the last election, the NRM paid an ex gratia payment amounting to 6.5 billion just before the campaigns for elections. If this was not a bribe, tell me what else it could be. So essentially money from the public purse was paid to what you admit is an illegal structure important for campaigning at the grassroot level just prior to the presidential election and you do not see a problem with that?

“Space-ships and time machines are no escape from the human condition. Let Othello subject Desdemona to a lie-detector test; his jealousy will still blind him to the evidence. Let Oedipus triumph over gravity; he won’t triumph over his fate. “ Arthur Koestler

Elections can yield democracy. But elections organised in an undemocratic way by an undemocratic government cannot yield anything else but chaos. They certainly cannot yield democracy. The principle of informed consent is a basic tenet of medical ethics. As a matter of fact autonomy is central to the practice of medical ethics. A person is autonomous in their decisions if they understand the pros and cons of their decisions and have the means to carry out or exercise that autonomy independently. A democratic government ensures that the voters are informed and empowered to make informed decisions. The NRM preys on an uninformed population. As such one has to question the so called democracy in Uganda. Just how informed is the average paesant in Uganda who constitutes the majority?Is it any wonder that the enemies of the NRM in the last few years are those who offer information to the general public. Those who offer alternate sources to “President museveni yagambye …”. Those who offer an alternate narrative to that fed to us for over 25 years? People like Nambozo, whose FM radio campaign was one of the most effective before FB took over. Journalists like Mwenda before he became mellow with vested interests. Journalists like Kalyegira who depite his often wild imagination presents alternate opinions to the official narrative. People like Obbo before he was kicked upstairs. People like the Mengo government or Suubi and now the internet and FB. This government went after all of them including going as far as holding Namboozo beyond the courts and closing down CBS on trumped up charges. Unlike all of the first sources, the internet is out of the reach of Museveni and his government which is why they are now squirming. And squirm they will for the winds of change are upon them and they have to adapt or die!

Do I support Besigye? No. Do I support Besigye’s right to protest and exercise his right to oppose this government? Yes. Do I believe that his party the FDC is the best thing since sliced bread? No! Do I have reservations about Besigye? Yes, lots. In many ways his personality and that of Museveni are similar. I would only trust him in the presence of structures to control the power of his presidency. But then there are very few people I would trust with virtually absolute power particularly people who seek power. I am more comfortable with those who do not seek power than with those who seek and believe that the only way to control them and their. But at the end of the day, Besigye has stood up to be counted and that should count for something.

“If conquerors be regarded as the engine-drivers of History, then the conquerors of thought are perhaps the pointsmen who, less conspicuous to the traveller’s eye, determine the direction of the journey. “ Arthur Koestler

At the end of the day, the era of Museveni and your father is over even though they do not seem to know it yet. Like all regimes that have come to their end, they wait until they have to be dragged out from a hole in the ground before they realise the end is here. I have come to accept that power creates a delusional state that makes those in power lose touch with their surroundings.

“God seems to have left the receiver off the hook, and time is running out. “ Arthur Koestler

It is time for an exit plan. If your father and his generation cannot save themselves, then you have to save yourself and your children. If you insist on continuing to stay on in one mans delusion, then you have only yourself to blame. At the end of the day Ugandans will blame all of ou in the NRM for failing to stand up and be counted on the sied of the people of Uganda. For failing to recognise that Museveni has lost his way and his quest for power too personal, too individualistic. Thay you have all become “useful idiots”! If you guys do not find a way of removing him, and handing power back to the people, the people will find ways of removing you all.Change is here. The winds of change that blew away the Pahraoh of egypt Mubarak as well as Ben ali of Tunisia have changed course and blown the Jasmine train into Kampala. And nothing will stop that train forom docking for that multitude of unemployed youth, the impunity that your uncles have enjoyed, the cronism and corruption in this government, and the longevity and obvious dynastic plans are the fuel on which the Jasmine train feeds. You can only delay it but you will not stop it from docking.

The death of the vegetable seller and all of those innocents who were killed in Kampala shall not go unpunished.I leave you with this photocollection documenting this governments brutality. Surely no one who has got a conscience can continue to support the men and women who did this.

“The most persistent sound which reverberates through man’s history is the beating of war drums. “ Arthur Koestler

At the end of the day, Ugandans may have to resort to warfor sometimes avoiding a war that needs to be fought simply delays the inevitable. God knows we do not need any more wars but if war does come, the NRM and Museveni will be to blame for they alone have got the power to stop it from happening.

Impatient young men … are tempted to turn to revolt because no notice is taken of their questions.

Sunday, May 22, 2011 at 2:56am

Dear Nina,

Am glad you have not kept me waiting. Now i know that you are really ready to return the love. Today I remembered this letter I wrote you when you were really playing hard to get. I wondered who Nina really was or wanted to be. It was returned “return to sender”. https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150116462577681 .

In that letter I wondered whether you were really just going to cruise along on family credentials or whether you were going to really put yourself out there. I think we are now well on to the way to finding out whether you will continue to play it safe or whether you are going to step out of the comfort zone of being a princess of the ruling elite. Of course I will not mention the one where you tried to give a dressing down for being so forward!!!

But now you are talking to me so we must move this forward. I hope you are aware that there is an immense amount of interest out there in this exchange between you and me. Its not just DWR and ST who want to get in on the conversation. Am getting friendship requests every day at a very high rate. I say, the more the merrier. What say you.

Of course we are on the same side in so far as you profess an interest in Ugandans and their interest and not the interests of daddy, party and president. For while I accept the fact that you are a loyal daughter, this course you have embarked upon goes far beyond your personal loyalties.

You are aware that I am not a politician, have no interest in politics and for the most part despise politics and politicians. That of course sounds like a paradox given that many of my opinions are about politics. That however is primarily because my primary interest is services and the delivery of services to the people. Museveni in 1986 stated that politics is about the delivery of services to the people. Judged purely on the basis of the provision of services to Ugandans, it can be comfortably said that Museveni and the NRM are failures. Here I refer to basic things like roads, health, community policing and justice, housing, transport, schools. By that criterion as well as the management of corruption, in my opinion one would have to ask whether Ugandans are morons for voting NRM again after two and half decades of abuse.

Yesterday I picked up a new word, “Oprahfication”. It is apparently an affliction of the upper middle classes and elite who have apparently become accustomed to letting it all hang out on Oprah. They treat her show as a confessional and she has taken on the role of a confessor, a pseudoconsellor handing out banal absolutions that allow the rich to let go of their own responsibility and blame someone else. So there is always someone else to blame. Never the individual. So over the years I have formed an opinion of many of Oprahs clients -if they are successful its in spite of their parents, while if they are failures its because of their parents! It seems to me that you are one of those oprah fans. Female, priviledged, MTV generation, westernised. Am sure you have watched your share of oprah.

But in this case I have got to agree with you. In this case as Museveni’s children, we can blame our father for ruining our lives. While he was running around playing guerillas with uncle Obote and Amin, tearing up the countryside because of disagreements with Uncle Obote that quite frankly we as children did not give a damn about, while conscripting some of us into his army and teaching us to kill before we could drink a beer or chase after a woman, let alone wipe our bottoms properly, our childhood was ruined. I find it interesting therefore that we are supposed to be greatful almost three decades later to the man who ruined our childhood. I believe this calls for an Oprah moment. Get up there, lay it all out, tell daddy we hate him for ruining our lives and walking off the set freed of our childhood demons. Unfortuantely he doesnt wish to go. Not only do we have to carry the scars of an abusive parent, but he insists on staying in our lives and even demands the right to mess up that of our children. But we must protect our children from him, else they too will acccuse us of ruining their lives.

We Museveni children did not graduate into political beings. We never ever had a choice. Politics was forced upon us. Its why we spent most of our adolescence and early adulthood ignoring everything to do with politics and playing catch up to compensate for a lost childhood. We are political beings from when we were little. We know the difference between good and bad governments. In a bad government, your good law abiding tax paying parents live in fear. Fear of death and torture from the government and its agents. The same government that takes your taxes. think about this -at the age of ten or eleven, I went to and from school in Nakasero through 16 roadblocks every day.

In 25 years you learn a lot about a man. You learn his strengths and his weaknesses. We grew up on the sound of bullets. We listened to news and birango everyday. People were afraid that if they missed the birango, they would miss the death of a relative from a sudden encounter with armed men. We therefore know a lot about Museveni and his men. And we now know that their so called revolution was all about young men whose elders would not listen to them wrestling the ‘animal’ from their elders with us paying the price for their foolishness. Now they are old men, they wish to prevent other young men impatient with them, from doing the same thing that they did to their own elders! So now we know that the band of 27 is no different from those they deposed.at the end of the day, they view the people they lead as a means to an end. Their word means nothing and is not binding upon their actions. Its this very fact that you attempt to hide behind the excuse of hindsight. We too do have the benefit of hindsight and this hindsight tells us that the emperor is naked.

Museveni and his band of rebels were not the first Ugandans to rebel against their elders. And neither was the generation of the Obote’s before them. Before that there were Baganda nationalists who rebelled against the colonial government and in many ways set the stage for the Ugandan nationalist struggles that followed. There were also other earlier struggles like the Bataka rebellion. The Walk2Work organisers probably believe that they pioneered unarmed resistance or rebellion in Uganda. Bu as you point out Uganda did not have a history of armed war for independence. ths does not mean that there were no struggles. The tools and weapons used then are no different from those used today. What you call lies were called “subversive rumours” and “radical rudeness” used by Ganda activists to disrupt social relationships between colonial government and local elites.

I find most interesting this paper regarding the activities of Ganda radicals in the 1940′s that clearly demonstrate an orchestrated campaign of unarmed activism. This paper talks about the ruling elite of that time and their attitude towards the demands of young men. Quote, “As ministers, Nsibirwa, Kulubya and Kawalya Kaggwa showed little interest in modifying their rule to make room for young men’s demands for public participation, democracy and change. They saw such innovations as disorderly, disruptive, and fundamentally inappropriate. As prime minister, Kawalya Kaggwa dismissed the radicals by calling them lazy, and saying “What have they done … so far? Have they improved their country in any way? Have they cultivated and kept good farms? No!!”. Kawalya Kagwa lacked understanding of young men’s discontent, to the point that the former missionary HM Grace chided him for his rigor, arguing in the aftermath of the 1945 strike, “impatient young men … are tempted to turn to revolt because no notice is taken of their questions. And a few become revolutionaries such as those you have in prison now…. Now you can’t repress this movement–it will grow even more as your soldiers return, and the more who are educated the more this movement will grow. This urge for some voice in government comes from reading the history book, the overseas press, protestant theology, and even the Bible. This young Africa is an explosive force and though the numbers may be small, it will have growing power and it all depends how it is treated now whether it becomes a curse or a blessing. I beg you and the other chiefs will deal wisely with it….” Kawalya Kagwa rejected such recommendations, perhaps provoked by the regular abusive telegrams he received from Mulumba and other Bataka party members. The radicals had more success with British officials and missionaries than they did with the leaders of the kingdom’s government.”

I would recommend that you read the paper as clearly demonstrates that as the young men of the 40′s rebelled against the Buganda kingdom officials and the colonial government and those of the 50′s rebelled against the colonial government leading to independence, those of the 80′s rebelled agains Obote and wrestled him for power at great cost to all of us, its now the turn of Museveni and the NRM. The young men are circling him. He may shoot them and kill them but ultimately he will lose.

I first got introduced to debate when I was about ten or eleven. I relished in debating any side and any point and demolishing my opponents. In high school I lost interest until a teacher, a Kenyan introduced political debate as an extacurricular activity. How he fired up the boys! He was such an orator. He so fired up the boys that they rebelled against the school food. The brothers were so incensed they invited a platoon of soldiers who were camped close by. That was the first time we were exposed to indiscipline by an NRM soldier. One of the older boys in A level was singled out for rough treatment and canes by one soldier who apparently had some sort of vendetta against his parents. We were all quite apalled. This was within a few months of takeover by the NRM. All the fancy words of discipline among their troops suddenly felt empty. The Kenyan teacher was blamed by the brothers for the strike and disappeared. He reappeared a few weeks later in full military uniform and it turned out he was an NRM political Commissar. The story was that he was a Kenyan dissident who had been involved in an attempted coup against Moi. The Kenyan government apparently expressed their dissatisfaction with his presence ad he ended up in Sweden as a refugee.

My debate was informal and consisted of mainly baiting savdees. You see in those days I could quote the bible backwards and confuse most savdees. You see i had little interest in politics and preferred other pursuits.

You feign ignorance of the power of the president. You also misquote me when you say I said the “only way” … Actually I said that one of the things we need to do towards curbing the powers of the presidency is term limits. There are other things that need to be discussed -separation of powers, independent institutions and checks and balances on the powers of the presidency. Today the presdient can misuse the powers of the state to persecute a political opponent without censorship. In a true democracy, he should have resigned after the Besigye rape trial or the recent police and army riots causing loss of life. To begin with term limits would curb the ability of the presdent to use his incumbency and state funds to subborn the process of democracy. You see democracy as you said is not delivered by elections particularly flawed ones. In Uganda we have a president who acts like a village chief. He is everywhere and into everything. He settles disputes between boda bodas and market vendors, receives small time conmen from Mumbai posing as investors, gives away government land, meets small fictitious kings like the Sabanyala, creates small non viable districts and constitutencies, settles pay disputes with Makerere lecturers or disputes for allowances with Makerere students etc. In doing all of this he undermines everyone including his own ministers. He takes over the role of the technocrats and as such has had a few scandals coming back to him like AGOA, the Aya brothers land giveaway or the Shimoni land giveaway or the various taxpayer funded rescues from bankruptcy for Basajjabalaba. He has taken us into more than one war without involving our legislators or having any form of national debate about whether we wanted to die in foreign wars.

But most disturbing of all is that there is virtually no curb on what he can and cannot do. There appears to be no mechanism for relieving him of office even if he maybe destructive. His persecution of Besigye for example using state resources is less than what lost Mbeki his presidency for using the state prosecutors to hound Zuma. Its even less than the ills that saw the prime minster of Australia kicked out of power. Neither the legislature nor the party appear to have any power or mechanisms for controlling the power of the presidency or for dealing with an incompetent president. He has undermined virtually every institution and usurped their powers. Institutions like the legislature, and the judiciary have all been turned into client structures without discernible independence from the presidency. If the presiend fights with the Kabaka, he instructs parliament to provide him with a Kabaka muzzling bill -for a fee! If the new enemy is walk to work activists, again parliament obliges him with another law. if he wishes to rule till he drops dead, for 2000 dollars (how cheap), parliament again tampers with the constitution. Now he wishes to extend term durations so he doesnt have to go back to the electorate for fresh mandate -no taking chances on a fickle public controlled by the dregs of society so parliament will be happy am sure for a fee to provide him with one!

You have issues with what you call insulting members of parliament. I do not insult them. To call a corrupt fool a corrupt fool is not to insult them and neither is pointing out the fact that both the seventh as well as the eight parliament were traitors to this country. Both parliaments took bribes from the executive in exchange for their vote on bills introduced by the presidency for the bnefit of the incumbent. For those crimes history shall judge them harshly. But so will the ninth parliament if they extend the term durations for the benfit of the incumbent or fail to return term limits back into the constitution. They will also be judged harshly if they bend to Museveni’s will and interfere with the constitution to take away the right to bail and the presumption of innocence as well as the right to afair trial. These are things that they need to know. We need to set the bar for our legislators higher, demand more from them and make it clear to them that they are elected to serve the interests of the people and not those of the ruling party of the incumbent. In Uganda we set the bar for MP’s and politicians so low that people believe all they need to do is say they are ‘honourable’ and we are supposed to believe they are honourable. They dont actually have to act with honour or even serve our interests except to come back every five years to buy us some waragi in exchange for a vote. And tribalism demands that we bask in their glory even when we benefit nothing from it. Did you notice the Basoga jubilating because Kadaga was the speaker? Seriously, could you go to Busoga and see the jiggers and poeverty and still take pride in electing this government? As my grandmother would say, “eyalooga bano yali tanaaba”!!!

Tamale Mirundi is a fool. I think you give him too much credit. I have heard things more nasty than me calling him a fool said about him by the people you suggest he speaks for. The last time I checked, Tamale Mirundi is the simpleton that you NRM elite use to say the stupid things you cannot say yourself. Its a bit like hiring the village drunkard and buying him a few so that he can insult your rival. he does not speak for the “dregs” of scoiety who you admit are the majority. He is actually a hired gun who speaks for the ruling minority elite just like Nagenda even though he sounds more coarse and crude. today i read Kabushenga’s interview with BBC in which he preapeats the very same lies that form the official government narrative. Mbu the videos of Besigye’s arrest were edited. One wonders what the chances of a conspiracy involving all of the journalsist from various services could be. And where is the missing footage anyway?

In looking up the NRM and Museveni’s innauguration speech, I came across events in South africa from the same time. It occured to me then that it was impossible to get something from someone who does not want to give it to you if you are playing on his field using his own rules. In Uganda, the NRM owns the field grace to the virtual carte blanche our parents gave them. They had twenty years in which they suppressed other political party’s activity while they used state resources to consolidate their hold on power. USing state resources they built the LC system and other grassroot structures which became an extension of the NRMO. This grasroot system has access to every villager. To get any formal papers such as a passport one needs an introduction from the LC’s. In the absence of a formal address, its the LC’s that vouch for ones identity. These structures are stamped NRM and controlled by the NRM. It is therefore misleading to try and claim they are not grassroot NRM structures. We saw how they were manipulated finacially just before the last election. We do know however that the NRM was dissolved so these NRM structures should have been dissolved too. But hey still ecist even though all of them are as corrupt as the NRM government.

The preindependence politics was not the problem. The problem was politicians who refused to play by the rules that brought them to power and sought to change and rewrite the rules and change the venue to one they control. Thats exactly the same politcs that Museveni and the NRM plays. But it wishes to be lauded for playing fair when we all know there is no fairness to this game nor the venue. the opposition in Uganda is there only to legitimise the NRM -exactly the same role that Museveni accused DP of serving. They are supposed to be good and play nice even when they are being hamstrung. To go back to my question regarding how to get something from someone determined not to give it to you at all cost, the ANC would never have won power by fighting the aprtheid government on its terms. To succeed they had to change the rules, chose their own weapons. Thats the brilliance behind walk to work. It doesnt matter how many tanks and guns you have, you will still lose. Walking is a simple everyday affair for many people. It is natural and an inalienable right. You cannot stop people from walking without making yourself look like a fool. Many governments spend millions of dollars to enourage their people to walk. But walk to work is only one of many strategies

Ugandans do not connect their rights directly with the provision of services. If they did, why would they vote for Museveni and the NRM after 25 years? Museveni indulged in a subterfuge during the last election. Everywhere he went, he displaced responsibility from himself and the government onto anyone else he could grab. Who in Uganda would dare to contradict the president in public? Health centre has no drugs, blame the doctors. Kampala has potholes, not his governments fault. IDP’s suffering and dying in neglect, blame Kony even though Kony was not in charge of the IDP’s. IDP camps were established by the NRM which displaced paesants from their land. It therefore had a duty of care for the residents of those camps. The well documented excess mortality in those camps for more than a ecade has got to be placed directly at the foot of the NRM government. The social costs of those camps cannot be blamed on anyone else too. In any other society, the residents of those camps should have been suing this government for opportunities lost and for lives lost as the government failed in its duty of care.

What the last 25 years under Museveni and the NRM represent are opportunities lost. Instead of building for the future we have spent most of our time entrenching one man and his family into our politics. Instead of fighting corruption even with all of the goodwill this government has had, it has instead entrenched it. Instead of fighting nepotism and tribalism, it has become a way of life. Instead of fighting impunity, it has been promoted to an art. Instead of promoting security, it has now built a police state. Instead of revamping our infrastructure, we boast the ‘best’ potholes in the world! And instead of at last having the chance of handing over power peacefully, we are risking another war because another set of old men do not recognise when their time has come to go!

I am who and what i am because of what my parents did for me not because of who they are. While I never really valued school while I was there, and took it for granted, I still knew it was the best school in the country. In many ways my failures are mine while my successes are the successes of my parents. I would never go as far as saying that the first half of my life was ruined by my parents. And if there is anything good in the second half of my life its because of my parents. When I was a teenager, I resented the control that my mother had over every minute of my life. In retrospect, it occurs to me that controlling the movements of their children was the best way of keeping them safe in a country where death was always close by. Sometimes i wonder how we ever even became normal adults and for that I can say thanks to my parents. So no my parents didnt ruin the first half of my life and neither did they ruin the second.

You make the mistake of settling for second best -setting the bar too low. Me i still want that ferrari, children or no. Today a perfect stranger looked at my car and said single mans car. No its not a single mans car. Its my car. children or no children. Yes they have or will have great education, the best that my money can buy. They certainly aren’t going anywhere near Museveni’s bonna basruwale schools. They will become their own person and make their own choices -and move out of my home. And I will go off fishing or buy a rocking chair when the time is right. I will not keep them beholden to me because I believe they owe me. You see thats what a parent who loves their children does. He or she allows them to grow up and make their own decisions and respects those decisions but does not seek to continue controlling them well into their adulthood. Such a parent would be called a controlling parent. In mny ways Museveni is controlling. With an ego and a degree of narcisism to match, his ego will not allow him to step off the treadmill he has set himself upon. Museveni is a narcissist. Narcissists thrive on power and control. Thats why he cannot contemplate retirement. To a man like him retirement is like death.

I know that most Ugandans do not wish for a ferrari. I also know that for many, the simpler things in life would be enough. But we are not talking bout luxuries here. We are talking about basic things. Not to be killed by the state that is meant to protect you. Not to be harrassed by the police that are supposed to be your friends. Not to die from preventable diseases because the government has misplaced its priorities and prefers to buy ultramodern fighter jets instead. Not to die from hunger in a country gifted by nature. Not to have a miscarriage due to Museveni’s terrible roads. Not to have your house flooded because the government cannot maintain simple things like storm drains and urban planning. Not to die an early death due to simple treatable diseases. Not to have my car damaged on top of all of the taxes i have already paid. Not to have to put up with corruption by the people who are meant to pevent it. To live under an accountable government. All of thse are simple things. They do not require a genius. Neither are they rocket science. Its called provision of services -the core business of government according to Museveni in 1986. Do you want to tell me that with hindsight Museveni and the NRM do not find any of these things reasonable any longer? That their foresight was based on naivety? Why then do they not tell the people to stop aspiring for these simple things?

When you put rats in a jar and starve them, they will start to eat each other. Thats the story of the NRM primaries. Politics is the best paying job in this country. And you dont even have to have any specific qualifications or job experience. If you are gifted with the gab and have little scrupples, then you will have a job in politics. and you dont even have to turn up for debates, dont have to read the bills, dont even have to make your maiden speech. You get to be called honourable, have a choice of maidens, get a taxpayer funded car and a salary that professionals with decades of training and decades of experience can only dream about, get to gate crash every funeral on the village as well as every wedding whle getting applauded regardless of whether what you say makes sense or not! The NRM has created a system pf patronage where all of the resources in this country are hoarded by the state and used to maintain the incumbent in power! Do the rural folk really fight for their rights or do they fight for individual politicians? As I stated in my last letter, true autonomy implies that the person making that choice is well informed. The NRM deliberately keeps its people uninformed of their rights. Many even believe that the government is only doing them a favour when it delivers a service.

LOL at predefined rules. there are no predefined rules here. There are rules that the people tried to set up in 1995 that the NRM and Museveni have since demonstrated mean nothing to them. Museveni makes the rules to suit himself but expects everyone esle to play by those same rules. No reasonable person expects to play a game on anothers turf using anothers rules and hope to win unless they are deluded. the rules that Ugandans agreed upon have been tampered with or are not enforced. The only way to win or have a fighting chance is to change the rules. who says that Museveni’s rules have got to be the rules by whic the game is played anyway? So welcome to the new world where Museveni and the NRM do not set the rules. Actually they themselves are playing catchup. Interestingly the opposition itself are not the originators of thiese rules. Others not even interestsed in politcs have been setting the rules. In Egypt when the Jasmine train docked, El Baradei was pushed aside. He had assumed that when the people overthrew Mubarak, they would automatically look to him. You are aware that Marchiavelli states that people wilfully change their rulers if those rulers show themselves to be unjust.

If the evidence of the last few weeks counts, lying is very much a preserve of the NRM and its cadres. We have seen the president telling lies about the so called riots -events that were captured on camera. We have seen a minster present the same lies in parliament -accompanied by a doctored video. We have seen Kabushenga present those lies to the BBC. Nabakooba and Opolot as well as Kayihura have outdone themselves. Talk about uncoordinated troop movements!

The referendum in 2005 was a sham because the question had already been decided in parliament by a compromised parliaement. It now goes down in the annals as a failed experiment in trusting our leaders to self regulate. Its why I would not trust Besigye or any of the others to regulate themselves in a system where the winner takes all, the opposition is toothless, and the government is allowed to use public resources to maintain an individual in power.

As for what am doing about reimposing term limits, we are talking about them arent we? He who can change thoughts has the power to change history. You would be very surprised how many people are following this debate.

There is a fable that Ugandans have been told for many years. Its the story of economic growth. The way this story is told, economic growth is everything and tells the whole story. But something keeps bothering me. Why if the economy is growing steadily, are people complaining of extreme poverty? Is economic growth as quoted enough t maintain stability? How much of our economic growth is true growth and how much is just simple ‘recovery economics’? You see post conflict countries have very little trouble achieving a growth rate of 10%. Democracy and elections in particular in africa do not guarantee stability. Economic growth matters to conflict probably through its effect on employment. Unemployment particularly of young men increases the risk of further war. Collier, Hoffler and Rohner in 2007 demnstrated that if the proportion of young men in a society with thrid world characteristics is doubled, the risk of conflict goes up from 4.1% to 30%. In another paper by Collier and Hoeffler in 2007, they found that increased military spending by a thrid world post conflict nation rather than decrease the risk of conflict actually significantly increases the risk of conflict. The most obvious infrastructure needs in a post conflict economy are power, ports and roads. The offer the best returns on post conflict development. Without reliable power, the formal sector cannot develop. Uganda is cited as a country where the biggest impendiment to investment was power. The failure to plan for power is a major policy failure. I have always wondered how Museveni hoped to drive his so called industrialisation and investment without relaible power.

Technically Uganda shouldnt be a post conflict country 25 years after the takeover of the NRM. Nevertheless we reamin a fragile country. In many ways our economic recovery has been mismanaged with over reliance on the raw figures of economic growth without telling Ugandans that in recovery economics, it is not unusual for post conflict economies to maintain a 10% or higher growth rate. Unemployment and the distribution of wealth as well as the large population of young men are factors likely to increase conflict. Increased government spending on military hardware is a factor that has been shown to increase the risk of conflict too. The ability to attract skilled manpower back is also useful in speeding up recovery. In Uganda’s case, we are more efficient at haemorrhaging skilled manpower!You stated that you believe that we are not at risk of war -I would say you are wrong. everything suggests that we are. The gap between the haves and the have nots, the impunity and corruption, the nepotism and cronism are features we share with all of the noth African countrie recently visited by the jasmine train. An oppressive and abusive government is a very effcient catalyst for conflict and a recruiting agent for the enemy.

Impatient young men … are tempted to turn to revolt because no notice is taken of their questions.

Mahogany, Kalyogs and your people who are never going to get it?

Dear Nina,

I had decided to give you a break while you were celebrating daddy being given the kisambi to hold while Museveni and his family are enjoying the kintu, but your uncles have conspired to make me break my silence! It is obvious that they learn very little -‘abaana tebakwaata’!

This government came out of the elections determined to demonstrate to all detractors that they were strong and very popular. The fact that they claimed a significant majority of the vote with a wide margin was of course designed to leave no doubt. One has to wonder though what they have really done to deserve staying in power any longer. And one has to look at the state of services to understand just how many problems Ugana has. For if the people who gave Museveni his majority are the same people who have to travel on his roads or attend his hospitals to die, then God save this country!

After keeping everyone guessing, Museveni finally came out with his new cabinet, a significant number of whom are really recycled old has beens who really need to be put out to pasture. We are well on the way to becoming a laughing stock of the world. What with Ssebagala being proposed as a minister and a minister of Justice who has a string of legal and social problems behind him! Not to mention certified buffons and incompetents as well as thieves! You father really has got his work cut out for him. I really think he has been set up the more I think about this! Quite frankly he no longer has the cojonnes for this. He is compromised.

If Museveni thought that the appointment of some new faces with impressive CV’s may be useful, he negated all of that by pandering to opportunism and expedience, blackmail and tribalism as well as that Ugandlish term -arrivalism. Am told reliably that arrivalism is the condition that afflicts those who supposedly fought in a war no one asked them to fight and continue to believe that we are forever beholden to them even when they are corrupt!

Quite frankly after 25 years, no one cares. if they want a medal or a trophy, they should just be given one to hang on their walls. If they wish we could even give them their own military parade together with a brass band to exercise their arthritic legs and vague faculties when they are 100. For 25 years they have had a public holiday all their own as well as the best of this land to use as their personal fiefdom. What else do they want -our grand daughters virginity too?

I laugh when I watch the short sightedness and incompetenece on show. Kayihura tried his bully boy tactics and got cut down to size. Now he is carefull to stay in the background and when he shows his face he is sure to ensure he is smiling and not saying anything he can be quoted on! The last time he tried his bully boy tactics, he ended up embarrassing himself and his boss and the whole government and nearly caused a civil war! The grapevine even has it that an elite police training academy in the UK does not wish to be associated with his new found notoriety. After the experience of the LSE in the fallout from having granted a pHD to a Ghaddafi, no school wants that kind of publicity -who knows Kale may end up in the Hague!

Old man Kivedhinda proved that there is such a thing as leaving when you are still ahead -the longer you stay, the more likely it is that you will finally stick your own foot in your mouth! Unfortunately, he all but pooed in his nappies on TV egged on by that Kabajungu woman!

A few years ago, Andrew Mwenda with the help of the high court finally put the last nail in the coffin of the stupid anti sedition law that the government has used for years to bully errant journalists with big mouths! Given the number of times the government invoked it and the number of times the government lost, I would have thought that you guys would be tired of humiliating yourselves and continuing to lose over and over. But now you have invoked an even older and even more stupid law to continue your harrassment -the ‘criminal libel’ law.

I dont know who is advising government but in my humble opinion, he or she should be sacked. The road that you have taken is the road to further humiliation for as usual, you are going to lose. this is one that is made for the high court and one that you are going to lose. If you do doubt me, it would behoove you to read up on the demise of the very same law in the UK after 700 years. One of the reasons it was repealed is just so backward repressive governments like the NRM that cannot use them while blaming the UK for it. For you see this law is based on criminal code inherited from the UK but you guys just dont know when to throw out the bad and stick with the good. This law is useless. It just brings ridicule onto your government. It paints you out as a bully out to dominate every little mosquito with a tank!

On the abolition of sedition Geoffrey Robertson QC said while defending Salman Rushdie in the last sedition case in the UK “This law is still used throughout the Commonwealth by repressive governments to jail their opponents. Its abolition here ensures that those governments can no longer use the excuse that they are merely following British law.”

Of the chllenge and repeal of criminal defamation and libel laws on the UK’s statutes since 1275 albeit seldom enforced, Agnes Callamard said, “This will send a very strong and clear signal globally that democracies do not have criminal defamation laws.” while a Min of Justice spokesman said, “These common law offences are anachronistic and their continuing existence, albeit seldom used, has been cited by other countries as justification for the retention of similar laws, which have been actively used to restrict media freedom” http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/oct/25/house-of-lords-libel-laws

The bottomline is once again, you are going to have lots of foreign governments and journalists trying to peep under your skirts for the simple reason that you keep forgetting your panties at home! http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/oct/25/house-of-lords-libel-laws

Your chosen target is even more interesting. Poor Timothy is a little bit confused. Who else believes in a seer in this day and age. When he first started writing about his seer I thought it was aliterary gimmick just like this love affair of ours in cyberspace! But then I realised, that the poor guy had lost it and actually did believe himself! It is cruel to beat up on a poor confused man who has lost touch with reality and no longer knows that seers dont exist. That no one can see the future!

I hear mbu it was his story on the bomb blasts that was remembered. I wonder what the trigger was. Did he touch a nerve with his story on the late Col. Muzoora? How else does one understand the timing of his arrest! While we are on the subject, how do you intend to hold him on bail for a charge filed under a law that is already under challenge in a higher court? Quite frankly if you really wished to neutralise his story there are better ways of doing so that leave him looking silly without all of the over reaction that is going to make him come out looking the victim! If you dont know how to do it, you should have asked me. https://ddembe.wordpress.com/2010/07/21/in-timothys-world-everyone-else-is-gullible-and-timothy-is-not/ You will be surprised to know that you are not the only ones that found his story diffiult to believe. But I must say, the more your uncles over react and show themselves up to be bullies, the more his story now starts to ring true!

Lets look at this. You have the mans passport. He does not have the capacity to interfere with any so called investigations that maybe ongoing. The case will not be able to proceed until the courts sort out whether this law should go the same way as the dnosaurs and the anti sedition monstrosity! Even to those who know him, he at times sounds a bit shrill particularly when he declares himself to be the only thinker in Uganda and everyone else an idiot -just like Uncle Kaguta! In that respect they are similar. You have frustrated th man and ensured that in this state of political patronage, his publication is starved of advertising revenue!

Which reminds me, you guys have the carrot but you dont even know how to use it! Museveni said before that in order to create a stable country, Ugandans have got to be pulled up into the middle class. I agree with him but it is obvious he does not really know how to do that -pull Ugandans into the middle class. Its almost two decades since he started saying this but see where we are! Paesants. Unemployed. Charlatans and political tricksters using thier positions to fleece the rest! Reality is that people who have something to lose ie vested interests are not likely to burn the country down. What you saw in the recent riots is people who have very little to lose if it all burns down and unfortuantel in Kaguta’s Uganda they are the majority! You guys need to learn to share that animal -the kintu that you want to hypnotise us into believing we belong to whereas we dont! But Ugandans are not so sleepy after all. They can see when they are being sold ‘byoya bya nswa’!

If you really want to see an example of how eating and owning a piece of the pie can change what tune a man sings, you dont need to look any further than your own people who have fallen out of things. Once on the street, they sing different tune. Some are still singing -like in the FDC. Your problem is that they are now joining up with the other majority who have never been a part of the kintu! The best example though is Andrew Mwenda to take an example from the journalists world. As they say, a man cannotafford to poo where he eats. When Mwenda was a columnist working for a paycheque, he could afford to be as shrill as he wanted. That was as long as his editor allowed him to. The Monitor editors allowed him to until the Agha Khan took over. And then they were told clearly that his tone hurt the Agha Khans business interests in Uganda. Mwenda was cut lose -and he wrote a bitter resignation. He however managed to pick himself up and now owns a part of the pie -5 billion shillings worth a year! if it burns down, he loses, He will be just another Ugandan who was onec promising. Starting all over again is tough particularly when middle age is approaching. Most men are at their most productive in their mid thirties and by their mid forties opportunity costs are quite high and hungrier young men are snapping at their heels. Mwenda is in the kintu and cannot afford to lose it. He is now one of Fannons compradir bourgeoisie. If one wants him to regain his critical edge, he would have to lose everything and start all over again! Can you believe what would happen if all Ugandans were in the kintu? You guys would be unassailable. People would be living in bliss oblivious of your thieving for things would work. Who cares if you are skimming off if everyone is doing good? everytime you read Mwenda’s increasingly convergent opinions, just remember what could have been and all of the missed opportunities therein!

I cannot go without saying something about Muzeyi Doctor porofessa Mahogany! Am sure you now know that I am a seer -there I said it! now you cannot use the criminal libel laws against me without looking like a bully beating up on a gentle soul with a feeble mind! Didnt I tell you that all of your NRM bigwogs including Mahogany and daddy dear were puppets on a string? And that when things started to get tough, they would all be thrown before the oncoming train -just like Ben Ali and the paharoh of Egypt attempted to do with their own cabinets? That this was a family business and Mahogany was the butler with the rest as house staff!

Mahogany is the first one to be thrown before the oncoming train. Not only has he been used and discarded, but he has also been charged in the anti corruption court to ensure that his political future is definitely finished! That last bit clearly points at the moivation here. Unlike Kazibwe who was given our money for a useless pHD at Havard (did she even finish it?), muzeyi Mahogany will not get free money for a pHD. Actually he already has one! And he will not be posted to Paris or London either nor to the UN! He will be humiliated and dragged through the streets like a common thief. I wonder why we distingusih between common thieves and thieves -is there a difference? Muzeyi Mahogany now knows why sheep should never run with wolves!

Interestingly, Mahogany may have presided over the comittees that caused financial loss to Ugandans but am more intrigued by the man who set up the vehicle though which the tax payer got fleeced getting off scott free! Not only does Kuteesa get a free pass and a new portfolio, but he has already been “cleared” by the IGG! I think we may have to re evaluate his role a bit more. As you know from Temangalo, it doesnt really matter to us what the IGG says. There are matters of ethics, propriety and impropriety that need to be probed. For example I am still at a loss as to why Kuteesa would set up and sell a company dealing in cars whose only major contract was supplying cars in a fraudulent contract to the government. I also find it interesting that this company won a bid on dodgy grounds against an established BMW agent in Uganda! Pardon me if I see influence peddling somewhere in here by someone who speculated on the fact that CHOGM would need suppliers for luxury cars -et voila, one can see the “smartness” of the move!

P.S: I hope muzeyi Mahogany does not go the way of Behakanira!

Overgovernance; we can conclude that the NRM government is useless to Ugandans

Friday, June 3, 2011 at 11:32pm

Dearest Nina,

I can understand why you do not want to talk to me right now. That loser ST misread my last letter and thought I was plotting to beat him to peeping under your skirts. I sear to God that was not my intention! What a creep! Wamma, I was refering to the NRM’s skirts!!! As for daddy holding a kithambi, that was a figure of speech! I hear dirty minds and dirty tongues have been wagging!

I still want to discuss daddy’s cabinet! As I have mentioned before, I am concerned with the inclusion of all of those greedy eaters! There will be very little left over for the rest of us after they are through with the kintu! you see the rest of us, all 33 million of us have been waiting 25 years to get to the table. Uncle Kaguta when he was handing out brown envelopes the other day bying our votes said that we would have first class roads within 3 months! He ordered the engineers in the Ministry of works to start work immediately. They even used this excuse to immediately flout all of the PPDA rules claiming they did not have the time to deliver in three months if they had to go through red tape!

But we know from experience that when they do that, we end up with air while the money ahs all been spent. More than three months later, there are no roads to be seen. Could you ask dady to check and make sure they have not ripped us off again! In Japan when a corrupt constructor builds a road and skims off some money to build his house, everyone wins. The corrupt contractor gets a house, while the public get a wel constructed road guaranteed to provide service for decades. But in Uncle Kaguta’s Uganda, the contractor builds his house but the public see no roads!!! Why can’t Ugandan corrupt people be like corrupt Japanese? Instead in Uganda, they remind us how they were fighting while we were hiding under the bed! What kamanyiro! Like they were fighting in their own backyard without disturbing the rest of us!!! You know as they say you break it, you’ve got to fix it!

Before the elections we watched the daylight robbery in that talk house called parliament where the so called honourables were stealing rom the people. Mbu they each got 20 million to “supervise” development programmes in their constituencies! Whoever thought up that lie must have been smoking something illegal. You would think that for that kind of money they would be able to afford a good liar! Less than 6 weeks before that particular house was dissolved each member was handed enough money to pay the salary of a Ugandan teacher for 20 years with no guarantee that they would deliver, no TOR, no mechanism for audit to ensure value for money! Whoever heard of a major nationwide government programme without an inbuilt programme for monitoring and supervision? Could you tell me if in the original NAADS programme proposals it was proposed that MP’s would be the supervisors? If MP’s are meant to supervise programmes in their constitutencies, what exactly are all of those government flunkies with fancy titles paid to do? People like CAO’s, RDC’s, LC chairpersons at all sorts of levels -five, three, one etc. All of those councillors! What does the supervising minstry do and what are the project managers roles? It goes to just how useless and parasitic this political class is.

As you may see, I make no distinction between the opposition and the government. They are all in bed together when it comes to fleecing the taxpayer! If you doubt me just look at the recent shenanigans in that talk shop where they decided to discuss their own obscene allowances in camera! Like Ugandans have no right to know what they get for their money! You see in Uganda leaders appear to believe that Ugandans are there for their own self gratification! Mbu the dishonourable idiots want expensive cars for themselves and tax free allowances! This disease of ‘arrivalism’ you guys brought with you from the bush has infected the whole country! No wonder the NRM primaries were so chaotic with adults fighting each other like their very lives depended on it!

Whats with all of those MP’s anyway! Oh, I had forgotten its all a result of you guys gerrymandering! Creating numerous non viable districtlets dependent on the state titty with greedy jumped up pompous politicians falling all over themselves to provide support to the NRM in exchange for a small slice of their very own pie to eat closer to home!

Interestingly those pompous busybodies rejected Ssebagala’s nmination! I would have thought that he would have fit quite well with them! They seem to imagine that because they have a few more certficates than he does, they are better than he is. At least with Ssebagala, you know quite squarely where his allegiance is -in his bottom which he is quite happy to put at the service of the highest bidder! I hear poor Hajji was on “bedi resti” after you guys ripped him off by offering him a minsterial post you never intended to deliver!

Prof Nuwagaba suggested that Uganda is one of the most overgoverned countries in the world! You guys have creted a state of patronage where the provision of services takes a backseat to appeasing greedy politicians! These idiots wouldnt recognise development if it fell into their own laps! I think you should read that article. It is brilliant! http://www.reevconsult.co.ug/articles/35-articles/22-can-ugandas-over-governance-transform-the-economy.html As a matter of fact, you need to pass it on to the PM if he has never read it. Am sure if he had he would not have agreed to be the leader of government business presiding over such an obese and innefficient cabinet. Daddy’s cabinet is one of the largets in the world! If it were a reality show, it would be the biggest loser! The Biggest loser at least does offer free entertainment. In this case it is painfull to watch all of those posturing peacocks who believe that being elected by Ugandans gives them the right to rip off Ugandans without their consent!

Nuwagaba says that _“We have 45,000 Local Councils (LC1s); 5500 parishes (LC IIs),1026 sub-counties (LCIIIs) including Town Councils and Municipal Divisions; 151 Counties (LC4); 18 Municipalities including 5 Divisions of Kampala City; and 80 districts (LCVs) including Kampala City. All theses structures have councils with 10 people as executive officials implying for instance 450,000 chairpersons and LCI executive officials, 55,000 chairpersons and LCII executive officials etc. There are also a host of councilors and chiefs (most of whom are now actually redundant because their main pre occupation was collection of graduated tax that has been recently abolished). Don’t forget that there are 304 Members of Parliament and 69 Ministers! Going by conservative figures, I have estimated that we have a Leadership to Population Ratio of 1:6. This compares with the national Doctor to population Ratio of 1:30,000!! with district variations eg. Kitgum has 1:33,000 (Ministry of Health Sector Strategic Plan 1999/2000).”
_
What exactly do you people think you are doing? Do you really believe that by paying off every greedy little local politician with a large mouth services will come to the people? Haven’t you learnt from 25 years of making the same mistakes? Look at Kampala city, one of the most over governed cities in the world. It is a smelly dump with un collected garbage, no roads for those pits you call roads can’t really be called roads without insulting roads! Even the potholes in Kampala are an insult to potholes!!! Yet the pompous little busybodies waltz around demanding respect like they have done a good job! Mbu Seya said he deserved to be rewarded! One wonders what for. For making us the laughing stock of the world? I cringe when people tell me they have visited Kampala! Don’t you? What do you tell your friends from Nottingham or Sweden when they visit? That daddy is the kingpin of this ant heap? Have yu ever seen those pitiful women sweeping mud filled potholes with grass brooms in the morning? That too is another scam perpetrated on the people of Kampala!

Now Kampala has like five mayors! A city you can walk the length of from one end to the other in an hour or even less!And a lord mayor. Plus loads of councillors half of them semi literate with no idea at all what a modern city should look like! All combined with one of the most corrupt bureucracies in the southern hemisphere! Now there is a whole minstry too on top as well as another authority headed by a CEO! I did listen to that woman talk and I must say that I may come to like her! She speaks well and with authority. and am not talking about posturing. She has clearly identified the problems. I would like to compare her knowledge of Kampala and its problems with that of the outgoing mayor and _“minister for fortpolio’s” _Seya Ssebagala! Unfortunately, with all of those posturing self important peacocks at all levels, she is going to spend a lot of time placating idiots instead of doing her job.

You guys had the opportunity to overhaul the local government act and instead of fixing the problem, you handicapped her with hundreds of puffed up councillors and self important mayors all in the name of political expedience! This was the time to close down city hall, get rid of all of the councils while appointing a new authority with a CEP on a performance based contract and no political affiliations with the powers to hire and fire her own team! But that goes to show just how little you get it and need to retire an leave these things to people with the training to do them. You see the limitations of peasant Generals are kind of catching up with the NRM! Paesant Generls are only usefull in the early parts of a revolution -to mobilise paesants but they have no place in a modern state as their skills just cannot keep up with the times!

Haggai Matsiko in his article of 9 November 2010, “A Sleeping Giant of Too Many Leaders, Laws, Policies, And No Implementation” stated that “The country has 327 Members of Parliament, 69 Ministers, 278 political appointees who include 80 Resident District Commissioners and 80 deputies, 75 presidential advisors and 43 presidential private secretaries and their deputies. And this is just a sample of the real picture of Uganda’s amorphous public administration.” http://allafrica.com/stories/201011100994.html

The new cabinet introduces more useless ministries like the Ministry for Bunyor, Teso, Kampala in addition to those useless one for Karamoja and Luwero not to mention Ethics. Quite frankly have you ever visited Luwero? They are so close to Kampala and have had a ministry all of their own for almost 25 years. I can assure you that if you visit Luwero, you will agree that having a minstry does not benefit a district! Karamoja too is one of those places that has had a minsitry for decades. It remains arguably the most underdeveloped part of Uganda. Workers have had MP’s in government and am sure they feel un represented. Ditto the army! Do you think those privates in tattered uniform and mama ingia poles feel represented?

While we are on the subject, given everyone has got to be represented, how comes the police is not reprepsented in parliament? The other day, I hear an association was formed for the_ “abataasoma”,_ the illiterates of this country! They too promptly asked to be represented! Mbu they wanted an MP too! And even more seriously, how comes our tribes and kingdoms too do not get an MP in parliament? Given the argument for the army getting ten representatives is that they have potential to destabilise this country, shouldnt tribes be represented in parliament? I cannot think of anything that has potential to destabilise Uganda like tribes!! If you do extend the subject you will of course realise why this obsession with representation in its most simplistic form is so ridiculous! Ugandans are so disenchanted with the ability of the NRM government to deliver services and development that they will only accept that they are represented if one of their own, from their tribe, their village or county is eating!!!

Matsiko helps us understand the figures even better, quote,_ “Numbers aside, the expenditure on these administrators is enormous. Each presidential advisor and presidential assistant earns a salary of slightly more than Shs 2 million a month, gratuity of Shs 9.9 million every year, Shs 150,000 fuel allowance and Shs 150,000 imprest every month. This alone translates into Shs 908.5 million in a year, enough to pay for 378 primary school teachers for whole year at a salary of Shs200, 000 per month and Shs 2,400,000 a year. The overall total of the government expenditure on advisors, presidential assistants, RDCs, deputy RDCs, presidential private secretaries and their deputies alone is about Shs 7.5 billion a year. This money would support 2,077 UPE schools of 800-pupil enrollment or buy drugs for 890 Health Centre IVs, construct 935 classrooms, or pay for 37,500 primary teachers, half of the additional 72,000 teachers required to lift the quality of UPE.”_

Now it becomes easy to understand where out money goes and why we have got potholes, rubbish is not collected, the health system is a shambles and we are addicted to debt and foreign aid!

Matsiko adds further that , “Despite the expenditure, observers say that these advisors are doing nothing at all apart from draining government coffers,….”. There it is in black and white. All of these people are useless. As you can see I can do a better job for a fraction of the price. Am sure there are plenty of young well trained Ugandans ready to step in and relieve all of the old foggy brains of the burden of mismanaging our country!

This Mastiko guy doesnt let go! He may end up joining Kalyegira for this article even though its old. But then Kalyegira’s is old too. He states further,

“Advisors aside, each MP earns 14.5million, which means altogether they earn over Shs 57bn annually, devoid of allowances. Moreover, there are 69 Ministers who have all sorts of allowances including government vehicles. Government expenditure on fuel, oils and maintenance of the vehicles increased from Shs 36.7billion in 2004/05 to Shs 92 billion in 2006/07. These ministers prosper at the expense of the public even though Article 114 of the constitution states that “the total number of Ministers appointed under this article shall not exceed twenty-one except with the approval of Parliament.”

We know of course that MP’s have since increased their pay to 19 million a small fortune to a Ugandan!

The other day Janet was in parliament talking about patriotism. One wonder whether the eaters in the NRM really know what patriotism means! Nuwagaba says that “as long as a receptionist in National Drug Authority (NDA) earns Shs 944, 541 per month, while a medical doctor who spent seven year in medical school earns a paltry Shs 705,621, implementation will remain a nightmare. Even a driver at the Bank of Uganda earns Shs 1,135347 per month. Such disparities defeat logic and directly affect public service provision. Consequently, skilled and experienced personnel required in central government service quit.”

This looks like simple logic to me but obviously its too difficult for the NRM to grasp even after presiding over this country for 25 years. Think about this -any high school drop out can be a receptionist while a medical doctor has got to excel at all levels of Uganda’s dog eat dog education, spend five years at university, spend another in slave labour otherwise called internship, be posted to counties and places other Ugandans dont even know exist for anywhere between 3 and 10 years then return to Mulago for a Masters degree that includes working free for uncivil hours for Mulago -and still earn less than the receptionist! Rwanda does get it, and thats why Ugandans are manning their hospitals!

Old man Gureme as far back as 2003, in “Over-governed and over-taxed, Uganda should restore federo”, said that,

“The federo costs: Let’s assume that Uganda had 100 counties, with an average of six sub-counties, each with six milukas, each muluka with say two batongole.

That would make about 4,600 chiefs. Add say 50 big chiefs at their headquarters, plus say 20 DCs and Buganda residents, making about 4,670 district administrators/dispensers of justice.

With today’s basic educational requirements and shortages of judges and magistrates, it would be advantageous if chiefs initially trained at the Law __

Development Centre (LDC) as magistrates, some rising to be judges in due course.

Today we have in excess of 79,900 councillors at all levels, some receiving stipends and/or sitting allowances, the rest spoiling for payment. Apart from __

the embittered northerners, they are mainly vote-entrappers for the Movement in the guise of LCs (nine at each stratum) taking services closer to the people, in practice taking terror closer to the oppressed (under Amin); and embezzlement closer to the victims today.

With 56 RDCs, earning princely salaries, parades of well-remunerated assistant RDCs, plus 56 rather insecure CAOs, and packs of assistants (we received __

relatively tamer wages for combining the two jobs), plus a mammoth taxpayer-financed asylum accommodating superannuated loyal discards in the Movement

Secretariat. An enormous “ethnically balanced” council of ministers; and a parliament too large for its House! Clearly this country is over-governed, for

which it is correspondingly over-taxed (never mind the non-prosecutable tax evaders); all building up a very strong case for restoring federalism.”

The NRM introduced this monster of political patronage. They believe that by paying off everyone who criticises them, they will be left alone to eat in peace. Unfortunately, Museveni forgets his own words. In 1986, he stated that government is useless if it cannot deliver services to the people”. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FedsNet/message/4201_
_
Today we can declare the NRM government useless with no shortage of abundant evidence!

Random answers on health in UG.

Monday, January 10, 2011 at 7:26pm

Nina says,

“I think Mugerwa was getting into this. I know for a fact that in California, US. All doctor’s sit exams for their licenses each year before it is renewed. Do we do the same here? Who is responsible for that? I know docto…rs put in some pro bono hours a year and it serves as community service. Do we do the same here? I know doctors are easily sued for negligence abroad, is that the case here? What about medical arbitration? Inspection of hospital facilities? Investigation of medical misconduct? monitoring of drug distribution? Reporting systems to the police on certain patients that are treated? Are these all not part of the solution that Mugerwa is offering except he is calling them pressure groups? What do you want us to call such overseeing bodies that keep Ugandan doctors that work abroad in check? Should Museveni lead this or should we ask him to set it up if it is not there, hence educate him?”

I will attempt to answer some of these questions for the sake of other participants even though I believe they were irrelevant.

Recertification is not universal even in the US. Very few other places in the world practice recertification.

Most rely on good training in medical schools, formal and structured postgraduate service and specialty/subspecialty training as well as good post spcialisation continuous education which is structured with GP’s and specialists being required to submit evidence of continuing education including attending workshops, conferences, journal clubs and formal post graduate/graduate courses in relevant subjects.

There are arguments as to which system is the best but the rest of the world is not rushing to emulate California. Uganda has no system for recertification.

Pro bono is a legal term more specific to law than to medicine. There is no requirement for voluntary work but many doctors do so. Some will offer treatment to disadvantaged populations others will go off to third world destinations to offer their services.

In Uganda the relevant paediatrics, surgical and physicians professional associations do organise upcountry ‘clinics’. These are collegial activities where colleagues go along for the fun and also render a service to a community such as free surgery or free checkups and treatment.

Quite frankly virtually every doctor in Uganda working in a public hospital or clinic who does not demand money from his patients illegally is subsidising the public health system as they are poorly remunerated, put in unpaid overtime all of the time and sometimes even contribute financially to the care of a patient or fuelling their cars or private phones used for official work.

There is nothing barring doctors getting sued in uganda save a relatively ignorant population that does not know its own rights as well as what constitutes quality care. Even those who believe they know probably have no clue what they are talking about. For example your example of prostate cancer in your grandpa that was allegedly missed until five years later when it was seen in retrospect may not be as clear cut as you think it is.

I doubt that many of our lawyers are competent at pursuing medical negligence lawsuits and neither can their patients afford them. Quite frankly our lawyers are too confortable making ten percent off drawing up easy papers. However the advent of mango tree universities churning out lawyers by the hundreds may change that as many will end up redundant and have to find new niches. There are however no amulances to chase so we will have to find another name for ‘ambulance chasers” as these lawyers are called.

If you ask me Ugandan patients should sue. But I would advise them to go for the hospitals and the government. these are government hospitals. If a patient dies, the doctor and the system have to be sued. if the doctor failed to provide care due to the negligence of his employer, then the hospital has to pay. There is a case for numerous class action suits by Ugandan patients against the government hospitals and the government. And trust me the dotors if this were tested in court will get out of it as many of the so called negligence is really a systemic problem due to them not being facilitated to practice their profession fully.

As for medical arbitration I beleive this is a completely undeveloped area. Patient liaison and support may be easier to set up. Specifically someone needs to speak for all those patients on Mulago’s floor. Someone with enough knowledge to advocate for them for many really have no idea that they are being shafted. I doubt that some of the managers know that either!!!

Medical facilities are inspected and “certified” as compliant with specific set out criteria. So a hospital can be certified as fit to take on interns for training if they have a certain number of consultants in place to supervise them, have certain facilities of a preset standard, have a certain staffing level at predetermined grades, does a certain number of procedures, provides a certain level of training etc. There is no such formal certification system in Uganda. The closest is the project christine worked in.

Medical misconduct can be pursued in uganda. All doctors are licences by the Uganda Medical Board. Having a medical degree is not a license to practice medicine.

It is possible for you to look up cases brought by the board against the proprietor of Case clinic for example a few years ago. in your circles every second or third person probably has been to Case clinic or know the proprietor and may have heard about this case. the board can withdraw licenses, suspend doctors from practice or limit their practice or demand practice under supervision. It can also recommend criminal charges for criminal negligence. The offices are in Wandegeya the last time I checked.See More

Criminal charges can also be brought if the problem falls under criminal law say abortion, sexual assault, homicide etc.

Monitoring of drug distribution is the job of the Ministry of Health and the government medical stores. If you google them, you wiii find that they have spent obscene amount of money on computerised warehousing software for the National Medical Stores. The deal for upgrading a software system that was working well and was less than five years old a few years ago cost a ridiculous amount of money. Personally I thought that there was a problem with the whole deal.

Local drug distribution, and dispensing within a hospital is controlled by the pharmacy. Nurses administer against a prescription signed by a doctor and have to maintain records for the pharmacy to ensure accountability. Doctors have no contact at all with drugs within this system except to prescribe them. In a tertiary hospital like Mulago that is the case. In upcountry stations it is a little bit more complicated as many times the only doctor is also the medical superintendant who has to travel all of the way to entebbe to do inane things like sign for drugs and transport them from Entebbe to kotido in the only ‘ambulance’ the hospital owns!

In the British system, doctors report deaths to a coroner if there is a problem or evidence of malpractice. Mandatory reporting of certain cases following preset guidelines has to be put in place. All other straight forward cases where the cause of death is clear receive a death certficate by a member of the team that looked after the patient. if the case is unclear then a post mortem is done particularly if there is suspicion of foul play.

Where systems work all cases where a patient dies within a certain number of days after a major operation or procedure is considered as reportable and the doctor cannot issue a death certificate without discussing the case with the coroner first. I think the equivalent in Uganda is the police surgeon!

Unfortunately in Uganda upcountry the local medical officer also acts as the police surgeon when required to so am not sure how you are going to get him to review himself when he is the only doctor in the county.

The police only gets involved in cases that fall under criminal law. Cases of malpractice, professional misconduct and negligence unless they cause bodily harm or death are cases for civil litigation or referral to the medical board.

Doctors abroad are not kept in check by “pressure groups”. Primarily the first check is training and specialist certfication in certfied units that are well supervised and perform a minimum number and range of procedures. Hospitals have their code of conduct and Health authorities have their codes too. Ethics is a part of medical training specifically medical ethics and professional conduct. licesnsing Boards oversea licensing and hear professional misconduct. hospitals have patient liaison and patient advocates who hear patient grievances and liaise with the teams. And insurance companies organise additional training in risk management to their client (doctors) to avoid law suits. Most of all the system in which doctors work has got to provide a framework in which they can practice safe medicine else the instituion gets sued. Certfication boards will not certify a hospital unless it comlies with minimum regulations else it will be shut down. Patient advocacy groups may advocate but they are an additional layer not the primary controllers of quality. Most of all hospitals know they will get sued if their doctors kill a patient and it is found that the system contibuted to the death. The primary role of setting up and supervising these syetms is the government and it cannot pass on this responsibility to anyone else.

In any functioning organisation or government the buck stops with the boss. thats how they justify their huge pay and bonuses. it all means that when things go wrong, again they take the fall!

Thats why in many democracies an investigation revealing excess deaths in a government hospital due to systemic failures and the negligence calls for the resignation of the Health Minister for failing in their dupervisory roles.

Now if people tell me that we have such a big problem and we cannot and should not place the blame on the people who have been running the government not for one but for 25 years, then i remain flabbergasted!

Even after a catalogue of incompetence and corruption in the GAVI scandals and numerous other flawed deals let alone all of the excess mortality and shortages!

If a president believes that giving each MP 20 million for the nebulous and ill defined ‘NDAADS” activities is better than making a grant to say Uganda Cancer Institute then we really are in trouble!!! Now the president is frantically making plans to offer new markets to upcountry areas as a part of his campaign donations!!!

The people to educate Museveni have always been there but he believes in teaching them! Many years ago museveni said doctors will get a living wage when they become “productive”. That he preferred to pay lawyers and tax collectors because they were productive!!! So junior lawyers and junior tax collectors made and syill make more than a medical consultant with more than a decade of training and several decades of experience! That said it all. If an economist cannot see a link between an unhealthy workforce and production one wonders. Who guarantees your workforce?

And if they believe the solution is to jail a few doctors as “an example” and place ignorant cadres with half their IQ’s to “supervise them” (read bully them), then I pity poor Ugandans!

Its time for politicians to grow ears and listen to the people who guarantee their “success”! No solution to health that bypasses doctors is going to work! And certainly one that bullies them will fail!

God save this country!

Health -Using figures to tell lies!

Tuesday, February 1, 2011 at 10:35pm

@ Mbabazi,

When brevity is required, i use it. When the subject requires more, my posts which are really notes to myself that i have been writing for years will be longer.

You are right, I am not impressed by Kaganzi! Obviously he does not know much about health services and neither does he know much about Ugandans! He is making up “government policy” on the run to make up for the deficiencies of the NRM!

Official Ugandan government policy is to provide free “health for all”! unfortunately they set the bar so low, but hope that Ugandans are so stupid, they cannopt see when they are being sold air!

IHK, Paragon, Nakasero, Gulu Independent are all purely private hospitals. They each have weaknesses that we shall not go into! All of these facilities are so expensive that their effective coverage of the Ugandan population is in single digits! you cannot base the healthcare system of a whole country of 33 million people on these hospitals.

Ishaka Teaching hospital is a beneficiary of government patronage both because of who the owner is -an NRM party member who is a party donor who receives government patronage and “launders” it before returning it to the NRM as “donations”. There are numerous other cases where he has received loans and outright grants from government in exchange for very little back to the taxpayer! During the construction of Ishaka, he received extraordinary tax concessions on building materials ordered by the president in the hundreds of millions of shillings! Lecturers in the teaching hospital, a private facility receive payments and salaries from the government again in special arrangements orderd by state house while this hospital receives government money. It cannot therefore be compared to any of the other hospitals. Paragon which looked very good on paper, practically went broke in less than two years!

God forbid you ever get admitted to one of these “hospitals” some of which are really not fit to carry the name except to Kampala’s ignorant glitteratti! the cost per day is in the hundreds of thousands to the millions of shillings per day! More than 90% -I would daresay well over 95% of ugandans would not be able to go anywhere near these facilities!

How then does a government cater for the over 90% of Ugandans who need healthcare but would never be able to pay for care in any of these facilities when it has virtually completely disengaged itself from providing healthcare services to them and left it to an underfunded private sector that quite frankly caters only to the top 2 to 5 %?

Even in developed nations equipment like CT scanners (there is more than CT you know in terms of medical diagnostic technologies), requires government expenditure. Even private facilities receive government capitation grants in order to access new technologies in public-private partnerships!

No country in the world can afford to pass the responsibility for providing medical services to the private sector! In a very poor country like Uganda, only by abdicating its responsibility to provide health services to its citizens can the government sit back and pass the buck to the private sector!

As for Ms Tracy’s spirited defence -again one has to ask a simple question! When did you people last ever visit any of these facilities you spout wonderful figures about? Half of the nation is under the age of 15. Real unemployment is virtually unrecordable. even those who claim to be employed can’t really be said to be employed -the more correct term being disguised unemployment! Count the number of taxi touts at a Wandegeya stop all calling for passengers to Kampala (there is no other destination for taxis that stop there), add the drivers and the conductors then tell me that those people really all need to be there? Ditto the number of boda bodas at one stage most really just chewing mairungi all day! How many of them are really emplyed and how many are pretending to be employed? Add the retirees and the paesants -who exactly is meant to guarantee that these people get a reasonable healthcare if not the government?

And before you tell me about the health centres, please read my earlier post on healthcentres!

Why bundibugyo and Kabale should sack their politicians and recruit more doctors instead.

Monday, June 6, 2011 at 12:36am

Dear Nina,

Today I feel great love for you! So I promise I will not mention the prime minster or that annoyance Twino! It will be just you and me, with the moon and the stars!

I am glad you went beyond the rhetoric and propaganda in the NRM manifesto and actually looked at what is happening on the ground. Ever since I started debating the issue of health services in Uganda on FB, none of the NRM debaters sent here by the government to “counteract opposition propaganda” has ever taken up the challenge! The challenge has always been that they visit a real hospital or health centre, speak to real patients or medical and nursing personnel and report their experience back here preferably with a comment as to how their findings compare with the official rhetoric! As you can see, things on the ground are not the same as the glossy reports by the government or the presidents rosy speeches! All of those challenged usually disappear and never come back or come back to a different topic while attempting to dismiss the challenge! The fact that it has stood for now almost a year tells one a lot about how un seriosly this government really takes the priorities of ordinary Ugandans!

I still remember that very brusing first round you and I first had when you challenged my views on Mulago and Ugandan’s health services. That we have now moved to the library and down to the ground is progress.

The NRM has forgotten one thing -all politics is local. Your choice of Kabale demonstrates this. But the very fact that all politics is loval is why the delivery of services is important. Its why it makes very little sense that the NRM ‘won’ the last election with “a large majority” which in their opinion proves their “popularity”! But we all know that this election was won on money and blackmail but not real issues for the issues that are closest to the hearts of Ugandans are the very issues at which it sucks most!

Your choice of Kabale reminds me of a girl who left Uganda about ten years ago. She has never come back and has no intention of ever doing so. I knew her at university. She was a very hard working student. She came from a middle class family, had grown up in an urban area and went to one of Uganda’s elite girls schools. Following her internship (you see she is a doctor), she was posted to Kabale. There she endured hardship for the next 2 or 3 years in virtual servitude and says she did things she never ever thought she would ever have to do to survive. By the time she left, the local rural men who fancied themselves wealthy and sophisticated wanted to marry her as an extra wife or keep her as a mistress! She felt humiliated for the reason that these mocal village idiots thought she was within their reach was because they knew she was broke. That some of them had control over whether she got remunerated or not did not make things easier. For as you know, the MoH divested itself of responsibility for docotors and decentralised recruitment and salaries to districts. At some point her pay was 12 months in arrears. She believed that the local politicians and admininstrators deliberately manipulated her salary to keep her broke and dependent.

Off the top of my head, I can give you a story from Fort Portal invloving a savedee who left after a year without a salary and having been forced to do things heis conscience could not live with, another who told me horror stories of operating in stone age conditions in Hoima -he left. And another who left Gulu after ten years having lived there at a time when most southerners would never ever consider crossing the Karuma. I can introduce you to people on FB who left Ugandan being owed wages for several months to a year or longer or others who were never delployed for months to years -they left and will not come back. They all have horror stories of working in primitive conditions, unpaid and unsupported. And when they hear you politicians trying to blame them for the inadequacies in a health system you do not even use, they just pack their bags and leave while the politicians continue to strut and posture for the cameras while shunning the same dilapidated health structures.

I can see that Apollo has problems with discussing what he prefers to believe is NRM internal business. I have news for him -the emperor is naked. Health services are used by everybody and they are public business. Specifically the failure of the NRM to deliver even basic minimum care for 25 years is in the public domain and has got to be discussed. Refusal of the NRM to discuss these problems is like the proverbial ostrich burying its head in the sand -does not prevent it from getting eaten by predators!

An Alice chimes in with her usual insensitivity! Why should doctors be bonded when no one else is being bonded? If we are going to bond doctors, then everyone else should be bonded to. Why is it OK for Alice to go off to the UK with her state funded degree and not for a doctor? As it is doctors in addition to spending more time on their training, working longer and more unfriendly hours, are one of few professionals who get posted to all sorts of places in Uganda without even relocation costs.

Migration is an individual right for everyone regardless of profession. It is the role of the government to provide reasonable remuneration and employment not the role of doctors to subsidise government incompetence and politician ineptitude. https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=469636102680 The invocation of selective patriotism is just simply blackmail!

We have already demonstrated how the huge political administration at all levels is a drain on public resources while being unproductive. Simply halving the size of political leadership at all levels from the executive, parlaiment to districts through counties and down to the village would free enough resources to employ new medical and nursing staff.

The question has been asked regarding what role RDC’s, assistant RDC’s, CAO’s and the armies of local politicians do to justify their allowances. If you followed Stephen Twinoburyo’s page in the last few days you will notice that the topic has been the cost of so called leaders and politicians and the opportunity cost in terms of service delivery. Today Ms Ssuuna posted an article showing that Kampala’s politicians cost the rate payers 18 billion a year. Methinks Kampala City could save a lot of money by getting rid of all its local politicians and using that 18 billion to provide services!

But the same could be said of lots of other places. Districts should get rid of the bulk of their semi literate councillors and self important chairmen and dliver services instead CAO’s RDC’s, assisteant RDC’s in addition to LC V district chairmenand councillors, various other politicians at county and subcounty levels as well as villagers should be got rid of. Specificall the village LC’s outlived their usefulness for they have no utility in terms of delivering services. All they do is to entrench the NRM in power being vehicles for patronage rather than vehicles for service delivery!

Today someone introduced me to the concept of a captive economy. Essentially Uganda is an economy captive to vested interests including those of politicians and cronies of Museveni. This results in gross distortions, corruption and innefficiency that stunt development. Essentially Ugandans will have to liberate their economy from these vested interests if we wish to develop at all.

Many years ago as a student I spent a lot of my time volunteering with cancer patients. I met a man who was a village teacher in Bundibugyo. His 8 year old son had cancer. Every two weeks this man travelled all the way from Bundibugyo with his son, in buses and taxis. He slept on the hospital floor while his son was in hospital and faithfully returned for the next treatment. He told me about the horrible journey through horrible roads. He told me aboyt the fact that his whole district had no doctors and how he wished that one could go and work there. His son survived as far as I know thanks to his fathers diligence.

The following links connect to a story about a Dr Ssessanga who in 2008 was the only doctor in Bundibugyo even after the Ebola outbreak in 2007. In Feb 2011, it was reported that “Dr Steven Ssesanga, the lone doctor, who also serves as the medical superintendent, lost his father last week and left behind hordes of patients writhing in pain, some needing emergency care.”

Please note the sanctimonious tone of the article like it was Dr Ssessanga’s fault that he was the only person willing to work in Bundibudgyo. In another article in April Dr Ssessanga states, “I am alone and I cannot attend to everyone at the same time,”

“Sesanga, also the hospital superintendent, is the only doctor in the district. Apart from treating patients, he has to carry out administrative work.

“I have very little time to rest. If I do, people will die,” he says.

Sesanga says Bundibugyo Hospital is the district’s referral health facility, serving over 280,000 people from as far as the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

However, the hospital is understaffed, operating at slightly above 50% of the required human resource.
Ronald Mutegeki, the administrator, says of the 126 staff employed at the hospital, only 71 are qualified.”

Further in the same article it becomes obvious the government is not doing its job. “The hospital receives sh276m annually from the primary health care fund under the Ministry of Health. He says the hospital needs about sh5b annually to meet at least half of its costs. “

I think that doctors like Ssessanga need a standing ovation as do many doctors who chose to work in Uganda despite the abuse, the poor remuneration, the poor facilites and job satisfaction.

Now could anyone tell me why the number of councillors and overpaid political appointees in Bundibgyo shouldnt be halved to make way for more doctors and better pay for Ssessanga?

Lastly this whole problem starts right from the top. In the early years of the NRM, Museveni stated that doctors will be paid a living wage when they become productive. He stated that he preferred to pay layers and revenue collection agents a living wage rather than doctors because “they were productive”. I remember thinking at the time that the president didn’t understand even basic high school commerce. My high school commerce taught me that the basic pillars of the productivity were land, labour and capital. My understanding is that a healthy workforce needs healthcare. if the president was not willing to pay the people who guaranteed the health of his workforce, how did he hope to boost productivity?

More than twenty years later, he still doesnt get it! And all of the choir singers in the NRM like Apollo do not want to contradict him because that would be “airing the government dirty linen in the wrong forum”!!!

P.S. You can find more of my thoughts on Ugandan health services on my blog.

http://ddembe.wordpress.com/category/health/

We all have big mouths! How comes only Banyankole get shut up with fat brown envelopes?

Dear Nina,

Today I have decided to breach a topic I normally stay away from. That of tribalism and nepotism practiced by the NRM government as well as the perceptions of Bahima and westerners that could cause major problems for us in future.

I know that this topic is taboo and that there is even a law that makes it illegal to call a muhima a muhima or something to that effect. That the so called anti sectarian law was created to prevent people from discussing this topic! That it is sectarian to say that Bahima are eating and the rest of us get to watch them! But that mad man Nathan decided to let the genie out of the bottle now everyone is talking about it. And that it is the closest equivalent to a tribal cyber stone throwing that we could have on facebook!

I also wish to complain because ever since I started writing on facebook and becoming a major pain in your governments backside, no one has approached me with a brown envelope while other people who happen to come from the right part of the country are all telling me they are receiving offers from as far up as the presidents office that include private audience with his excellence! Even that rat Twino got invited to eat things!!! Is it because he is from Kiruhuura and speaks she and I am not? I hear people have been calling him to say he should not discuss “family business” and that they will sort him out with a big brown envelope to keep his big mouth shut! Shia! Even me I have a big mouth! How comes no one is shutting me up with a fat brown envelope? Even corruption and bribery is tribalised in Museveni’s Uganda!

I have not peeped at Nathans Bahima board for two days and have never read it in full. It’s going to be my next project. I did see a few quite primitive statements from both sides including some very typical bush Bahima. I will demonstrate what I mean by bush Bahima!

I will be writing my views on Bahima my fathers family having employed them for generations as some members of my fathers family have more cows than many Bahima could ever dream of.

My first meeting with a muhima/bahima was at the age of seven while on holiday on a relatives ranch in Luwero. I was amazed at this creature, obviously poor and ill mannered, who addressed his employer’s wife who had just offered him free food as “omwiru ogu”. He refused to dig up the food he was offered free at his request (cassava) as “ngu nti mwiru”. He had claimed his family had nothing to eat! This was after he he had turned down free potatoes “ngu, narya ebitakuri, ng’omwiru?” Even more amazing to me was the fact that his boss offered him free alcohol and actually went down to the garden and dug up the food for him which he carried off at the end of the day. This simple woman had hundreds of cows in her own right!

Over the course of that holiday, I came to meet many of these “bush bahima” and their arrogance. I still remember them till today and in many ways understand how the Bairu of Ankole feel about them from that interaction and many future ones. I even learnt runyankole which unfortunately I later forgot. Children are very fast learners.

With the advent of the NRM, many bush bahima suddenly fell into things. I use the term bush bahima losely to refer to those ignorant ones like the ones I have referred to above who treat people even those who feed and employ them as dirt. They suddenly fell into things with many hillarious stories told about them which I shall not repeat. Some of those very funny characters have now evolved to become the movers of our society but unfortunately their manners have not -they brought them with them intact into national offices. If one wants to get a clear idea of their evolution, one just has to look at serial photos of Museveni’s suits from the short sleeved kaunda suit over long sleeved shirts, watch on the right arm, and gum boots in 1986 to saville row suits today.

I found out that they spat and “kunyampad” in public. The fought after getting drunk on their hosts free booze. And they were arrogant and abusive and looked down upon everyone including their boss! And the men and women squatted leaving very little to a vivid childhood imagination. Neither men nor women wore underwear! I also found out that they married their cousins, practiced a form of wife swapping and many were paedophiles and harrassed young girls who the wanted to “kusweera”!

I did then and later when I was older ask my aunt about her interactions with the bahima. My uncle took me around to the kraals where they lived with his and my fathers cattle. Their homes were pathetic and in many cases lean to’s with the children sleeping outside on a “katandaro” or in a small hut with their parents who I was assured by older teenage cousins had some fairly noisy sexual habits! I found that these bahima showed me how to milk a cow. They knew all of my fathers cows by name including which one was the mother or father of which one. They knew when they were sick. My uncle and aunt just laughed at what they called ignorance but maintained that some of these men and women were actually good men and women. Both of them spoke fluent runyankole.

From my aunt and uncle i also found out that many of these people were good men and women. The women would come around for free food and chat with their boss. And they had the same problems athat other women had. They talked about family and children. That the men could be very good and generous friends with friendships lasting for decades. My uncle did say however that he could never trust them with his cows except to look after them for if he blinked, the cows would disappear.

I learn the meaning of the word “nyabuzaare”. The joke around as I found out later was that if you married a muhima woman and a vistor came who she referred to a nyabuzare, do not leave them together! For the sexual taboos that Baganda had towards blood relatives differed from those of Bahima so this nyabuzaare some of whom visit for months or longer maybe the reason yur children look like Bahima!

Some girlfriends later taught me more about this nyabuzaare thing. One was amazed at Baganda. “Abaganda nze sibategyeera”! In her opinion, the way Baganda behaved could never happen among her people. She believed that a muhima could never discriminate against a fellow muhima and offer a job to another, regardless of merit. Actually she believed that in the matter of jobs, a nyabuzaare and tribesmate came first! That if a muhima headed a department, it was expected that he or she would offer jobs to all villagemates and relatives first. That it was impossible for them to head a department full of foreigners.

I got to know one girl and her “bush family” very well. She was hima/ tutsi from the lukoola’s of Buganda in Sembabule and very well connected to kuteesa, jet mwebaaze, Kazini, joviah, Kagame, Guma and Salim Saleh. Actually she introduced me to some of them’ Through her i got to hear some interesting stories behind the street parking deal and the Entebbe enhas deal. I learnt to recognise these peoples private and public dealing with the spla and bashirs hostility. i heard about congo years before we fought there. and i knew stories from behind the lines in rwanda. I even met spla officers at a private function introduced to me at a day after museveni had publicly disavowed any connection between spla and uganda. i understood then that to many of these men the war in the north and southern sudan was simply business -they provided goods and protection. i met coltan dealers when most ugandans were unaware we exported coltan or even had it. and i learnt that there was indeed gold in karamoja and it just wasn’t stories. In person many of these people were very nice and generous if they were your friends. at uni i knew three more girls, one of whom was very close to jim muhwezi while another was close to salim saleh. at one point salim gave this 20 year old girl 30 000 dollars to “keep” for him. those days this was a fortune!

Over the years, i have seen and heard the stories of sudden wealth, arrogance, whole departments staffed by one tribe, lucrative postings and jobs reserved for one tribe. i have seen reports and queries about ura and high ranking army officers. i have seen people who have risen from little more than herdsmen to significant wealth by any and all standards. I have seen young people, some relatives who will not bother to apply for jobs because its now accepted that you have got to come from one part of the country or have a nose of a certain length to qualify.

But I have also been back to Luwero as well as Mbarara and realised that there are still many Bahima there who still leave much the same way that I first saw them as a child. I have had them beg me to buy milk off them in Luwero because it will go bad and they have to feed their children. I have realised that this kintu is just a gimmick. That even among Bahima, some are closer to the table than me without connections or with the background that enables me to go around this entrenched system of patronage!

The average muganda is still better off in many respects than some of these people. That while there has been an unofficial affirmative program involving choice postings, lucrative positions and free money from supplying air in contracts known only to some as well as scholarships distributed under the presidents bed under very vague circumstances, this system of patronage does not benefit all westerners or even Bahima many of whom are still as poor and ignorant as ever despite the arrogance.

I have a two brothers with Bahima girlfriends/wives and children and have never seen much evidence of things falling their way. The only time that one seemed to benefit from a large contract negotiated in lunyankole to what appeared to be a private business that its since become common knowledge was the beneficiary of billions in public and CHOGM money, he got ripped off and lost hundreds of millions! Having a muhima wife and child did not help him from becoming a victim of thieving and impunity!

I have also learnt that Banyankole are not the same. That if you put Bahima and Bairu in the same country together and we all withdrew, they would massacre each other! That the only thing that prevents them from doing so is being part of greater Uganda!

Travel allows one to meet all sorts of Ugandans in foreign capitals some of whom are frozen in time. I have learnt that there are Ugandans many of whom are from the past who would love nothing other than a good old fashioned massacre of anyone with a long nose or suspected to be a muhima or munyarwanda. The only problem is that many of these people would not recognise one if he or she fell on their head. To them every one with a nose of a certain length is an enemy and an eater. To them I would be a candidate for massacre and s would lots of Baganda, Banyoro or anyone from the west!

I have also seen the emergence of a fortress mentality with many people from western Uganda believing that Museveni is their only bulwark and protection from getting massacred. The reality in my opinion is the opposite. That Museveni’s continued stay in power will instead increase the chances of us having a good old massacre! That in propagating this cycle of tribal eating, he has increased the risk of resentment against his people. That the primitive accumulation of wealth and primitive consumption amidst poverty and deprivation is rapidly creating the conditions for a “correction”.

The problem with such corrections of real or perceived historical injustice is that they are often irrational and follow no logic. They are based on fear. Our history is full of such ‘corrections. A granduncle of mine who was close to a nubian family was mistaken for a nubian. In 1979, he was driven to exile and his house destroyed. He was exiled in Juba and Kenya and his children scattered. He returned later a poor man despite his having previously been a very wealthy man. By the time of his death, he was a bit loopy!

In Rwanda, men and women turned on each other with no logic. In Kenya a massacre came out of virtually no where. In Mabira, some Asians were killed in violence that came out of virtually no where. Someone who knew nothing about how Asians interact with native Ugandans would say that this came out of nowhere as did the expulsion in 1973. Reality is that both were on the back of long standing resentment and inequality.

Uganda is hostage to vested interests of a small minority many of whom happen to be Bahima related to the first family. Ugandans particularly other Banyankole and Bahima need to recognise that they are captives to fear. But they also have to be aware that if they do not embrace change, they will be forced to accept the change that we all do not want. That they need to be seen to be standing up against the abuse of this government together with other Ugandans if they are to protect their own interests.

Change will come but it needs to be a change we want. Change that involves further bloodshed of innocent Ugandans is not the cnahge that we want. I am yet to go through this discussion but I have heard from inboxes that it is a public stone throwing fest. This is not necessarily a bad thing as discussing a problem is half way to solving it. This resentment has been going on a long time and the arrogance of this government does not help.

When asked to comment upon the composition of the so called national army particularly the high command, the army commanders invited before a comittee in parliament arrogantly refused and claimed it was a matter of national security! this is a rpime example of embedding sectarian interests and claiming them to be national interests. In another similar request involving URA, they dodged the question which referred to the name rank and tribe of its employees starting with the chief a muhima woman who takes home more than 10, 000 dollars a month. They submitted stats for drivers, askaris and sweepers! I may have exagerated there but the reality is they refused. A rumour in the past shed some light on how some of these units are staffed. The Special Revenue Police Service that Kayihura headed before it was disbanded for torture and murder was apparently vetted in person by Janet Museveni from so called “savedees” known to her or her son. He was not then a member of the armed forces! There have been other stories about her involvement in recruiting! Anyone who has grown up under Museveni has heard about or seen evidence of interesting recruiting practices in the URA! And anyone who has met Bahima kids on government scholarship in overseas capitals knows that there is more than meets the eye!

A well connected muhima girl sent me a worried inbox message after Nathan put up his topic. She narrated some rather chilling episode her poor children went through during the so called Buganda riots that Museveni used to kill over thirty unarmed people. She believes that her children almost became victims but for her driver who drove away from an angry crowd at Bunamwaya. That her children were targeted because they have her long nose even though her husband is from another part of the country. She cites as evidence the fact that the same mob was in the process of overturning and burning down a MOVIT car owned by a mukiga. What she doesn’t know is that I have a cousin who has worked at MOVIT for years and his employment practices are exploitative and primitive and its more than likely that the resentment had little to do with tribe and more about how he treats his employees. Evidence for this is that the MOVIT employees have since gone on strike that required riot police intervention. That too may just be evidence of impunity that prefers to use the police rather than communicate with ones employees. Nevertheless I feel pity for her and her children for having been put through this horrible expeirence.

The reality is that Ugandans need to learn to share. That inequality will always lead to conflict and war. That if the rest of the country does not see evidence of equality, we are sitting on a ticking time bomb. That this has got to be taken very seriously by those in the kintu in particular westerners and Bahima. They will need to distinguish themselves from those who have turned this country into a personal fiefdom! When I get phone calls from relatives who believe that I can get them jobs because I “know these people” I feel sad! People seriously believe that without connections to the west or Bahima, its not possible to get a job in Uganda and everything this government is doing suggests so. The arrogance and twarire mentality buttressed by an arrogant president who proclaims in public that “he will only reward those areas of the country that support him” does not help at all in dispelling this true or false!

The issue of tribalism, sectarianism and nepotism under the NRM needs to be brought out in the open. This is the only way that resentment and future problems can be prevented.

But I know how this government will respond to Nathans topic. They are going to claim sectarianism and invoke their anti sectarian law which has always been used to witch hunt those who point out the governments sectarianism instead of punishing those guilty of sectarianism.

Museveni employs his wife, his son, his daughter, his adopted daughter, his brothers and sister as well as various other relatives both his and Janets in government business in jobs we know they were never interviewed for. his military high command, embassies, lucrative posts and businesses doing business with government are filled with bahima out of proportion to their numbers or qualifications.

If you doubt that a certain region has benefitted disproportionately from government patronage, it send your research team to count the number of cars with government plates heading for the village on a weekend along gulu road and that to Mbarara and report back here.

And then tell us whether you think that Museveni is not sectarian.

Another thing I have found out in interacting with people on FB is that those singled out for bribery to stop voicing their dissent are from Ankole! I have people who send me inboxes who have been active on FB. Interestingly only those from Ankole have been apporached with offers of lucrative positions and money to stop their activities against the government on facebook.

The approaches have played on sentiments of Us versus them! If there is anything that has taught me how this government works its this. I too would have loved to see a big brown envelope come my way! Surely I have been more noisy than some of those others!!!

I hope that at the end of the day, this Bahima discussion leads to an understanding that we are all being taken for a ride by the tribal and family interests of a very small clique but we shall all pay the price if good people both Bahima and non Bahima do not take a stand against the NRM government on tribalism and sectarianism!

This letter can also be found on facebook

Of scholarships kept under the bed and distributed on the bed!

Dear Nina,

Since wading into the murky waters of the tribal debate, I have had lots of inboxes. One of them will be the subject of my letter today. Its about the issue of “personalised scholarships” that appear to favour students from one region. The most famous of these of course is the presidential scholarships that have no known public criteria and nobody appears to know where the queue is!

Among my inboxes was this from a lady who is an insider and well connected to your government. You may even know her but I will withold her name given she did not allow me to use it.

Essentially she said of one lady, a cabinet member that, “the scholarships to India were given to her by Indian government when she visited once. They gave her scholarships of 4 girls a year so that is her program.” This reference was to a minster receiving 4 scholarships from a foreign government and handing them out as personal property in this case to a daughter in law. The son was a beneficiary of a previous scholarship. No wonder there are so many kids from western Ugandan studying India, China and Malaysia. I always thought they were paying for themselves kumbe they are using their public offices for personal gain! as you can see the implication here is that a serving cabinet member or government official can receive scholarships from a foreign government and treat them as personal property to be dished out at his or her personal whim without conflict of interest. You know I have said in the past that this government would not recognise a conflict of interest if it fell on their heads. I always thought the Ministry for Ethics was useless but now I have got even more proof.

This lady went on to inform me that “I also do scholarships but because I went out and looked for them. As a matter of fact, because of working with China a lot, they first suggested to me that they would give me a scholarship and I asked if my brother would take it, then I asked for more and they gave me 5 a year which my mum took over and totally threw me out. ……Those are individually sourced. I am talking about government sourcing scholarships on their own and putting in a pool.”

Now am starting to get relly worried! Seriously don’t you see a conlict of interest here? That some one who like you is very well connected to one of the most powerful men in the land receives scholarships as personal gifts from a foreign government we are well aware is very interested in influencing powerful people in Africa? Does the NRM have a code of conduct for public officials? Doesnt the leadership code cover gifts to serving officials of government?I will of course relate this to the recent debate about nepotism and tribalism in Uganda. I know that debate is on fire but we shall stay away from the more controversial elements and deal with this issue.

This revelation explains a lot. All those young Bahima and other kids from the west who appear to have an inexhaustible supply of scholarships that no one else has ever had of or knows where to queue for! Do we really live in the same country?

Imagine one group has the opportunity to use their offices to solicit favours and benefits from foreign governments which they can then channel to their relatives as they wish! Multiply that by 25 years and you can see where the inbalances come from. Extend that to skewed and flawed recruitment practices fraught with graft and nepotism and you will understand why we now have such a big problem with all of the resentment against westerners and Bahima. Jobs that are not advertised and scholarships that are not advertised or available to all. Can you imagine some girl from Buwekula (don;t even know where that is but it sounds interesting) ever accessing such state patronage? For some of us who had to pay for our degrees both undergrad and post grad because we didnt know where the queue was, it is galling and annoying! No wonder there is so much resentment among Ugandans. And then I wonder where some of you in this government get the chutzpah to claim that some of us are not “patriotic” when it is obvious you guys are eating alone -for 25 years!

Below is my detaieled response to her;

Ee are going to have to discuss the issue of scholarships further. I think that its innappropriate for a foreign government to “give” scholarships to an individual. It is also innappropriate for the individual working in an official capacity representing their employer to “receive” personal gifts from a foreign government. It is a well recognised form of corruption where foreign governments and companies attempt to influence government officials. Obviously this government does not train its officials regarding corruption and how to deal with foreign governments! This is one form of corruption.

An example of say a government operative who is likely to influence decisions involving a foreign government or foreign company accepting gifts from the foreign government or company of a material nature does influence their integrity. This can only happen in a third world country.

I can tell you that where I work, all gifts that come to one during their employ, belong to the employer and have to be declared. So I cannot receive a gift from a client or a company particularly if it supplies goods to my employer or if I am in a position to influence the decisions of my employer in procurement. This is a blanket rule!

A colleague of mine received a lottery ticket from a client. It won 3 million dollars. He could not claim it and had to turn it over to the hospital. Both the clients family and his own family were of course unhappy!

Internal codes of conduct if they do exist need to be reviewed with regards to these scholarships. Cretainly the leadership code needs to be re examined if it says noting about this issue for its a matter of national security as well as important in the fight against corruption.

These “gifts” are not innocious and are given out with ulterior motives to officials in a position to influence strategic and business dealings with a foreign government or company. In your case your closeness to the seat of power, your future potential makes you a target of foreign governments. I can bet that the Chinese have got a dossier on you and are actively interested in influencing you now and in the future.

The correct way to do so would be to “receive” the scholarships on behalf of government and hand them over to the central scholarships committee to be advertised and distributed on merit.

That law should be within the leadership code. I have never read it in full but if it was well drafted there should be some limitation or control on what kind of relationship government officials can have with foreign governments.

We have a whole ministry for ethics that again should have already dealt with this as should have the government itself given that it has for 25 years claimed to have a war against corruption.

While you can give the scholarships to your youth group again that is not in the spirit of equitable access. Its in part why we are having this debate about the national cake and how its distributed.

If we accept the conventional wisdom that western Uganda has got the bulk of government positions and managers in key government companies and organisations, then that means that western Uganda has the largest number of people with access to these kinds of unconventional gifts.

If like yourself they give them to their mothers who advertise within their clan and send all of the kids who have failed their high school, abroad on these scholarships, you can see how the rest of the country can see a pattern. Multiply that by 25 years and you will then understand why others will be fighting to dislodge you from power. Because after 25 years priviledge starts to make the government look like your family. I know what my mother would do with such a scholarship if I gave them to her. If your mother is anything like my mother who has educated tens to hundreds of her relatives with her own money, you can bet they will have all won the lottery. She looks out for her nieces and nephews as well as many in her community. I doubt that she will be inviting those in Arua unrelated to her to partake. After all she is not the government.

Extend this argument further and say these governments or companies come into the country to do business which is the Chinese and Indians primary motive. They understand graft very well these chinese and Indians. They will offer you directorships, shares as well as ask you to “assist” them find suitable employees. They know you are going to bring your relatives but that is a cost they have already factored into their maths. They want you to favour them. To use your influence and connections in their favour. To get access to contracts and resources or simply leverage to be used at some future date.

In 25 years, all business public and private starts to look like an extension of your clan and village!

These are the things that westerners are accused of but because they all consider such “gifts” given to them as personal gifts, they shrug it off.

These are not personal gifts as long as they are given to one in office or because they are close to someone in office. In many countries that take these things seriously, the employee of a lottery company or their close relatives cannot be allowed to cash in on a lottery. Everyone with any sort of potential to influence the outcome has got to distance themselves from any form of dealing that could be construed or misconstrued to heve been influenced by these gifts. And government officials cannot accept material gifts from officials of foreign governments particularly if they are in a position to influence policy and decisions!

The other problem of course with these gifts is that they threaten national security. Government officials pass on official secrets and insider information when they have extensive and close potentially exploitable relationships with foreign governments or businesses.

I hope that you will bring this issue to the powers who have declared that useless war against corruption. They actually need to read their laws and enforce them or close loopholes where they exist. Surely 25 years is enough to do that!

P.S I too have some young relatives who would benefit from some free scholarships! Could you direct me to the queue?

Patriotism and national guidance preached by dishonourble women!

Thursday, June 16, 2011 at 12:16am

Dear Nina,

Akabulilililo!

I can understand why you have decided to hide from me but you know you can run but you cannot hide. I will still get you particularly given your people are making it so easy!!!

There are times when a man does not know whether to laugh or cry! The NRM government has brought us to one of those times! At times like these I wonder what makes you guys in the NRM believe that you are better than Ssebagala. Or the lumpens, the dregs of society that your praise singer Nagenda was talking about!

Talking about praise singers, today we have got to talk about that other praise singer Mary Karoro Okurut and her friend in crime Margaret Muhanga! Who said that women are to be outdone when it comes to misusing thei offices to steal public resources to enrich themselves? I have heard some say that the appointment of women to this cabinet would be a blessing as coruption maybe less! These two women have proven that that simplistic argument simply will not get ri of corruption!

This word coruption is so misused as to become useless. I am starting to believe that it must have been coined by a paid wordsmith like Karoro! Surely isn’t thief a better word? For that one has no ambiguity at all! If one takes what does not belong to them under false pretences, thief is one of a few choice words that come to mind!

Mbu I hear Margaret Muhanga told people on the airwaves that the land they stole from UBC under false pretences was aquired “legally”!! Surely the very fact that the same land was put on themarket 4day after it was acquired has got to be a false pretence that should invalidate the whole transaction! The fact that the purchase fee of over 900 million was not paid as well should have invalidated the deal as it was meant to be paid upfront! I wonder what her brother Mwenda is going to say!!! Me I would stay out of that one if I were him!

I do remember another similar scandal many years ago where public land has been stolen through false pretences with some middle man who obtained it free walking out with millions. it is the latest NRM scam! Actually many scandals ome to mind. Did you know about Shimoni? The school was “allocated” free to “build a CHOGM hotel that never ever happened. The recipient went off laughing to the bank -with millions in the bank! UBC too lost land again to another CHOGM hotel that never happened. In that scam a firm contracted to move the archives also got freemoney with valuable archives destroyed. In yet another land scam, Butabika hospital lost acres of its land -for “industrialisation”! But this land ended up in the portfolios of individual NRM politicians and members of the first family instead! Please do tell me you never got a piece of that scam too! You would be the only one it appears who did not partake of that daylight robbery!

More recently that NRM bigwig Basajabalaba, who has turned scandalous controversy into an art has also been caught for the umpteenth time with his hand in the till -again land! The fact that he is a chairman of one of the NRM party organs and a major donor to the NRM party does raise issues of money laundering. Could it perchance be that you guys siphon off state funds to collaborators in these shady deals who then return the “gratitude” in donations to the party? This is one of those times when I despair at those men and women of the opposition! That something as obvious as the source of the NRM party and election funding is not the subject of court action to reveal its source is a surprise! But then again they have failed to react to the budget!

Speaking about the budget, Emmanuel tumusiime-Mutebile finally rediscovered his Kiga roots and grew some cojonnes. He had some home truths to say to his boss through the Financial Times. Methinks he should have stood up to be counted a long time ago! I was starting to believe that he was not a mukiga!!! Quite frankly I was not surprised for it has always been obvious that this government does not have a clue what they are doing! Can you imagine that after going to the UK begging hat in hand and receiving 0 million pounds, Museveni went on a shopping spree? He spent 30 million on a new state of the art plane that same year! Didnt help poor Mayombo though even though he was offered its services as an ambulance to airlift him to Israel! this year we are hoping to see some oil come out of the ground. But before weeven see a cent, this government spent our money on planes we cannot afford for reasons that are too vague! Earlier in the year, the presidents re election campaign was funded with state funds to the point of driving inflation up a few points and causing a crisis! While Mutebile is still talking I would like to hear him tell us that Basajabalaba paid back all of the free money that was gifted to him!

I ont get this government! For 25 years they have presided over a dark nation without electricity yet they sing industrialisation! One wonders how they are going to deliver! What exactly do they think powers factories? I am yet to go through the budget with a fine tooth comb but save for a mention of a mega dam which Mutebile objects to, I se no strategy for power generation that is sustainable and environmentally friendly! there is no strategy for energy saving, none for alternative energy sources and little education of the public on energy saving devices and strategies. There is litle involvement of local communities in using new technologies at small scale and community level!

I know that Ugandan men love to have schools of children but what is this obsession with a large, poor, and unemployed population with no skills and no education! What passes for an education in UPE schools is quite frankly pathetic! President Museveni keeps telling people that a big population is good as they will create markets! I know you went to Nottingham and studied Economics! Could you please whisper to him that a poor people cannot create a market as they do not have purchasing power! While you are on the subject, please tell him too that factories need people with skills not glorified degrees from amngo tree university not worth the paper they are printed on! Have you ever built a house in Uganda? Quite frankly the idiots who pass themselves off as tradesmen should be shot. Most are hustlers who cannot recognise a straight line if it were right in front of them! No wonder all those monstrocities built with stolen money look crooked! How many vocational schools and technical colleges have been built in this government? When the EA free market opens up, Kenyans will be best placed to take advantage of the larger markets. Ditto for industrialisation. Not only is their work ethic different but they also have the requiste certificates and diplomas while Ugandans have degrees not matched by commensurate skills!

A young man reminded me today in his Letter to Drew, that many of our well poken and qualified leaders are no better than Sebagala. He was not impressed by the condemnation of Sebagala for his pidgin English! He believes that his skills at “eating on behalf” of Nagenda’s lumpens, rats and cockroaches and dregs of society should have been the criteria and not his English! http://weeklytouch.webnode.com/news/letter-to-drew/

Personally I wouldnt give a a stuffing if he did not speak a word of English but was a fine gentleman of good morals and standing! Furthermore his non performance if one could even use that word performance in the same sentence as Sebagala to describe his wasted years as mayor of Kampala, should disqualify him from ever having the word leader and Sebagala in the same sentence! Even the seya’s gave up on him and he had to sell his tired behind to the highest and most desperate bidder! Bottomline is Sebagala is not fit to be a minster een if his English were impeccable. But Karoro the word smith with the impeccable English is not fit either following this recent scandal and should resign or get pushed! Am not holding my breath though!

Could you explain to me what a poltical statement is? Your people went to a lot of trouble using our money of course bribing the MP’s to pass the fault ridden kabaka muzzling bill! Mbu cultural leaders should not make political statements at the risk of imprisonment and being derobed! But in thelast few months we have had the Queen mothe of Toro go around openly making political statements in favour of the king of kings Ghadafi! This week he was joined by the Omukama of Bunyoro! That Makubuya fellow will have to come back and tell us more about this political statement thing!

When one is starting to forget those chaps in the opposition, you guy conpire to raise their profile again! The guyshad slowed down an started to fight among themselves. Now lightning rod Besigye is back and waving the red flag and your are responding so predictably! Mbu he cannot walk back from the court to his home!!! I was going to use the word retard to describe your people in government and the police, then I remembered its not so politically correct! No wonder after 25 years, it obvious that it is too hard to teach people with learning disabilities anything! These guys simply do not get it -that they have failed and a few more years can only prove just how incompetent they are! Why can’t people retire when they are ahead?

Can anyone in the NRM recgnise a conflict of interest if it fell on their heads? Now this Karoro woman of the “mbwa zirime” fame! You know my grandmothr used to say that small lies became big lies and soon one became a ‘kondo’, robbing people before ending up in jail or killed by a mob!

But Karoro and Muhanga will not end up in jail! Having lost out in the election, I wouldnt be surprised if Margaret was proposed by this government for an ambassadorship. Irent those reserved for political rejects after they have ost elections? As for Karoro, me am still waiting for her to apologise for that lie she told about Mbwa zirume which was meant to incite sectarianism and hatred. You see while this government sings sectarianism, some people are allowed to get away with it. And while it preaches a war against corruption, for 25 years that has remained invisible!

For Karoro and Muhanga to receive government land for investment but then pass it on for a profit without paying the government is fraudulent. Other words come to mind -influence peddling being one! Impunity being another! The ladies did not receive tha land “legally”! They breached the terms within 4 days of reciving it when they put it on the marked and failed to pay for it as per thir contract!

Now who is going to collect our money? And will Museveni disown these two women and sack the second one from the “national guidance ministry”? You can imagine the irony with which I say national guidance!!! I assume “patriotism” falls under that ministry too -LOL!

https://www.facebook.com/note.php?saved&&note_id=10150219911037681

When rats start to desert a sinking ship!

Monday, June 20, 2011 at 11:49pm

Dearest Nina,

Hope you are fine.

I can see you have been tying yourself up in knots trying to understand Uncle Kaguta’s economics! Me I gave up on trying to understand him a long time ago! The more he stands before a board and tries to explain it, the less I understand!

Have you ever had an older person who was important in your life when you were growing up? Someone who you looked up to and thought he was brilliant? Maybe a parent, maybe an uncle? Or just maybe a teacher or elder around the neighbourhood? It could even have been that older guy in the neighbourhood who used to make your heart sing in the hope he would notice you!

And then you grew up! And realised that it was all hot air! That they were really a dissappointment and that in your young mind you had built them up inot more than they really were! that they really were quite ordinary! And as they grow pot bellied and the hairline recedes, you start to wonder what it is exactly that used to make your heart pound!!

Thats the way that many of Museveni’s children feel about uncle Kaguta but the poor man does not get it! Instead of retiring while he is still ahead, he continues to hang on until the little children will start to laugh at him! Why exactly people put themselves through that, I have no idea! The other day, Ghadafi’s son was proposing an election in Libya with his father as a candidate! After 42 years, dont these people get it? Ghadafi overthrew a king and declared a republic! Yet he continues to rule like a king -for life! Museveni overthrew what he called dictators! Now he looks more and more like those he overthrew!

Talking of Ghadafi, I read that speech to the UN by uncle Ndugu Rugunda! today is going to be a Bakiga fest! The other day it was a Bahima fest! But these Bahima individuals, they do not eat alone! The clan and tribe should not be blamed. And it should be recognised that they have apologists and do not eat alone! uncle Ndugus speech got full marks for pulling all of the right strings! Pan Africanism whatever that is! Colonialism and neocolonialism and even racism the convenient clubs of the african autocrat when he is caught with his zippers down! Make the white man feel guilty that he is bombing Africans. Never mind the Africans are always bombing each other! i never heard ndugu make any wonderful speeches during the walk to work when all those innocent people were shot down and killed by Kaguta and Kayihura’s boys! Nor during the so called Buganda riots or Kasubi. Or when all those people in the north were in camps for more than a decade! Have you ever seen those camps? They make one ashamed to be Ugandan, that all of those people with their kids were wards of the state, yet they were in such poverty and misery! How do you guys sleep at night? Not for one night but every night for thirty years and counting? Do you ever sit up at night and think about all of those people who have been killed or have died so that you could eat?

At the end of the day, I was unimpressed by Rugunda’s speech! I firmly believe that when a government turns its guns against its civilians, it loses lefgitimacy and with it its monopoly on the carriage of guns! Every citizen automatically gains the right to take up arms in their self defence! Ghadafi is not exactly known for his magnanimity towrds his enemies! All of those people who protested against him knew what was coming to them -that they would be slaughtered! Better to die fighting if one has to die! As it is, they have not been very easy to slaughter! Me I gave Ghadafi gabwerere. He needs to get himself a Pimochet solution while locking out the Europeans while he still has some bargaining power!

Thats not to say that the Europeans are there for altruistic motives. of course they are not! We all know what they re after -oil! But that is Africans and Arabs weakness. How that really wide UN resolution was allowed to pass without any comment or challenge, I have no idea! Where were the Rugunda’s? Where was the arab league? The UN itself loses legitimacy for having allowed such a resolution to pass. And the lethargic African despots heading the AU, whoever said that a monkey can ever be the arbiter in a case involving the forest? They are saving their behinds! they know that the west has finessed the art of politicising everything, fitting it into neat labels like “weapons of mass destruction”, genocide, “rape as a weapon of war” and even potential genocide! Of course the presence of Somalia, and Congo immediately show the lie in their actions in Libya!

Back to uganda and Bakiga! Totya, am not going to mention daddy dear or Temangalo! Today he is safe. After being defanged and saddled with a bloated incompetetnt cabinet and a greedy bloated parliament, I pitty him! You remember I predicted Bukenya downfall last year? And that others like daddy dear needed to make sure they keep a black book just in case they are stabbed in the back? What happened to Bukenya can happen to anyone. That he alone ends up before the corruption court when others like Kutesa who actually set up the vehicle through which the government was fleeced is declared clean beats my understanding! That a company in which Kutesa had shares and sold to Kabonero was the main bidder outside normal procurement rules in a deal that was flawed and fraudulent beats my understanding. I would love to know the value of Kutesa’s shareholdng and what exactly it is he was selling? Daddy dear as leader of government business just became the ultimate fall guy! After the wikileaks scandal in which you were mentioned by that ka Australian man with women issues, the elevation of daddy, or is it the demotion of daddy kind of reminds me of the Godfathers kiss! You remember that kiss meant certain death!!!

Another mukiga has been on the rampage. Again he is a mukiga who has served to entrench this government for 25 years! This is another one who has been talking through “unofficial channels”! HAsn’t he ever heard of a man called Besigye? If I could talk to him, I would refer him to videos on the net of Besigye being beaten black and bule and being shoved under a seat on a pickup like “ebiwaata byente”! When that man Kakwenzire threatened that mad man Nathan who brought up the Bahima debate with taking him to Nyabushoozi and making him look after cattle for a year in bare feet, I saw the kind of mentality that drove the heinous acts against Besigye. But I digress -if you speak to Mutebile and I know you speak to all of the important Bakiga, tell him to make sure he has got a parachute as they will be sending Arinaitwe and other such thugs to get him!!! You think these things ended with idi Amin?

But I like what Mutebile is saying. For the first time in 25 years he has decided to say the truth. Better late than never. I think all of that fiscal indiscipline accompanying the elections nust have got to his head! What with money being collected left right and centre! Who would not lose their sanity of they were required to balance the books in that situation!!! I wonder what jolted him? Are they replacing him with a cadre from Janets village? You can tell me -I wont tell! I hear all of those under the bed scholarships have started bearing fruit! Seriously, Museveni has been preaching industrialisation for 25 years? What does he think factories run on? No dam built and when they tried to build one, the design was faulty! No one paid for that one! Now we are belatedly trying to catch up on lost time!

Mutebile talks about vocational training. Now he is singing my tune! I personally have never been impressed by the mango tree degrees they are churning out in Uganda! it is a perfect scam -a rip off! Passing out half baked graduates who are essentially unemployable but now have an inflated sense of self! Banage we are dead if these half baked UPE graduates ever get into office! But what can you expect in a country where Sebagala can not only be a mayor but a ‘minister without fortpolio’ as well! Just because he put his behind before the president! I wonder what daddy dear is going to do with that one! Dump him in the dumping ground of the foreign office where political rejects end up? No wonder one cannot get service from a Ugandan embassy abroad! Back to vocational training a country talking about industrialisation should relly be talking vocationl training schools not glorified universities not worth the paper their degrees are printed on!

That other mukiga in Canada who run away 30 years ago also wrote a letter today. it was a heartwarming one. Inportantly he told the story of how he supported Museveni during the war but soon realised that what he thought they were figting for is not what Museveni had in mind! We all have that feeliing!

Bakiga are coming out of the woodworks every day. First it was that Nathan! Now its Kanyeihamba! Retirement and old age are wondeful things! One can tell people the truth and pretend they didnt mean to insult them! If challenged, one can always claim to have dementia! Kanyeihamba is enjoying himself and I say, whatever he is smoking is good stuff! Bamwongere! He is saying it like it is! At least me, I kubikabikka ko! For him, he just unleashes with full force! I need me a head of white hair and sme retirement and I will find me some weed and tell them what they need to hear!

First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out – because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out – because I was not a socialist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out – because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out – because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me – and there was no one left to speak out for me.

Nienmoller

This family project is going to take everyone with it starting with its most faithful house staff! Bukenya the butler was the frst one to be sarificed! I wonder who is next!!! The Bakiga seem to be waking up and want to jump out of this ‘westerners’ boat!

When rats start deserting a ship, you know things are not good! better look for a dunny! Me I will hide you under my bed tofaayo!

IGP’s press conference -Kayihura needs a refresher course on crowd psychology and crowd control!

Monday, April 4, 2011 at 10:55pm

This is a very interesting letter. Interesting in its naivety and ignorance. If Kayihura were just any other person, one would think incompetence but this looks more like a priori justification of police brutality by setting up a self fulfilling prophesy. it also demonstrates an ignorance of crowd psychology that is appalling in a police commander!

If one really wants to be cynical then one could say that Kayihura is deliberately setting up a situation that will predictably -predictably because he and his officers will provoke it starting with this letter, decline into a riot and police on demonstrator violence.

Kayihura sets the stage by defining demonstrators as the enemy and imputing evil plans and emotions onto them. He goes further by declaring that intelligence received by him clearly shows that the motive of the demonstrators is violence and disruption of the peace. He even throws in just for good measure that oft misused word terrorism making one wonder whether he even understands its meaning. It is often misused by repressive governments to justify cracking down on dissenters and using extrajudicial means!

The relationship between the egyptian army and the demonstrating public is a clear demonstration of community policing at its best. For days and nights, demonstrators peacefully stood their ground and the army maintained their positions without seeking to attack or mete violence on the crowds. If anything they sought to engage with the crowd in a non violent manner and reassure them that they were not going to hurt them.

It is the kiboko squads on camels that finally caused chaos and threatened to turn the peaceful demonstrators into rioters! In Libya, it was Ghadafi’s goons who shot live rounds into demonstrators killing them that created the headless monster now causing problems -an armed insurrection!

Kayihura’s police has a major image problem -one that does not help during such situations. They are known to be corrupt, incompetent and brutal. they are also known to be partisan in their interactions with the public particularly gatherings unfriendly to the government. They have been known to use deadly force even in situations that did not warrant it after they themselves have deliberately or out of incompetence and ignorance of crowd control provoked violence!

This kind of image means that Kayihura has got to work much harder to control crowds and prevent the situation from getting out of control. Unfortunately he and his men do not view it as a failure when a member of the public rioter or not gets hurt. They actually view it as a victory and reinforcement of their manhood -they are not weak!

A “self-fulfilling prophecy” (SFP) was coined in 1948 by Robert Merton to describe “a false definition of the situation evoking a new behavior which makes the originally false conception come true” (Merton 1968: 477)

Kayihura defines demonstrators as a threat to public order. In doing so, he “locates the cause of violence as lying entirely with the crowd as opposed to arising out of the interaction between crowds and the police, it neglects the possibility that police actions may contribute to the production of conflict and hence provides no basis for developing strategies, tactics and technologies that might minimise such a possibility.” (Reicher et al 2007: 403)

In their paper on the principles and Practice of Public Order policing published oline by the Oxford Journal of Law, Reichar and his colleagues see two major problems with this approach.

“The first is that it runs the risk of creating a self-fulfilling prophecy: if you define people as hostile and if you then act towards them in ways that make it obvious, you think of them as being hostile, then they are very likely to become hostile in response. The first time the chairman of Manchester United described his fans as ‘animals’, the fans responded by chanting ‘we hate humans’ at the next game (Robins, 1984).

The second problem is that this approach misses out on a major opportunity. If the police can interact with crowd members in ways that lead to a deteriorating relationship and increase conflict, they can equally interact in other ways that lead to improving relationships and reduce conflict.”

Either the IGP is cynical and is deliberately trying to create an incendiary situation, or he needs to go back to school and study crowd control and crowd psychology!

Demonstrators are not a threat to public order. They are expressing grievances in a manner they consider lawful and constitutional -and indeed it is. If there are political actors whose primary goal is to create violence then those actors should be isolated but it should not take away peoples right to demonstrate! The theory of crowd psychology however demonstrates to us that when met with violence a peaceful crowd can very easily turn violent. This is the kind of incompetence that led to the death of 30 people during the so called Bugandan riots as well as a further 3 after the fires at Kasubi. Its also the same incompetence that led to the shooting and death of 2 students at Makerere university when Mao was guild president. The recent fracas in Wandegeya just two weeks ago being a case in point as are other sitiuations in the past that have been mishandled in the past by the police which instead of taking responsibility has sought to hide behind imprecise terms like “terrorism”! The use of direct police brutality as well as proxies such as the kiboko squad will predictably result in the chaos that the IGP now “predicts”!

I would like to recommend this excellent paper to Kayihura and other readers.

Knowledge-Based Public Order Policing: Principles and Practice
Stephen Reicher*, Clifford Stott†, John Drury‡, Otto Adang§, Patrick Cronin¶ and Andrew Livingstone**
http://policing.oxfordjournals.org/content/1/4/403.full

What does the state of the economy say about public confidence in the current government?

Monday, April 4, 2011 at 10:11pm

Nina Mbabazi says,

“on 2nd July, 2007 The Norwegian Council for Africa warned that Uganda’s 2007/2008 increase in fuel taxes would double food prices. A story covered by New Vision that day. What was the increase that sparked off this upward turn of food prices?”_

[](https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150150814942681)

I think the problem is not fuel prices but elsewhere in a more simple reason -consumer confidence in the stability of the country and the government of the day.

In many organised soscieties that hold frequent elections, one can track economic performance and financial market behaviour and match it to investor and consumer confidence.

At times of uncertainty including elections, markets, interest rates, commodity prices, mortgage rates, employee recruitment and consumer confidence tend to decline. These pick up once the political situation stabilises or consumers start to consume again.

The real or perceived stability of a government or its performance can affect markets and consumer confidence in negative ways.

In Uganda, there is always uncertainty around elections. Fuel prices, comodity prices, transport prices increase while buyer behaviour changes with hoarding of essential comodities and reduction of non essential expenditure. I vividly remember my parents stocking up on such comodities -and US dollars.

Normally there is a quick recovery and business returns to normal but this is not happening this time around. it may have something to do with the heightened state of anxiety caused by the visible military presence on the streets as well as the fear caused by all of that military hardware, or it may just simply reflect the fundamentals -that people do not have confidence in Museveni anymore despite his “win”!

Since the last election, there has been negative economic news each day. Uncontrolled and irresponsible government expenditure -bribing LC’s -6.5 billion, bribing MP’s -6.5 billion, bribing the electorate -600 billion, buying new fighter jets -trillions, swearing in ‘new’ old president -30 billion, pension arrears 65 billion, salary arrears for civil servants, announcements that government is broke, rising fuel prices, rising inflation, lower tax revenue collection, rising USD rate etc!

If one were to make predictions from the state of the economy right now, one would say that Museveni’s government is on the way down!

MTN, FDC, cyber freedoms and politics in Uganda

Thursday, March 31, 2011 at 9:21pm

http://www.facebook.com/muhiire.nathan/posts/199665066723289

Nina Mbabazi, Bainomugisha has some good arguments that cannot just be thrown out because he does not have evidentiary proof.

There is such a thing as circumstantial evidence and the circumstantial evidence against MTN is fairly strong.

-The FDC was raided.
-Soon after the raid, their power went off.
-Prior to the elections, they were harrassed and intimidated about having their own independent tallying centre which is exactly the same thing that you had and any newspaper or serious media outlet could have within their own offices.
-While your arguments regarding contigency planning maybe valid, I doubt that the FDC could activate such plans if they had them when their centre was under occupation

MTN is not a Ugandan voter. it is a welcome guest in Uganda as long as they play by the rules which includes not getting involved in local politics.

If they got involved on one side beyond acquiescing to a legal order signed by a duly qualified authority quoting relevant laws (which order they should have a copy of and should be able to show the press in exoneration of themselves), then they should get what was coming to them!

The politics of foreign investors believing that their financial interests overide those of millions of victims is the very same politics playing itself out in the middle east and north Africa. Its the same politics that draws out all sorts of players and their governments to try and justify bombing whole societies back to the stone age for their interests while using the trojan horses of democracy and freedom. Its the same politics that saw your father accused by an invested investor who requested his government the USA to impose sanctions and travel bans on him instead of turning over what alleged evidence of corruption and bribery they may have had to the Ugandan authorities for investigation!

Your father presented and promoted and even probably drafted the bill that seeks to control certain internet and communications freedoms under which any action against FDC would have fallen. This includes phone tapping, internet eavesdropping and censorship as well as controlling providers of internet and telecommunications services. I gather that the powers were eavesdropping on Ugandans and looking for certain words!

BUT MTN would be duty bound due to a duty of care to its customers to only respond to a legally valid order and they have got the lawyers to enforce that. Instead its possible they simply folded to intimidation or even colluded with an order they knew to be illegal! if they did, they crossed a line for which they should be penalised. If it can be proven that MTN cut off service to the FDC without a legally valid order, am afraid FDC has a case for punitive damages against them. Needless to say, the current on going publicity while it may not be enough to lose MTN its customers loses it a lot of credibility as it was believed that in the past they have always withstood pressure from the government to control them!

The temporal relationship between a raid on the FDC centre and commandeering their IT equipment as well as the cut off of Internet and cellphone services is suspect i must admit!

People like Museveni and probably most of our leaders have never lived in a democratic nation during an election. There are all sorts of independent tallying centres. While its true and i have defended this before that only a legally constituted EC has got the right to declare the winner, virtually every party as well as every media outlet has got its own independent tally.

The NRM exercised this right but they interfered with the FDC’s right to exercise the same right as well and I wonder why!

And the MTN may have been the NRM’s accomplices which opens them to civil action both in the courts as well as on the streets!

Companies like MTN need to understand that if they get involved in local politics they will get burned. They dont get a vote and should stop trying to buy one!

Museveni’s rioting soldiers and policemen; time to make exit plans

Tuesday, May 3, 2011 at 3:27pm

Dear Nina,

Writing you letters is becoming a habit! At this rate am about to claim that am a seer like Pastor Kayanja or that other guy (or is it a woman) that Timothy Kalyegira talks to! I need to talk about that man of God (or is he?) another day. At least my predictions do come true unlike his! Kayanja is MIA! I wonder whether he would like to give us some new fake predictions! I know that the pentecostals would like to be recognised up there side by side with the Catholics, Protestants, Orthodox and Muslims in Uganda but do they have to be ensconced so far up uncle Kags bottom just so they can be recognised? What happened to separation of the church and the state?

Now they are the recruiting agency for the government through Pastor Natasha and her mother or is it the other daughter! i hear Kayikura and Arinaitwe were recruited by the pastors and vetted by the first lady to confirm they were saved. But judging by Arinaitwe’s recent performance as well as the circumstances in which Kayihura’s saved boys with guns brigade the SRPS was wound down for torture nad humnan rights abuses including deatsh in custody as murders by security services are euphemistically called, the saved formula doesnt work. And this is before we go into those allegations of pederasty against the man of God or those of smuggling truckloads of wine!

But I digress. My prediction in my last letter to you was that it wouldn’t take very long before the lawyers and journos linked up against Uncle Kags bully boy tactics. within hours of my saying so, a magistrate decided she wasn’t going to be used any longer in the rape of the courts. Another threw out the case against Mao, and you now have the lawyers on a 3 days strike ironically in support of the people you chose to call criminals! Didnt I say that the lawyers and journalists wouldnt take long before joining the fray collectively? Now the newspapers report that they have joined the fray. See what your village idiots have done! They have united the lawyers and the journalists against your government. Am starting to suspect that your people in the police and army are working for the opposition and trying to make you guys look bad!

I wonder when those lazy workers MP’s like Lyomoki and his friends are going to come out and walk with the people they claim to represent. For twenty years they have been sitting in the rubberstamp parliament collecting allowances and getting fat! i think its time they now came out and spoke on behalf of the people they are paid to represent! At this rate I can see teachers walking in solidarity with those other teachers you tear gassed and their pupils. Taxi drivers are about to walk in protest too since you guys are now interfereing with their livelihoods. People no longer want to travel and stay in their homes. I can see all sorts of other professions joining the fray. You know my mother chose to retire from the civil service during Idi Amin because she could not stand having to go through an army check everytime she went to work. She worked in one of those sensitive government offices. I can therefore understand why Ugandans may chose to stay at home and hate you for having unleashed the dogs of war onto the streets. You know the police and army had started to shed the name “basirukaale” but the last 2 or 3 weeks are quite rapidly undoing that!

This is going to make for a very interesting swearing in! Uncle Kags or is it Sevo these days may end up getting sworn in like Kibaki -like a thief in the night! I wonder how your people will be able to account for the billions they stole from our taxes if all of those 32 heads of state stay away! You know thats a very distinct possibility! My intuition tells me that those videos of your goons in action compounded by the village idiots you chose to speak for the government are right now causing problems in many state houses around the world. For sure Uncle Bob maybe able to come. He doesnt get to get out much these days to inspect a guard of honour and stretch his very old bones. As you are aware he is very arthritic including in his extra bone -you know the one that women don’t have. I hear his missus when she is not shopping in Singapore, has been examining the funny bones of other men younger than Uncle Bob! For many other heads of state whose governments are accountable to the people and sensitive to criticism and negative publicity, those images are going to keep them away!

I gather now you guys have a new tactic -if the people wont walk2work without a permit so that your goons can exercise their neanderthal reflexes to crack some heads, they are now lobbing tear gas into their homes so that they can be forced outside and frogmatched to town! That kid of reminds me of all of those villagers your guys rounded up from their gardens in northern Uganda and frog matched them into camps for the next 20 years! I wonder where you will build the camps this time. The protests are everywhere. Gulu, Mbale, Masaka, every surburb of Kampala, Jinja, Mbarara and rukungiri. The strange thing is that you guys have always claimed to win with 90% majorities in these last two towns. Who was that guy who rounded people up in the north? Tinye? I hear he rounded up some balaalo in Buliisa as well who thought they could squat over some few million barrels of oil and claim royalties! is he also involved in this operation?

If ever there was evidence that your people are tired and don’t have any new ideas, it is this crisis. All that your goons understand is kill, beat, crush, eat like a samosa! What violence? Did your mama’s deny you breasts or what? Why can’t your people think of anything else other than fight and kill. I hear your uncle Kaguta wears his ability to kill like a badge of honour. When told he has been fighting for 25 years he gets insulted and reminds all that he has actually been killing for 45 years! I wonder what makes him think that people have got to keep dying for him so that he can continue remaining in power indefinitely.

Yesterday I had a brain wave. Must have been the excitement of writing to you -are you married? It suddenly occurred to me that Museveni is now a “life president by stealth”. Am not sure what it was that I was smoking but I sure need to try it again. Am getting confused -couldn’t have been smoking anything as I dont smoke at all. Couldn’t have been drinking anything either as the strongest drink I take is coffee just like Uncle Kags! must have been someone walking past and blowing smoke my way! boy tha was some pretty good stuff if it suddenly made me creative! You see am not creative -I remember you trying to tell me exactly how I was a nobody! this stuff could change that as I may even copyright that statement as I surely haven’t seen it before in print. Wouldn’t you agree?

That Museveni who lost an election miserably in 1980 level field or not is the one who felt aggrieved enough to wand to start a destructive war? I hear that even in his own constituency, he lost miserably! That he successfully wrestled the animal from the swine and then “reluctantly” as was his claim in 1986 agreed to be president for 5 years but has since then repeatedly kept shifting the goal posts just so that he can remain in power suggests that he has stealthily become a life president! But don’t take my word for it. I looked it up and apparently anthropologists allot a duration of 25 years to ancient an ancient kings reign or era. As a matter of fact one can roughly estimate how old Buganda is by multiplying the number of kabaka’s by 25 in this case 36 kings each ruling for 25 years makes Buganda approximately 900 years. So Museveni is a king -one who has already ruled for an era! But he wants to go on! Is that greed or what? He even thinks its worthwhile for people to get killed so he can continue to rule!

If ever one needed evidence that your NRM people are unsuited to leading our country into a modern world, it is their failure to do battle in a modern world with modern tools like keyboards, social media, and boots on the ground chanting keep walking! They have exercised all of the wrong reflexes since this started a couple of weeks ago. Mistake after mistake!

You know I have a soft spot for you even though you hate my guts! So I will give you some free advice to pass on to the strong men of the NRA. This here thing is going to end badly if they continue posturing and bullying. They are going to either have to get rid of the tired old man in a hat or to prevail on him to sit down and talk. And when I say talk, I dont mean talk in the condenscending manner he is used to. Talk with respect looking for a mutual solution to this problem and most of all looking for a way of healing our communities. But I can guarantee that the stickler is going to be term limits. And some people are going to have to commit seppuku -like kivedhinda. its time he retired anyway. And that soldier masquerading as a policeman, he will have to go back to the barracks and get redeployed. You are also going to need some people with real conflict resolution credentials and am not talking about that thug in NAirobi who was previously the spokesman for the LRA. I know that he is attractive to you guys as you love people you can buy!

You can of course ignore me but you know by now that am a seer -there I just said it! How long do you think it will take before the traders in Kampala decide they are tired of having police and soldiers rioting in the city and messing up their business.

You am sure notice that i have deliberately used the term rioters to describe the so called government security agents in the city. They have been rioting since before the 18th, making people uncomfortable in the city and disrupting business. I wonder how much money has been lost since they were released from their mama ingia pole’s in the barracks! These guys are going to bring the economy down! I wonder how you trust people who are so poor to guard you and your healthy looking wives and children. Me, I wouldn’t trust them at all!I was starting to think that I was the only one who had noticed that Museveni’s soldiers and the police were rioting and destroying the peace and people’s property in Kampala.I almost even thought of copyrighting that too -you know “Museveni’s soldiers on a riot”!

But I found that Dr Ian Clark beat me to that;

“Although it is the duty of the Police to keep civil order and prevent, or control rioting, one wonders, as they watch television and read newspapers, if these are anti-riot Police or rioting Police.” – Dr. Ian Clarke (Mayor-Elect, Makindye division).

Prof Jjuuko also thinks that your soldiers are on riot. “What we have experienced since the start of the Walk-to-Work campaign are police riots. It’s like the police are telling the people ‘if you cannot riot then we will riot’,” says Prof. Jjuuko.

The old man in the hat is tired! I wonder how he will be when his MP’s join the walkers like some have already started doing at least in their comments, his cabinet starts splitting as you know its now blackmail season. Those he was planning to drop have suddenly received a shot of viagra and will be blackmailing him while the army may have to do a Mubarak on him.

Its time to make exit plans!

Predictions -Museveni will be removed by his own people not the opposition

Monday, March 7, 2011 at 11:00pm

Today someone asked me what my prediction for the next few years was. i hjave made similar predictions in the past some of which were accurate.

Museveni will become more paranoid over the next few years. Certainly if he has no plans of retiring, he is going to have to become more oppressive for things will get tougher and people more radical! Ambitious NRM insiders will become more and more agitated as they too are approaching 75 years particularly if the terms are extended to 7 or 10 years! Chances are that Museveni is going to be removed by his own people. I do not see the opposition being able to remove him now but his own party as well as army if they are reading the signs and mood of the country as well as that on the continent must be getting restless!

Those on the inside who wish to remove him will be using the very same arguments that we as well as the opposition have made. Lack of democracy, removal of term limits, prolonged incumbency, succession issues, shifting goal posts. those who are still true to the ideals of the movement or those who get a crisis of confidence as they get older will be questioning the status quo!

those who have promoted the claim of only one man holding the vision to Ugandan’s future are starting to look foolish and may wish to make remedies while those who suspect that Museveni has dynastic plans may now become galvanised.

Whether the move to retire Museveni is political or military is going to be the issue. Its is possible that Museveni would chose to resist a political removal and treat it as treason! one wishes that the NRM was the ANC and the party had institutions that transcended the individual! The least bloodless would be political but his control of the party is too absolute. But when you see his own men like Mbabazi cracking, then you can see that there’s going to be trouble.

If museveni has succession plans for Muhoozi which I believe he does, the next few years are going to be for building a powerbase for Muhoozi both within the army and outside the army. That means selected and handpicked young and mid career recruits as well as sidelining those opposed to project Muhoozi! Muhoozi took his own friends with him when he joined the army and there were previous rumours of him recruiting his friends to ISO. He also has his own army within the army having control of all of the crack troops and mechanised troops. Plus he has access to the main business cash cow soon to come online which is oil as part of his brief is protecting the oil fields. this of course will lead to options, partnerships and chairs on oil company and supporting infrastructure boards once he has been civilianised after promotion to General and likely being granted a medal for his action against kony in Garamba even though it was a failure!

There is also Salim saleh who has control and command of the reserve forces -if there is anyone South of the Sahara, who can russle up and create an army very fast from scratch, fast its got to be him. Between his reserve forces, his veterans association and his Saracen security/mercenary outfit, his Rwandese, Sudanese/SPLA, Congolese and Somali/Putland connections, I doubt that there is anyone south of the Sahara who can build an army from scratch as fast! He is another person to watch as if the army decided to get rid of Museveni he would be backup if the sons troops got overwhelmed.

The real question is going to be whether when the time comes, the son is intelligent enough to read the signs or whether he is going to tough it out and fight! this of course could become anywhere from a congo to a Libya!

The next few years could see a purge of people previously considered to be loyalists simply because for those who are ambitious, time is running out. The longer Museveni remains president, the less likely it is that they will have their chance too! People like Mbabazi stand a risk of getting replaced by people like Nsibambi or Atubo who are not really threats! Amelia Kyambadde is a new comer and loyalist who could potentially replace people like Bukenya!

The next few years are going to be interesting to watch!

2011 elections -Quick thoughts!

Saturday, February 19, 2011 at 8:35pm

David is right.

May I add some quick notes. Analysing this is going to take days to months and is going to be very interesting!

While my sympathies lie with the opposition, none of them particularly tickles my fancy. My comments should therefore be viewed as constructive criticism!

The ‘massacre’ at presidential level maybe a reflection of the real and perceived weaknesses of the presidential candidates themselves. There is no doubt though that the power of incumbency particularly the resources at the disposal of Museveni thrown at this election may also have their own story to tell. Obviously other pragmatic things like “twebaka ku tulo” may have played their role too[^1](https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=488948312680)!. At the end of the day, out history remains relevant and continues to be manipulated quite deftly I must admit by the incumbent. https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150094334267681. We are going to have to find out where we went wrong! https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=483879117680

Underestimating the son of Kaguta has always been the downfall of his opposition! The over reliance on ‘agende’ and he has been in power too long rather than articulating what makes them better qualified to take over has always been their weakness! https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=500786022680 Paying the LC’s was a coup that they couldn’t have foreseen! LC’s are the doorway to each village and its inhabitants. They know everyone and are indispensable in doing a house to house ‘kakuyege’! I wrote this about Museveni’s grassroots campaign machine in 2004 using the LC’s! https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=499939492680

The ‘massacre’ of Museveni’s cabinet that appears to be emerging itself tells another story. I doubt that that could have been an accident! clearly Ugandans believe that their politicians are like diapers -and need to be changed regularly. Why they don’t believe in changing their president needs further study. Could it be that the campaign of “the president is a good man surrounded by bad people” actually worked? At least we are closer to getting away from the Kenyan disease. https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=486232492680 The real question though is going to be whether there is enough change in parliament to act as an effective check and balance on Museveni! Of course Museveni will resort to his best tool -just buy all of them! With oil, he is armed and dangerous! One would hope that we have not exchanged one bunch of peasants in suits for another bunch of peasants in suits who will be busy making deals for themselves with the devil instead of advocating for their voters!

The leader of the opposition has been a casualty of this election. Personally i think he was not very effective and needs to find another job too! I wouldn’t be surprised if Kaguta offered him one too! His involvement in the death of a young lady also left too many unanswered questions! https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=488954117680 I would love to believe that his electorate are punishing him for this!

Buganda is also going to be interesting. I have seen some claiming that its a referendum on Kabaka versus Museveni which I doubt. I suspect this is an example of voter sophistication. Certainly the fact that the Kabaka remains probably the biggest crowd puller in Uganda without spending any money and can beat any of the presidential candidates who have to spend massive amounts of money is interesting.

The sources of Museveni’s funding will need to become subject to debate. Am not sure what Uganda’s laws regarding disclosure of funding sources for political parties is but if they exist, am hoping that someone will visit the constitutional court and demand that they all declare their funding sources! Certainly in these days of oil, it is imperative that the public know which candidate was owned by which oil company!

The recent constitutional ruling on independents will be the second level. this is not yet over until all of the injunctions are dealt with! this is going to be lawyer season for the next few months!!!

There is no doubt that the field is not level at the level of presidential elections. Certainly none of the opposition can match the use of state resources that Kaguta has access to. I suspect that a return trip to the supreme court claiming rigged will have the same outcome as in 2006. https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=486600427680.

As I have said before, there is incompetence and there is rigging! How much of this election is rigging and how much is incompetence is unclear! What is clear is that the best that the opposition could ever hope for was a run off and even that was a long stretch! https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=293997787680 . https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=381085707680 . I wrote some predictions in the past that remain relevant even though they were written before the 2006 election! https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=433787272680

I think that after a decent time has elapsed, and the dust has settled down, Kiggundu needs to get sacked for this EC is incompetent! https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150095148497681 An electoral commission that people have confidence in needs to be created and resourced!

Elections and the talk of war makes Ugandans very nervous. There has been a significant amount of talk about war. I have written about this before and why it could backfire. Certainly it works for the incumbent to talk about the prospect of war and drum up sentiments but it does the opposite for his opposition! https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=293571052680

The Otunnu factor fizzed out very early! He underestimate the ‘collective memory’ factor with which he came face to face when he visited Kasubi! He too is going to have to look for another UN job unless he comes down to earth and goes back to basics -or find himself a wife https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=280423437680. Time will tell if he has got the staying power! The messianic complex he brought into the fray did not materialise and he soon realised that while many would like to get rid of Museveni, they do not view him as their messiah.He thought he could just waltz in, kiss the ground and leadership would be his even if he hadn’t worked for it for a single day! this time around Kaguta’s security idiots unlike in the past when they arrested Besigye had enough brains not to do his job for him by arresting him!

I can predict here and now that his 5 million man march is going to be a non starter! At the end he even failed to vote for himself while showing contempt for his followers! I wouldn’t be surprised if UPC disbanded and individuals found new homes -NRM perhaps! Otunnu learnt nothing from the past and brought a naivety to this election that was surprising given his experience!! https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=389531617680

He has now given a press conference to ‘explain’ why he did not vote -mbu he did not want to waste his time since it was not free and fair! I consider this to be contempt of his followers. Why did he waste their time and vote? Is he going to refund taxpayer money given to him for campaigns?

As for Besigye, am afraid he will have to find another job! like many ministers he is going to have to go and look after his goats and ducks! I am waiting to see whether he will graciously turn up in kololo for the hand over or whether he will shun it. I can bet that otunu will not go while Mao and Betty Kamya will. https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=488899497680

Kamya needs to find a vehicle to hitch her carriage too. On her own, she is just going to be another Bidandi! Saying that bidandi really needs to hang his boots up! Bwanika also needs to find a new vehicle. Mao will have to decide whether DP on its own is an adequate vehicle. The rest need to retire.

If Mao ever mentions the Nile Republic again, I will delete him from my list of potential future presidential aspirants to watch! I have been watching Mao for many years and have several notes on him. However i did not believe that he was ready for this election. I think that 2016 is his year -kind of make or break!On the other hand his ambition makes him vulnerable to doing a ‘Kagimu’ or an ‘Atubo’ if he sees time running out increasing his risk of becoming a ssemogerere! Museveni is quite good at killing off his opposition by keeping their mouths full!

A year ago I wondered whether Mao was a fresh breath on Uganda’s politics -I am still not too sure! https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=342439367680 . In making his declarations on the Mao republic, expressing his “solidarity” with kony during the peace jokes, his handling of DP dissenters and his handling of Suubi, I am not sure that he has really learnt much from his own past! https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=340019517680

The return of Museveni leaves us with the same problems we had before -corruption, prolonged incumbency https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=281916497680, the lack of a succession plan and the risk of his rule becoming a dynastic one, Somalia https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=438045762680, the problems of the oil curse, potholes, poor infrastructure and mismanagement https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=414346822680, increased tribalism to fill the gap left by Museveni undermining all institutions https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=499182852680, a personal army that cannot be called a national army, and lies, lies and broken promises https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=280601647680!

The question has been asked as to whether Uganda is ripe for the Jasmine revolution. I personally don’t believe it is yet but I have no doubt that it will be! Uganda has all of the hallmarks but at the moment does not have equipoise! these elections are unlikely to be the trigger! https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150092832897681 . Something else say Somalia spilling over into Uganda, another attack on the Kabaka or Omukama, a misjudged heavy handed treatment of a peaceful demonstration or just about anything could trigger one. Certainly Otunnu cannot trigger one even though am sure he would love to! Only Museveni can prevent a Jasmine revolution by learning from Egypt and Tunisia and pre emptying it by making clear and activating his retirement plan!

In the meantime we will continue to ask whether Uganda really is a democracy! https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=433811377680 . We shall have to ask ourselves how to best empower Ugandans to advocate for their own interests rather than be swayed by brown envelopes and salt and sugar!https://www.Facebook.com/note.php?note_id=490312807680 . We shall continue to look at others such as the Chinese and Singapore and how they did it https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=489380857680 . And we shall need to ponder how to best develop our country https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=489384952680 .

Most of all we shall have to think about how to prevent Museveni from passing on his power to his son in hereditary rulership!

Of illusions -post 2011 election

Monday, February 21, 2011 at 10:39am

I had no illusions at all that Museveni was going to ‘win’ this election. I agree with the commonwealth report and have already pointed out the same points in my own note yesterday.

In my post yesterday, I pointed out the heavy use of incumbence, state patronage and state resources and that this will need to be examined further if necessary in the constitutional court. The laws regarding party funding will need to be examined as this is a loophole Museveni has used. The use of money in this election will need serious debate.

Again in my post election post I mentioned the payment of LC’s as a major factor in this election. I posted a note I wrote in 2004 regarding Museveni’s grassroot campaign machine (LC’s). No other party can duplicate this structure. I personally think that the opposition should have pushed for he dissolution of LC’s an NRM party structure, when the NRM one party government ended and multiparty politics started in 2006, but Museveni is quite good at diverting them for months on useless debates like the anti homosexuality bill that am sure he never intended to pass in the first place but kept parliament from debating issues that affect Ugandans!

Unequal access to the media -I believe something like 9 FM stations in the north denied access to opposition politicians. This should be illegal and needs to be addressed! there should be laws guaranteeing access to all political parties during campaigns.

The use of technology. While FB has emerged as a factor that has put the NRM on their toes and the effects of this forum on this election and future debate and elections will need to be analysed for sometime, the opposition failed to use it for leverage. In this respect, Museveni was ahead of them. As you can see they at least sent their agents provocateurs like Nina, Ochola, Okello, Maria, Jimmex and Mugerwa to monitor and at times attempt to disrupt and derail debate in these forums! The opposition spokesmen failed to engage in these debates or use technology as leverage.

The opposition still remains weak and immature, even though it has made great strides since 2006. Their main campaign strategy is still based around antipathy to Museveni the man but many fail to articulate a clear position on what they have to offer Ugandans that is different to what the NRM and Museveni have to offer! The presence of old guards who themselves are tainted either by association with previous governments or by association with the NRM does not help either! FDC has taken on more of the character of a political party rather than a coalition of desperados with personal grudges against the incubent. Thay also managed to field more candidates this time in most constituents. DP has thrown off the old guard while UPC has thrown off the Obote family that controlled and virtually owned the party for 49 years but is still controlled by old reflexes! The beginnings of single issue lobby groups and parties campaigning on a single issue such as Kamya and Ssuubi have emerged.

KB is going to have to move aside for either Muntu or his wife or whoever else his party choses to elect as their leader. Mao is still immature and it is not clear whether he will be able to build DP back into a strong party with a young base and a national representation or whether he will go for short term gains and jump ship. One hopes that he will be ready for 2016. Otunnu was still born and his petulance and childishness in this election has exposed him as just another egoistic politician seeking power for himself. He hoped that ugandans would view him as a saviour and that their hate of Museveni would act in his favour. Unfortunately like many politicians from previous governments who have lived outside the country for a long time he continues in the delusion that Ugandans hate Museveni. Its true some do but many don’t. To many he was a necessary evil -against people like Otunnu and his previous friends many of whom remain his current friends. While many are tired of Museveni and would like to see him go, in a direct contest between otunnu and Museveni, Otunnu Museveni would win hands down! the only way that Otunnu will be able to change that is actually getting down on the ground and doing ‘kakuyege’ -do the hearts and minds thing and not the ‘shock and awe’ thing which obviously does not seem to have traction with the masses! He needs to actually build a base if he wishes to have a future as a Ugandan politician else he should just return to New York and look for a job! Intellectuals maybe impressed by his resume but paesants don’t care -and paesants have the power here! Paesants are more interested in “twebaka ku tulo” and their next meal and he needs to articulate how he is going to guarantee that!

The NRM was more mature in not giving him free publicity by making him a martyr which is what he wanted. Am sure he was itching to be arrested! Like Awori, such people fade away when ignored but like Besigye gain traction when persecuted.

The heavy deployment of the army in this election needs to be discussed. Policing is the job of the police and not the army. During an election, emphasis should be on the use of police which should be resourced and trained to maintain the peace. Instead resources were diverted to the army! I just received a message from my mother while writing this. I will quote her sms verbatim; “Museveni again! We pray that there will be peace. We are OK, but still in houses! Greetings and God bless.

My parents are not aware of my writings or activities on this forum as I do not discuss them with them. For years they supported and in some way helped maintain the NRM in the early days. They were very active in civil education campaigns of the CA and early LC’s but lost interest when it became clear Museveni had no intention of stepping down and corruption was not going anywhere. I am very sure that they do not feel the same way about Museveni since about 1999-2006 and am sure they are not the only ones. If they voted any other party, it would be a protest vote. Again I have never asked them who they voted but I wouldnt be surprised if they voted against Museveni. Traditionally they were DP, by I would be surprised if they voted DP either. I suspect that their vote would go to one of the smaller new candidates like Kamya even though they would be well aware she had no chance. On the other hand I would not be surprised if they chose to vote for “stability” and voted for Museveni!

It is interesting that in many places, people decided to vote out Museveni’s minsters but voted to keep him! This probably boils down to ‘stability’ and twebaka ku tulo’ as Museveni and his Generals have made it very clear that they will shoot anyone who threatens their hold on power and they are not about to salute anyone else! Surely it is not because they think that they are doing a wonderful job otherwise why sack a performing team? And we know that on corruption, on poverty, on infrastructure etc, the NRM and Museveni score a big zero!

The fact that 3 days after the election, they still haven’t ventured outside their homes is telling and explains why there really hasn’t been much celebration even if the NRM should be celebrating! The intimidating presence of the army given the circumstances and our history may therefore have played a role in peoples choices. It is the same ridiculous choice that Egyptians had to make in entrusting the stability and security of their country to the frailty of an 80-something year old man until they got the courage to overcome their fear!! All this military presence is designed to heighten anxiety and stampede people into voting for stability just like Tony Blair stampeded his parliament into rubber stamping his war in Iraq by stationing tanks at Heathrow even though there is no conceivable role for tanks in a fight against a suicide bomber with a backpack or even stolen plane! This is psychological manipulation of the population as is all the talk of terrorism and intimidation of anyone who talks about demonstrating against the NRM by labelling them a war monger or terrorist!

The opposition is going to have to become more sophisticated. The funding of the NRM in this campaign has got to be questioned including in courts. If there are laws that require parties to declare their funding, they should be used to force the NRM to declare their funding sources. If they used state resources as we all know they did, then that should become subject to legal and constitutional interpretation. The use of state funds will need to be explored and queried including the supplementary budgets passed during campaigns and the funds given to the presidency as well as MP’s. The passing of the unconstitutional “Traditional Leaders Bill” should be reversed and discussed and redrafted properly if it is really deemed to be necessary! One hopes that the new strength of opposition politicians in parliament will be used to force debate on all of these issues including cutting the powers of the presidency as well as bringing back term limits!

If there has been oil company money in this election, this needs to be declared. The WikiLeaks documents clearly demonstrate that Tullow oil sought to exert influence through possibly blackmail on our politicians. If they have made any major payments to the NRM or any other party, this should be explored including using the US governments laws on private companies payments to and links to foreign governments!

Lastly one has got to mention the obvious incompetence of the electoral commission under Kiggundu. The credibility of the EC really needs to be improved. Certainly Kiggundu needs to take one for the team and go back to whatever it is he used to do before! https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150095148497681

I pointed out to Nina in this forum before that there is such a thing as a pyrrhic victory. Like for Ben Ali and Mubarak, this may turn out to be one.

The Jasmine train is not yet derailed. This debate must continue!

Of ticks and fatted bulls!

Monday, February 28, 2011 at 8:01am

Mbabazi,

Nice try (Mbabazi thinks I should join the NRM and change from within). I promised myself many years ago never to work in an organisation where I became a part of the problem -if I cannot hire and fire, count me out! Everyone who joins the NRM becomes poisoned! in so much as you all continue to allow Museveni to continue to live his dreams at the expense of the country, you are all now a part of the dream!

You know that am not coming over. Your chalice is poisoned! Everyone in your yellow bus is a pawn! Its a wonder you don’t feel soiled!

It is obvious to everyone by now that Museveni’s wish to stay in power has got nothing to do with this country! Its got a lot more to do with his ego, and his fear of becoming irrelevant!

And having fattened on the best that our country has got to offer for 25 years, the fatted cow has attracted a lot of ticks! And those ticks have vested interests in keeping the cow around!

But what those ticks do not know is that they are all dispensable and disposable! if one of those ticks so much as becomes annoying, they will be swatted away like the nuisance they are! We all know these ticks -Mbabazi, Nsibambi, bukenya, the tinyefunza’s, Muhwezi, Mukula etc! Like Ben Ali and mubarak sacrificed their cabinets before them, they will be the first ones to be thrown in front of the mob when it comes for retribution! As you can see he has already been sending around a whispering campaign -he is clean -blame the ticks around him!

That the tick imagines that they for one instance have some sort of influence on the bull on which they feed is laughable! The bull laughs at them! The indulges and tolerates them! You see with Uganda at his mercy, he has a lot of blood at his disposal -more than the ticks can drain! His immune system is adapted to their presence. They cannot kill him but he can kill them or just swat them off to starve -like he did Kategaya!

There was however one tick, Besigye that became really annoying and got swatted off. He continues to survive even when separated from the host. But thats only because there was some anaemic and thin cow called opposition onto which he managed to cling and continues to hold onto literally by his teeth! A couple of weeks ago, opposition lost a few more liters of blood to big fat bull!

What Mr Big Fat Bull does not reckon on is the resilience of the downtrodden Uganda on which he has fed for all of these years. You see, Uganda has seen other Greedy Fat Bulls before. They all thought they would be around forever -Amin, Obote etc!At the end Uganda had the last laugh! The more of Uganda’s blood they drain the more erratic and mad they get! you see thats one property of Uganda’s blood they did not know -it has the power to make them run mad and destroy themselves!

In one swoop, Uganda will rise and Mr Big Fat Bull and all of his ticks will be gone!

The paesant Generals are only fit or bulungi bwansi not to run a modern country!

Wednesday, June 22, 2011 at 11:27pm

Dear Nina,

Today I decided to read all 350 comments on that mad mukiga Nathans page. One man Apollo Kakwenzire, stood out! Not just for his insulting comments about Baganda but also about his blind sycophancy towards the NRM and its policies!

LOL, I often wonder how people mortgage their brains in support of a government that is past its due by date! Poor Apollo Kakwenzire is still at it! Denying, bullying, browbeating all in an attempt at proving that white is black and that Museveni and the NRM have the skills and the will to take this country forward! How shallow can a man be?Ugandans were quite happy to give him some tough love though!!!

What happened to Mwenda is simple stuff. Ask any teacher and they will tell you that this is basic psychology. If you have a disruptive child in class, you single them out and make them the class prefect and soon you will have thm trying to maintain calm in the class.

Franz Fanon had a name for people like Mwenda -comprador bourgeoisie. The become a part of the system once they have got something to protect. When Mwenda was drawing a salary, he was siding with the man on the street. Now that Mwenda runs a 5 billion shilling company, his concerns are the same as those of the oppressors -protecting his bottom line! He has got something to lose!

Thats why Franz Fanon advocated for dispossessing the cmprador bourgeoisie for until they know what it is to be hungry, what it is to be jobless or what it is to be opressed, they will continue to act to protect their own interests! I can bet that Mwenda’s companies get a significant amount of their business from the state like most media houses in Uganda! When Mwenda left the Monitor, he was railing against his being gagged to protect the business interests of the Agha Khan who had then purchased the newspaper! As an owner, his interests and those of the state converge and he gets more and more distant from the ideals of the common man. For him to get his critical edge back, you would have to burn his company down and reduce him back to a level where he understands the aspirations of the average Ugandan!

Museveni finessed the art of buying off loud mouths! When he first came to power, a commission of inquiry was the most common way of buying off loud mouths. So every Makerere lecturer who made too much noise against government policy, got a commission of inquiry the result of which would never get published! Soon he graduated to politicians -so vocal anti corruption critics like Nsadhu got co opted into the machine -and became a part of the machine!

He graduated to offering ministries as bribes, then ambassadorships t the point where there is only one serving career diplomat at the rank of ambassador the rest being political appointees -essentially political rejects some of whom sold out their constituents!

You can extend this patronage and political bribery to layers of politicians and political appointees like RDC’s and their deputies, LC council chairpersons at all levels down to the village level! This creates a system of graft and corruption as well as an unproductive layer of overpaid political sycophants milking the public purse as long as they sing “the man in the hat is the only man with a vision”!

Virtually every member of the NRM is tainted. The longer their incumbency, the higher the likelihood! They have perfected the art of lying to the tax paying public!

The truth is that Museveni’s government is incompetent and lacks the skills to carry this country forward. This is reflected in the recent cabinet appointments as well as the budget which offers nothing new or radical!

Musveveni’s continuing rule is a private project. It is a family mafia! At its core, is a family esconced into government like its a private company. There is a wife who is a full minister and MP, a son whose accelerated rise in the army could not possibly have been on merit but nepotism, a presidents office that cannot run without a first daughter as the presidential secretary an another as the chaplain, a brother to the president whose fingers are in business, in private armies and secretive government projects siphoning off large amounts of money ostensibly for poverty alleviation, yet no one seems to know where the queue is or who belongs to his farmers associations, an anti corruption unit in health set up in state house run by an adopted daughter, sons in law, brothers in law, sisters in law, sisters etc, all in government without going through any known or advertised interviews! And we wont even go into the rumours of people recruited from some peoples villages to government departments or in the first ladies kitchen!

You people must believe that Ugandans are stupid! That tired line about people in the diaspora not knowing what goes on in Uganda is overused! Who do you think finances the failure of Museveni’s government to provide social services? When people go to hospital and need money for drugs, they call their relatives in the diapora and line up outside western union not any government office for they know the government abdicated its responsibility a long time ago! If Ugandans in the diapora were to stop sending money to relatives to create jobs and pay for social services, your government would not last a day for the paesants would rise up and kick you out! By the time one drives from Entebbe to Kampala one has seen dust, uncollected garbage, potholes, poverty, chaos, bribery and corruption name it unless they are blind. All eveidence of poor government! A week will aquiant one with all sorts of social problems from health to edication to housing all through the long lines of supplicants for ones help. Yet you preside over tis heap of refuse and garbage and try to pass it off as a miracle!

For five years maybe! For ten, really!! For 25 years, quite frankly you should all be lined up against a wall and shot! Shot for trying to pass off a not so convincing counterfeit as success and development!

Seriously after 25 years of “development” one of the most important items in the budget is the price of hoes!!! There is no strategy for employment. We talk about tourism without any evidence that we even know what the word means and we are obsessed with increasing a jobless semi literate population with no skills and hoping that consumption without production will be the main driver of an internal market! Industrialisation without reliable or adequate power? Goodness! Power should be one of the first priorities of recovery economies! That 25 years later we are still doing stuff that should have been done in the first decade of NRM rule suggests gross incompetence and negligence. Certainly it suggests that Museveni and his paesant Generals need to return to the barracks or better still their farms and hand over to a more competent generation! Which schools of economics did our so called leaders attend?

In any dveloped economy for the Governor of the central bank to make the kind of statements that Mutebile made, would demand his resignation or the collapse of the government! Certainly it would be an ominous event that could precipitate runs on the banks, a collapse of markets, a drop in investor confidence, a flight of foreign capital, an increase in inflation and an increse in interest rates and consumer prices. All indicators suggest that all of this is already happening in Uganda!

All of that irresponsible spending was bound to catch up with us. All the money stolen to finance an election at all costs was bound to contribute to inflation while drawing on our reserves to fund fighter jets we do not need was bound to cause problems too!

AS for Apollo’s story about his brother from the UK who run an incompetent campaign seriously all the story proves is that the possession of a university degree is not proof of intelligence!

The Jasmine revolution in north Africa was triggered by food prices. This government is in trouble!

Lunacy is when you keep doing the same thing and expecting a different result!

Response to where did we go wrong?

Saturday, December 18, 2010 at 1:17am

So far I have stayed out of this discussion because of work commitments but mostly because any discussion of our past leaders is almost always divisive and ends acrimoniously with personal attacks and insults. Our leaders both past and present have almost all been divisive. Any discussion of their contributions to our acrimonious and conflict ridden history is always ridden by subjectivity and anecdotal evidence.

I can see some have been directed towards Godfrey whose sentiments and opinions on many fronts both regarding revisionists of our history as well as the role of the economy I agree with.

I will however wade in with my own opinions and hopefully balanced opinion despite the fact that I will draw from my own personal experiences as well as those of my family.

For the purposes of this discussion, I will ignore Lule, Muwanga, Binaisa and Muteesa except to say that virtually all of Uganda’s leaders except Muteesa came to power through the gun either directly or indirectly.

I do not believe in regime change as an end in and of itself. However i still maintain that Museveni has outlived his usefulness and should go. If the NRM does not have the internal structures to replace him then they too should be confined to the dust bins of our history. The NRM will only ever come of age when they can prove that the party is more than Museveni and can survive beyond Museveni. Beyond the test of whether they are all pawns in one mans dream for self aggrandisement and power is the test of succession and party structures. Are they strong enough? Do they have strong enough party structures to prevent Museveni annointing his son as his successor? So far there is very little evidence that the NRM is strong enough to replace Museveni or the he is subject to party structures.

DP has demonstrated maturity in being able to move beyond the Ganda catholic clique that had become synonymous with DP. Obviously in the short term, thay have paid a price but in the long term there can only be benefit. Neither Ssebaana’s, Kiwanuka’s nor Ssemogerere’s children have monopolised the party’s future in the way that Obote’s family controlled UPC until recently when they were booted out, or the way the Odinga’s, Moi’s and Kenyatta’s princelings control Kenya’s destiny.

UPC was a party with a history that got eclipsed in one mans dream and megalomania. To hear the story told, one could believe that there were no others that came before Obote and that he founded the party from scratch. I believe that Obote excelled at manipulation and manipulated all of those around him with the sole aim of keeping himself in power.

It has been said that Museveni is the longest serving ruler that Uganda has had followed by Amin. I wish to correct that impressionas obote ruled uganda initially as prime minister in 1962 until Uganda’s first coup in 1966 when he abrogated the constitution, single handedly rewrote it (with binaisa who boasted they wrote it overnight), used the army to overthrow Uganda’s first constitutional head of state thus introducing us to the militarisation of our politics, unilaterally declared a republic without recourse to parliament or referendum, declared a state of emergency, systematically undermined parliament, introduced detention without trial and introduced the nation to the politics of state oppression by their leaders through the security services. The only time that Obote was ever directly subjected to elections in his 16 year rule of Uganda was in the disputed 1980 election that led to the NRM war.

He subsequently ruled Uganda till 1971 when he was booted out by his mastiff Idi Amin whom he had promoted against all advice and common sense in the hope that being illiterate, he would be a pawn in his power game. Thats until Idi Amin decided to go into business for himself and overthrew him with the help of British and Israeli intelligence. Both the Israeli’s and the British later turned against Idi Amin after he expelled Britains non landed citizens (Ugandan Asians who held British passports) from Uganda, a plan that was actually not his but was already a part of Obote’s indigenisation and nationalisation policy of the late 60′s

He subsequently ruled for another 5 years following the overthrow of Idi Amin in what is in my opinion one of the darkest periods of Uganda even eclipsing that of Idi Amin before being booted out by yet another of his mastiffs -the Okellos (and Otunnu) who were themselves booted out by Museveni!

Obote’s personality and lack of democratic credentials is further characterised by the hold he had on his party the UPC which he run virtually like personal property and even bequeathed to his widow with the plan of passing on to his son Jimmy. This plan was finally thwarted by the same people who booted him from power in 1985 ie Otunnu. All in all his control of the party and its structures spanned 51 years a full half century during which time he was not exposed to elections. He also continues to posthumously control the only property the party owned Ugandan house (though I believe that state funds were used in its construction) through the Apollo Milton Obote foundation controlled by his cousin Sam Odaka and his widow.

This problem of parties built around personalities rather than party structures continues to dog us todate. So Museveni, his wife and almost certainly his son and brother as well as various inlaws such as Kutesa control the NRM, the Obote family until recently controlled UPC, DP was for almost 3 decades synonymous with Ssemogerere, CP equals Lukyamuzi and FDC equals Besigye! While these various personalities indulge in dangerous power plays we all pay the price for their personal aspirations for themselves and their offspring.

In a recent conversation a friend of mine who came across the stranglehold (and arrogance) that Asians have over the economies of our neighbours in the East african community said to me that much as Amin was a stain on Uganda, he may have done Uganda a favour in getting rid of Asians and breaking their control over our economy. The surprise is that his father was one of the prominent Ugandans killed by Idi Amin. This is something I have come across before and certainly have been reminded of by the arrogance of Kenyan Asian shopkeepers and attitude towards black people, my interaction with Kenyan members of a rotaract club (membership of rotary clubs is by personal sponsorship by a club member so this club in a black African country can only be pure Asian if the Asian members do not sponsor any Black Kenyans for club sponsorship) from Mombasa that was all asian or encounters with clearly racist white Zimbabweans in Zimbabwe as well as south Africa who clearly control the economy where only 7% of listed cmpanies in the Jo’burg stock exchange are owned by black south Africans. In that respect, Amin empowered Ugandans and broke them from the stereotype of being Asians ‘boyees’ and servants! I must admit that I do not entirely subscribe to the method even though I fully understand what informs these sentiments about a minority that despises you yet controls your economy!

Another example about Idi Amin that i got from my parents is the effect that Idi Amin had on the self image and pride of Ugandan muslims. Apparently Al Hajji Abdul Nsereko who was a newsreader for most of the years we grew up first started reading news in Amins time after Amin demanded that Radio Uganda and the TV had to employ a muslim. At the time we grew up, he had an affected American accent but in the early seventies he spoke like ‘seya’! Apparently his English was atrocious. This was apparently Amins own form of affirmative action. It cannot be said today that muslims who were synonymous with illiteracy lag far behind other Ugandans in education or wealth.

I have also quoted from my own childhood the episode when as a kindegarten pupil, I abused Idi Amin to his face and he simply smiled and waved at me! I know for a fact that had a child done that during Obote II, both the child and his family would have been massacred! I also do not remember seeing armed soldiers on the street until 1979. In Amins Uganda uniformed sldiers were confined to the barracks and my only memory of uniformed soldiers were those in military landrovers. this is not to say that Amins soldiers did not kill people. While Amin controlled his mastiffs, Obote had very little control over his own who were his nevertheless! One of his famous quotes in parliament to Ssemogerere then leader of the opposition was “Where are your Generals?”, in reference to the personal allegiance his army held to him!

Furthermore, my family’s escape from Kampala during the fall of Kampala in 1979 was in a bus commandeered by an army commander in Amins army to transport him and his wounded men to Arua. My father paid them to transport us to Luwero wehere we stayed on a ranch owned by relatives until Kampala was safe and my father came for us. Despite the fact that our group comprised of women and children, they were perfect gentlemen and did not molest any of the women or teenage girls. On the way they even picked up a young girl and boy who were walking home several hundred miles and dropped them off without demanding any money. Many months later, my mother met the bus driver in Kampala. The soldiers once they got to Arua, paid him and released him to return to his family in Kampala!

But I also do know that in Amins Uganda, a parent was stuffed into a car boot in front of his children at my school Nakasero. I used to walk past State Research Bureau every day. I was classmates with Idi Amins children one of whom cried for a friends toy, a birthday present. The teacher returned it to the rightful owner and was later that day taken away in the boot of a car when Idi Amins daughter in an upper class ordered the bodyguards to do so!!! Can you imagine a primary school child having that much power?

We were later to be exposed to the power of mere children during Obote II when children could get one killed, carried weapons to school and even boasted of having killed people! Teachers were terrified of these children who were considered above school rules and untouchable.

Despite being a child I was aware of the fact that particularly in the latter part of amins reign, the shops were empty, that Kampala last had a proper ‘supermarket’ in the early part of my childhood (at Drapers building above the Taxi park), that we grew up virtually not knowing what sausages, apples or chocolate was save when a parent came back from overseas. That sugar and salt were ‘magendo’ commodities that your parents bought from the backdoor of hajji’s shop and so was petrol! Its therefore illusionary for people to claim that the economy was good during Amins time. I do however remember that whenever I needed medical care, I was a VIP and received private treatment in Mulago’s private wing because I was ‘entitled’ by virtue of both my parents having been civil servants. The only ‘supermarket’ in Obote II’s time was Hajji “Seeya’ Nasser Ssebagala’s shop on UCB arcade that was no better than a grocery store but was really a front for illegal currency dealings. I know this for a fact because I was sold illegal travellers cheques there in the 90′s!

Despite the fact that I can see this good side to Idi Amin and his soldiers, I cannot bring myeslf to see anything good about Obote or his rule. The truth be said Obote introduced us to the mess we are in. A classmate who was the younger brother of an army commander regaled us with stories of how he killed people, threw a grenade at a group, commandeered cars and got them past roadblocks manned by his village mates who just waved him on once he introduced himself. Needless to say, he was the only one of my classmates who actually owned a car in O-level. The same guy once threatened us that if the “wayekera came, he would ‘soot’ all of ‘zeez’ waganda”. When the wayekera did finally come, we are the same poeple that shielded him together with other children of high ranking army commanders some of whom were notoriour for their barbarity. I remember having trouble reconciling a schoolmate, a son of Bazilio Olara Okello with the man who reputedly commanded platoons of marauding soldiers that raided homes around Kampala at night! While the son was reputed to own a gun, he was one of the most gentle and cool headed students in school. Obviously because of the schools I attended, I rubbed shoulders with the children of all sorts of people who were notorious at the time. None of the stories I can tell though compare with those of students in day usually mixed schools like Kitante, Kampala or Kololo high that brought guns to school and scared teachers, raped girls or disrupted football matches with rival schools!

My real introduction to true state terror was during Obote II. I have already written about my childhood which is one we all share. I do not subscribe to the claim that the war in the 80′s was urban warfare as opposed to guerilla warfare. There was only one group that subscribed to urban warfare and that was Nkwanga’s group that specialised in car jackings and they were really not effective and not much more than bandits. Kayira’s group attacked Lubiri barracks on a couple of occasions in the early 80′s leading to Obote’s soldiers laying waste to Rubaga, Ndeeba, Mutundwe and surrounding areas. Houses in these areas were deserted and looted beyond recognition! Most of the rest of the time these guerilla groups including the NRM were in the villages and bushes and no one that I know of around Kampala had ever seen one! Sometimes people even argued that they did not exist! Evidence however of their existence and the war that was ongoing in the countryside was abundant in the form of family members and rural -urban migrants who were refugees from Luwero and other theatres of war!

But everyone in Kampala knew that the state was a terrorist. Everyone knew about Makindye barracks and Lubiri barracks and the many people who dissappeared into these places never to return. everyone even children knew about NASA as well as the special forces and various other paramilitary forces. And everyone who lived in Kampala knew not to be outside their house after dark not because there were guerillas lurking about but because there were government soldiers about at night. Everyone knew that having money was dangerous and so was having a beautiful wife or girlfriend. That every idiot with a gun was next to God. That you did not argue with an idiot in a government army uniform and a tax payer funded gun. That everytime you got past a roadbloack was one more day you stayed alive. As children we learnt to recognise fear in adults all around us.

The argument that Museveni was the major architect of the terror in luwero does not wash either because testimony from the residents of Luwero that is well documented in the Human Rights tribunal clearly points the finger at Obote’s troops and names names. Furthermore recruits to the NRM were from the residents of this area. Personally having witnessed the behaviour of Obote’s troops towards civilians in Kampala that was not a theatre of war, it is not too much of a stretch of my imagination to imagine how they would behave towards civilians when under attack! By the same token the behaviour of Kony and his troops in the north when viewed in light of Obote’s troops in Kampala then is not really too surprising as the only difference was their targets. Kony’s troops primarily targeted civilians, engaged in hit and run with little attempt to engage the army in head on battles. They practiced a scorched earth policy primarily targeted at causing disaffection among the local population rather than attack military targets. Their various massacres are well documented as well with attribution for various atrocities clearly alloted to Kony’s troops by local civilians. Many internally displaced people in the north themselves preferred to move to government controlled areas rather than seek protection from Kony and his troops which does somewhat tell you a little bit about who they considered to be the lesser enemy! There is no doubt however that many army commanders were guilty of profiting from the war as well as being negligent.

My home 5 km from the city centre was 8 roadblocks and at each of those roadblocks one could die, get tortured, get raped or get robbed! I went through 16 roadblocks a day to and from school until my parents decided I was safer in a boarding school and never ever saw a guerilla! These roadblocks were manned by government soldiers. Around this time of the year, going into the city was dangerous as at any time it could get shut down by soldiers looking to steal meat milk, or goods for christmas. A classmate who had six sisters told us how his mother, a widow and all of his sisters got raped in front of him while they were forced to watch. Their home was in Makindye next to the barracks! An uncle of mine dissappeared into Makindye barracks and has never been seen again! Another got shot and killed in our own home and my family had to watch him hold his guts for hours till he died because no one dared drive a car till morning to take him to hospital. Hospitals had embedded intelligence officers who arrested anyone who brought in a gunshot victim on suspicion of being a guerilla. My father got arrested in panda gari cordons several times and I witnessed day light robbery more than once. I know people who were killed for no reason and heard gunshots almost every night! While I continue to marvel at how much our parents shielded us from the mayhem around us we were still exposed to quite a lot! Its a wonder we ever did turn out to be normal adults or are we?

The International conference centre where Obote had offices was also the main detention centre and torture centre for lots of people. You cannot tell me that he did not know what went on right next to and under his own offices!

It is often claimed that Obote built an infrastructure. But its also often neglected to say that Obote inherited a functioning bureaucracy and civil service. This bureaucracy crumbled under his rule in particular in Obote II when salaries meant little. My fathers salary could not pay his transport to work for a week let alone feed us or pay school fees. Finally my parents had to decide that one of them had to leave the civil service and move into private entreprise in order to survive and make ends meet. My mum could not put up any longer with the presence of military guards in the government installation in which she worked so she resigned. I lose track of the number of times that her businesses were robbed by government soldiers and she had to stsart all over again! Finally she just could not stand going to work in the city again and run her businesses by remote from home while minimising excursions into the city centre as she developed panic attacks, something that I now recognise as ‘post traumatic stress syndrome’! Its also claimed that he built schools without many specifics as to which schools he built. It has also been stated that each school had a truck and school children were fed. I know for a fact that in Obote II there were tata trucks given out to people that paid bribes for schools that did not exist except on paper. Supplying “air” to government was finessed in Obote II and is not the invention of the NRM government! “Ghosts on the payroll, poor pay or no pay were characteristics of Obote II! The economy too was not rosy with basic commodities always being in short supply and the rural economy was decimated. Tripple digit inflation figures were normal and people needed millions of shillings to buy a loaf of bread. Businessmen and women did not open up shop before checking the US dollar rate on the street as this changed every day! Mugabe did not invent runaway inflation as this was the reality of Obote’s Uganda of the 80′s!

Its forgotten that many public schools were actually nationalised schools rather than schools actually built by the government. An example is Nakasero which I attended which was an “European school” nationalised and became a public school. So was St Mary’s college Kisubi which was a catholic funded and founded school on private property donated by an aristocrat of Buganda that was nationalised! These schools already had their own infrastructure that was not bequeathed upon them by the government. In Obote II many of these schools also adopted PTA’s in order to survive. The official school fees was a pittance and teachers salaries were a joke so parents formed these PTA ‘s that levied extra fees to run the schools! When I attended kisubi, Kisubi and similar schools were not cheap. Many of the best schools in Uganda have their history in the vision of colonial government and local governments such as the Buganda government and were not government founded schools!

As for roads and hospitals, Musevenis roads and hospitals maybe crap, but Obote’s roads were no better! Kampala’s main roads were one big pothole! And the hospitals were a cesspool! Services were non existent and parastatals were money draining loads on the public coffers and inefficient! Farmers sold their produce to government marketing boards for peanuts and got little back in exchange paid in arrears upto years later subject to runaway inflation!

I can see the role of cooperatives and believe they should have been saved. I however believe that parastatals were just vehicles through which public money was stolen by government officials and their cronies. Certainly that was the case during Obote II. Those who claim that parastatals should have been saved certainly never listened to Obote’s budget speeches. Many parastatals in Obote II were losing money and subsidised by the government. This trend continued in Museveni’s regime when he transferred many under NEC industries an army corporation. Many were sold to government officials including Kategaya, Kuteesa. Salim Saleh, Bidandi Ssali, Francis Guma, Tumwiine and others. Government owned houses where run down shells. Many were sold for a pittance and are now multi million dollar residences. th government has divested itself of all of our “family jewels” including major parastatals, cooperatives, foreign embassies, local residential properties etc. The problem is that the funds are nowhere to be seen! UCB was sold while it was still profitable. Local banks were run into the ground. Politicians took loans they never paid back to government banks and cooperatives.

It has been stated that farmers were rich and had access to funds from their produce. That may have been the case in the colonial period and early years of the 60′s but it was less so in the seventies and by the 80′s was no longer the case. In Obote’s Uganda, the marketing boards became the vehicle through which farmers were robbed of their produce. Collected from them in exchange for “chits”, many went unpaid for a very long time. By the time they were paid at fixed government prices subject to inflation, the money meant nothing! At the time we had runaway inflation. my mother owned several businesses in the city and it was common to see people walk down the street with sacks of cash that really couldnt buy much! Until the market was liberalised in Museveni’s 80′s and farmers could sell their produce to private companies in exchange for cash, the government was the only buyer! Coffee Marketing Board was the main vehicle through which farmers were robbed and farmers responded by cutting down their coffee trees! Now the rural economy has been decimated creating a dependent population!

We have been discussing our roads and infrastructure which is chaotic. Our so called development which follows whim rather than a template. Policy is made up on the fly and our village chief walks around dispensing wisdom and favours. Unity is at its lowest with different groups ready to turn on each other at short notice. The big village chief mentality and the colonial governor mentality all got fused into one in our current and past leaders!

Museveni was a beacon of hope in his early years probably because Ugandas so wanted to see some hope and change. We were all hopeful that things were finally going to change. He talked the talk and to some extent walked the talk. He co opted many who were ormer enemies into the movement and in some ways tried to build a coalition of national interests. I agree however that his best years ended in 1996 and he has since become more and more of a liability. He is obviously setting us up for dynastic rule. Like Saddam and Mobutu, his refusal to retire from the centre of our politics has potential to wipe whatever legacy he believes he may have created. He has hung around long enough to make all of the mistakes his predecessors made.

A major blight on Museveni’s rule is corruption. While he has always talked the talk against corruption, Museveni has failed to walk the talk. In many ways corruption makes Uganda look like a cartel run by mafia warlords! impunity a major catchword of his early days is a major problem in his government. Many of his so called cadres have been accused of corruption and have gone unpunished. Museveni will go down in history as having presided over a corrupt cabal of thieves!

Security in the north is also a major blight on Museveni’s regime. A major problem is the as yet unresolved Mukura Kyaligonza wagon case. While I would not go so far as blaming Museveni for the war in the north, as Uganda’s head of state he is responsible for failing to protect civilians against the attacks of Kony and Lakwena. Not only was he and his government culpable by virtue of their failure to protect civilians, they for ten years presided over the IDP’s with their attendant casualties in terms of poverty, disease, malnutrition and social destruction. this was gross negligence for which no one ever paid the price. The tendency of his idiots to react with deadly force such as during the so called Buganda rots a security disaster the responsibility for which should be laid squarely at Museveni’s feet is also a cause for major concern! Museveni is personally culpable for the people shot during the Buganda riots as he personally ordered a shoot to kill even though his government have so far failed to prove that any of the people they shot were armed or even rioters!

What disturbs me most is the selective justice that demands that Kony be exonerated while Museveni be tried for the war in the north. The same people would like to see Obote celebrated for presiding over chaos and the terrorisation of citizens but wish to see Museveni vilified. its at that point that we all lose the plot and start fighting each other leaving only Museveni as the winner! If we have exonerated everyone else, could contemplate granting the animal Kony amnesty, gave Obote a state funeral as well as a medal in recognition, then it is not too much a price to pay to grant Museveni amnesty and immunity and start all over again with new rules. We need to create he cuture of former heads of state retiring in the country! the same people who sit with kony and call him Jal, are the same people who would like to apply selective justice! the same people who have selective amnesia for the ills of the past are the very same people who wish to place Museveni’s real or perceived crimes at the centre of our politics.

I must admit am biased. I did not live in an IDP camp. if I had I would not even countenance Museveni being let off Scot free. Neither can I ever forgive obote. But I accept his burial in Uganda or whatever honours (that I do not believe he deserves) he may have been given posthumously because I believe it is important for Uganda’s future. We do need to find things we can agree upon rather than forever emphasising things we shall never agree upon! I know that in Obote’s uganda, I was an endangered species. I know that for most of Museveni’s regime, I can walk around at night including on foot except in some parts of the country. While am not a direct beneficiary of Museveni’s government kleptocracy and the crappy infrastructure and obvious lack of urban planning irks me continuously, I can do my own thing, fly in and out, carry US dollars or any currency, drive whatever car I can afford, or build whatever ugly structure I wish to without getting killed for it! And I can walk down the street with my kyana without being afraid that some idiot with half a brain could take a fancy to her and kill me or rape her!

I would not give my vote to Museveni. But I cannot convince myself that I could give it to any of his opposers either. In many ways our opposition is disappointing. I actualy believe that the best they can do is force him to a rerun which would force them to unite under one leader. While that maybe a good thing for our opposition it would not be a good thing for Uganda. Kenya, Ivory coast, Congo and Zimbabwe are perfect testimony to the fact that our so called democracies are not ready for close indecisive elections which increase the chances of use degenerating into more chaos.

UPC,DP, FDC and the NRM all had chaotic elections that revealed their own internal weaknesses, absence of internal structures as well as hypocrisy and lack of internal democracy. DP, UPC as well as the FDC and the NRM have all failed in the way they have dealt with internal dissent. A perfect example is how the FDC dealt with Ms Kamya. When you review their elections all of which have been marred by dissent, chaos and cries of foul, one wonders whether any of these clowns should be allowed anywhere near the presidency. What it demonstrates most clearly is that the power of the presidency needs to be cut down! This overarching winner take all democracy needs to be rewritten. Term limits also need to be rewritten into our constitution. The basic premise was that we could not leave it to the incumbent to leave while they were still ahead. Museveni is a perfect example of why term limits were written into the 1995 constitution in the first place! It is evident that he has no intention of retiring until he is pushed which is not really in his own or his family’s interests and neither is it in ours as a country! It is also increasingly evident that we are going to be saddled with his family and dynastic politics should he pass on!

I would love to see a well articulated response to the governments budget speech for example presenting an alternate budget and campaign promises based on realistic and verifiable figures rather than rhetoric. I would like to see lists of people allegedly killed by this regime rather than blanket statements of the government has killed people. To begin with how about a facebook page of all of the people killed during the Buganda riots and the Kasubi riots? Museveni and his government may increasingly act like the thought police but they cannot control facebook! I would love to see verifiable documentation of corruption rather than simply claims designed for news conferences. The PAC committee was on facebook but how about a “wikileaks” site on facebook for each of the various corruption scandals? I would love to see less posturing and more facts. If you are going to take us to the moon how are you ging to do it and where is the money ging to come from. If you are going to give Buganda federo, how are you going to do it? The claim that the opposition cannot say what they can do because they have not been given a chance simply doesnt wash. These are verifiable figures in the public domain. The leader of the opposition is entitled to access these figures anyway! I would really love to see the opposition raise their game. I would really love to see a new leader challenging Museveni within or without the NRM with more than he has ruled too long and its time someone else ate too? I would love to believe that in changing Museveni we will not be simply exchanging one bunch of “paesants in suits” for another bunch of “paesants in suits” but how do you seriously expect me to take a party that sits down with Hajji Ssebagala and considers him to be one of their leaders seriously? Or someone who refers to Kony as an elder or Jal and thinks he should have a role in government?

Lastly of the economy. While we can blame the World Bank and Structural adjustment programmes from the IMF from a lot of the disengagement from the provision of social services such as health and training, the IMF are not our rulers and we did not elect them. Our government has got to accept responsibility for acting on bad advice.

I have stated before that every Ugandan should be given a bill. In essence I was saying that every Ugandan should be dragged up into the middle class. Middle class people have jobs and create jobs. They consume. They have mortgages. They pay taxes. They buy shares and have investment. Essentially they have a stake in the economy. people who have a stake in the economy make decisions based on their best interest. As it is poor Ugandans have only one stake in government -peace and security. there is no expectation of anything else from the government. People who have a stake in the economy are interested in how government policy affects their jobs, their mortgage interest rates, their retirement funds, their investments. They are interested in the excesses of their government. in essence thats the main difference between our so called democracies and many western democracies. We can afford idiots because as long as they do not molest us at road blocks we can wander around doing our own thing -surviving while those in many western democracies cannot allow imbeciles to lead them to ruin as they all get ruined if they mismanage the country or economy! People who pay taxes and whose fortunes are bound to the economy and government policies take a much closer interest in the workings of governemt and its effects on their personal fortunes. Our parents who were graduates in the 60′s had very bright futures that were affected greatly by Uganda’s politics so we should not underestimate the potential for politicians to mess up even the best economies and gains of private entreprise.

My take is that we need both private entreprise and strong government with a vision and policy. The market is not self regulating and you cannot subject citizens to the goodwill of companies whose only motive is profit just like you cannot subject citizens to the goodwill of a leader and expect them to retire of their own free will. There are simply not that many Mandelas and certainly Museveni is not one!

Lunacy is when you keep doing the same thing and expecting a different result! We Ugandans are lunatices and we do need our heads examined!

Lots of things!

Tuesday, February 8, 2011 at 11:49pm

Amos and Stephen, thanks.

It is possible that Museveni did really believe what he said at the beginning. But as Binaisa said, “Entebbe ewooma” or in English, power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely!

When he stated in 1986 that the problem of Africa was leaders who overstayed in power, it was easy to believe him. Along with other statements such as the role of politics is to provide services in reference to the poor infrastructure. He ridiculed the potholed roads and said that a woman could give birth just sitting in a car going over those potholes! His roads are no better and in many places a lot worse! Furthermore when he said that there was no need for a government to kill its people if there is a disagreement between the people and itself in reference to the 1966 Kasubi incident, it was easy to hope that at last we had a government that was going to make the bad old days history!

Fast forward 24 years and we have had a second Kasubi, his soldiers repeatedly fire upon with live bullets and kill people in almost all major demonstrations since Makerere University in the days when Mao was Guild president!

At the time it was hope that made people believe him. I myself had hope that our country was going to get better and you could not have convinced me then that 24 years later we would have roads and hospitals in their current state while corruption and nepotism run the country!

Museveni has always played the reluctant president but anyone who has watched him the last 24 years as well as read his history prior to that back to the 60 would have no doubt that he loves being in power! Its now obvious that he has no intention of ever leaving power except to his son and this whole pretence of party nomination is a sham! When Besigye tried to stand against him in the NRM, citing individual merit and his right to stand for party bearer, you and i know what happened. He was hounded from the party, harassed with threats of court martial accused of having HIV with a sitting president going to court to be cross examined on the question of whether there is such a thing as a community diagnosis of HIV which really was an extreme thing for a president to do!

He subsequently again charged Besigye with rape after keeping the main witness in state house for a year almost a decade after the purported crime was committed! one wonders whether it was for blackmail reasons! What is not obvious and should have been obvious to his strategists then is that the false charges against Besigye were more publicity than money could buy and if Besigye became a formidable opponent instead of fizzling out its because he presented him with an opportunity to be a martyr!

The first admission that he never ever had an intention of leaving power was during some Jamahiriya celebrations where he stated that “if he believed that his revolution would not last 50 years, he would not have started it”. Soon after that the constitution was changed.

Multipartism was forced upon Museveni. In the beginning, the only contract with the people of Uganda was to ‘suspend” party activities. There was never any contract to create a one party system. When the time came for them to go, he created the unnecessary subterfuge of a referendum that had the poor turnout of 51% but served to remove the multiparty ban. By that time it had been obvious for many years that the movement really did operate like a party and that there was no opportunity for individuals to progress if they nurtured their own ambitions!

It is true that there were lots of fighting groups that had to be pacified with or without war. However the main one the LRA last raided a village in 2002 but the villages were not disbanded till 2006 again after pressure and having been sent a clear message in the elections when the whole northern region affected by war voted against his government. To me this was the first time that Ugandans ever voted for an issue -the north for the peace they had been denied for years even if it meant allying with a westerner, and the rest of the country to maintain the relative peace they had what is derisively referred to as ‘twebaka ku tulo”! In my estimation it was an act of negligence for the camps to remain for as long as they did particularly given the well documented excess mortality associated with them!! this was clearly demonstrated in a research paper by Dr Kobusingye Dr Besigye’s sister in a paper published in an epidemiology journal in Canada.

It is obvious that Museveni is becoming more and more autocratic. Incidents like the war against the Kabaka, the stupid sedition law that the courts removed from our statutes, the use of the military to control the police services, the stranglehold on FM stations -the Nambooze incident, the CBS affair, the shoot to kill orders on unarmed demonstrators, the recent anti Kabaka bill etc. In this week alone in unrelated incidents, activists have been arrested and charged with stupid charges like inciting violence and attempting to incite treason because of passing around pamphlets against the 20 million paid to MP’s in what was an obvious gaffe! statements such as I will only hand over to the right people suggest he does not respect elections and will only accept their results if they give him the answer he wishes to hear!

The Nairobi Peace jokes were a waste of time! I have no doubt that if he had joined them in a coalition government he would have ended up dead. To me, I have no regrets at all that he refused to respect them. That particular bunch of idiots simply had to be got out of our politics!

For the first ten years there was concerted efforts at improvements. We all understood we had to tighten our belts. It was no different from many peasant general revolutions. Slogans, politicisation but most of all an air and feeling of inclusion in the political process. every man and woman in every village felt that they were a part of the revolution. There was a honesty engendered in having to stand behind a man -no secret ballot. if the whole village didn’t like you, everyone including you knew it. There was hope -hope for a better infrastructure, better governance and pride in our country! All of this is no more as it gets more and more clear that this is just about one man!

the time for resistance councils was gone by the early 90′s. Many people by that time had lost enthusiasm for them. They had been left to unemployed people around the villages and suburbs by then. People would rather pay a fine than attend meetings. it had also become obvious by then that the cadres themselves were corrupt. Fortunes were being made by people who were goat herds just a few years before and had no businesses and manufactured nothing if they were connected to the right people or came from the right village!

There comes a time when peasant generals are no longer useful as a society modernises. A point where there has got to be a shift from loyalty to expertise. Museveni still values loyalty over expertise. He keeps the same deadwood in his cabinet for decades despite years of incompetence and non performance! He only trusts that which he can control. So his wife has got to join parliament. And she has got to be a minister for Karamoja because no one else could do it. His office cannot run unless his daughter works there. And neither can the army be professional without Muhoozi his son in the army. His bodyguard can only be entrusted to his son! His extended family have so many tentacles embedded in this government its more like a family thing than a national government!

Oil is going to create its own problems. Museveni already created problems with his sectarian bafuruki letter. All this of course was meant to appease the Banyoro while their oil is being stolen right under their eyes. As a matter of fact the anti Kabaka bill will probably claim as its first victims the royal family of Bunyoro for when the oil starts to flow and they realise they have been sold air, they may revolt. that’s when the Ogoni solution maybe invoked covered of course by this unconstitutional bill!

My sister was in the first batch of students required to report to Kyankwanzi. All students admitted to Makerere were that year required to go for 3 months. This was in the early 90′s. She asked Museveni during the pass out why his cadres were so corrupt! he glossed over the question and countered by suggesting her parents had to be ‘petit bourgeois’ and that’s why she was asking such a question!! By the second batch, many students refuse to report to Kyankwanzi. I believe they substituted with a few weeks of training in Makerere. My father was in a batch of civil servants who went to Kyankwanzi for 3 months. it was a waste of time as the sloganeering by high school drop outs was amateurish! All he did manage to do was lose a few kilos!

The first and second parliaments were good. Most people were there on individual merit. They had a connection to the masses. it was largely independent of the executive. when Wapa left the CA to join the NRM secretariat, I personally thought that that was a big mistake!

Museveni will have to adapt to the new Uganda. Even if he wins the elections, that will be the beginning of his troubles. If he is not ready to put up with more demanding and aggressive Ugandans he should resign now. Unfortunately unlike the jungle, fighting your own unarmed people is fraught with a lot of problems. its easier when there is a frontline.

Ugandans want services. And they need jobs. And they need an end to nepotism which is so obvious starting with the presidents own family who are all employed by this government. We need an end to cronyism. Everyone whether they live in Uganda or not wants the best because they have family and investments in Uganda. Plus most Ugandans in the diaspora wish to retire at home. unfortunately simple things like traffic and roads, poor quality housing and practically non existent health care services keep older people abroad!

When the time comes for the Jasmine express to dock, Museveni will have to go whether he wants to or not!

Museveni’s children -taking our country back!

Monday, March 7, 2011 at 1:24pm

http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=196331557052152

And I hate to admit that you were right!

My mother admitted when I finally asked that “We voted him. Ate what could we do!” But she was at the same time fearful of what the future held under Museveni! my brother -he will never vote again for as long as there is a Museveni on the ballot ticket!

You see we are a very apolitical family and never even discussed our political opinions and voting plans before the election.

My parents know nothing about my activities on Facebook! If they did, am sure they would be horrified and dissuade me from expressing myself!

You see they became adults in the 60′s and lived under Idi Amin and Obote II! To them this is as good as it gets! They have lived under repression for so long that a gilded cage represents home and freedom is scary! They are not the only ones going by the recent elections!

The uninspiring opposition does not help much either! And neither does the aggressive rhetoric for it reminds this generation of war!! Unfortunately the impression and opinion that the guys in opposition are just another bunch of politicians who are making noise just so that they may get closer to the national cake and divvy it up among their kith and kin, just does not give them an appetite for change.

My parents need to see change they can believe in! they need an Obama. Someone who comes along and somehow makes people believe that there is a good reason to change! you see having watched mad monkeys tear the country apart, they are afraid of letting monkeys mess them up again just for the sake of change. But they are old, and one can forgive them. Unfortunately there is no amount of stalling that’s going to allow us to get past the fact that Museveni is now the single largest roadblock to democracy as well as stability in Uganda! for the longer he stays in power, the more likely it is that we shall have to fight a war to dislodge him or his son from our politics!

Today I read a story by Nina Mbabazi of her family’s experiences in Obote II. http://www.facebook.com/notes/nina-mbabazi/my-experience-of-house-arrest-under-president-obote/10150124597924449. I am not her Facebook friend and am sure not her offline friend either given I recently aimed a few choice barbs written a long time ago in the direction of a dearly beloved one in her family! But that does not matter! Point is I couldn’t leave my opinion behind! Her family left Uganda in the early 80′s and she describes life in exile in Kenya and Sweden. Quite frankly hers is quite tame in comparison to those of us whose parents stayed behind!

I think more people need to write these stories including those within the NRM! I say this even though i believe that Nina’s story is tame in comparison to those of us whose parents stayed behind! But I will not detract from her story because it is an important part of the narrative of our chequered history of conflict! Nina was born in the 70′s just like all of us other “children of Museveni born in the 70′s 80′s, 90′s as well as this millennium! She has for so long been an insider that her view of the narrative has become warped! But now like all of us having tired of parties she is starting to open her eyes and starting to see and hopefully question the veracity of the narrative in which she has been brought up! But Nina’s story is useful in demonstrating that even within the NRM there is more than one story -that of one man!

You see like the proverbial blind men, we Ugandans all have our own idea of what Uganda is and what it means to be a Ugandan! So those who touch the trunk describe it as thick and long, while those who touch the ears describe it as flat and wide -like a leaf! those who grab the tail have their own version-thin and long, while those who grab a leg think its like a tree trunk! While we did not have to fight for our independence, we have spent the last 50 years fighting each other! Its the only thing that remains constant! Conflict and pain rotates from one region to another -as does the cake. the ideas of who the oppressors are also change!

But I digress. I was talking about Nina and her new found awakening. Her most recent postings remind me of another NRM chick before she took the big jump. You see, Nina and her friends have for so long been buried in the NRM narrative that they ignore the most obvious truth. That we have all, Museveni’s children excepting those in the IDP camps and those in Sweden, been NRM children passively or actively! Even when we had zero interest in politics and getting laid or going to a club was the foremost thing on our minds, we in some way contributed to the NRM narrative through our apathy!

We did not vote, we did not make any political statements but just let the grown ups to do all of the talking and play big peoples politics -abusing one another and framing each other for rape! We didn’t care as long as no one was shooting at us! That other NRM chick who for a while confused everyone with the question of whether she was coming or going was the very brainy and beautiful Byanyima now wife to Besigye the leader of the opposition! Interestingly while she was an active and vocal opposer from within, she strangely went silent once she was on the outside and allowed her hubby to hog the limelight!

There is such a thing as the enemy within. What Frantz Fanon called the “comprador Bourgeoisie”! The well educated, middle classes that in one way or other are confortable with the status quo. They are politically inactive even when they see things happen to others. They see the poverty. They see the corruption. They see the miscarriages of justice! But they do nothing. they even buy into the narrative of the dominant powers -that anyone who opposes them or their stranglehold on power is a dissident, an enemy to be crushed, an anarchist, a ‘kipinga’ just like those idiots in the LRA and more recently a terrorist -just like those idiots in Al Shabaab! Being in the opposition becomes a dirty word -synonymous with all of the above! the idea that a government needs an opposition as a check and balance to keep them honest just does not have any traction with them! So anyone who fails to toe the line is an enemy! Nina is about to find out that she is an enemy unless she runs back to daddy and uncle Kaguta! That the nice uncles and granddads can turn nasty and vicious!

You see our country has become hijacked by one man and his family. All of those in the NRM are working for him, or pawns in his personal narrative. In his version of events, everyone else was just a support person! That real people died and suffered for his dream is immaterial -he actually forgot those people! That many of those people who died for him to win his war would not approve of the way things have turned out, again eludes him! Like many people who are placed on a pedestal, megalomaniacs start to believe in themselves to the point of delusion! You can see this in Libya where Col. Gadhafi seems to believe that when he says he has no title we should all believe him!

The extreme narcissism that makes one man declare himself to be the one and only man with a vision in a country with 33 million people is mind boggling! That one man could be so arrogant is amazing! That other intelligent people could let him get away with it is even more amazing! But to a narcissist its only natural that he be the only one with a vision. That everyone else is there only and only for their own self gratification! There is no doubt that narcissists can be very driven and become very successful people but they are also shallow and vain as well as potentially very nasty if other people do not recognise their prowess and success! Museveni is a narcissist! And all of his men are patsies there only for his own glorification!

It is time that Ugandans decided if they can afford Museveni any longer. It is time that all intelligent men and women evaluated whether he adds value to the future of the NRM and the country or whether its time to put him out to pasture. Its obvious that the opposition is not upto the job yet. For as Museveni has pointed out, they are incompetent by virtue of the fact that they do not have access to the national coffers to bribe the voters and legislators, but they also do not have willing patsies in the army willing to kill to keep one man in power! for unlike those professional Generals in Egypt who refused to go out and shoot their own people, our own personal army still has the mark of Museveni and is yet to become a national army. Certainly one cannot trust our Generals to stand down when ordered to shoot upon Ugandans! for again theirs is the narrative that anyone who opposes Museveni is an enemy of the state -to be killed if necessary and their body labelled as terrorists in retrospect as were those of civilians shot and killed in the so called Buganda riots of Sept 2009!

Museveni and Gadhafi have for so long been the only men with a vision that (everyone else in their governments is dumb) they believe that everybody else owe them. Their children and the children of those in the ‘kintu” have for so long lived in the official narrative that they believe that a government was taken over after five years of fighting by one man and 27 accomplices!

Buddha did not become great until he left the palace gardens and walked among the people on the street! The children of those in the ‘kintu’ will have to come out and join their hands with real people if they wish to have any relevance in the future of Uganda! the idea that like Gadhafi’s sons they are entitled to a good life because their fathers fought is one they need to disabuse themselves of!

We all fought for and paid for their victory and have all worked hard for the last 25 years to achieve whatever victories they may claim for themselves!

Even when as children we cowered under the bed with bullets raining on the roof everyday, or while soldiers ransacked our homes looking for our fathers, we were making our contribution -in childhoods lost! When we jumped over dead bodies as children ,we lost our innocence!

The NRM like Uganda is ours, whether we are card carrying members or not, for we paid the price for it! It does not belong to one man and neither does it belong to his family! He is not a king and therefore should not be allowed to rule forever! And neither should his son who was safe in Sweden when we were being terrorised be succeeding him!

Every right thinking member of Uganda whether pro NRM or anti NRM has got to be thinking -no resetting the clock, no further extensions, and no succession! And having now learnt the lesson that one man can never be trusted to decide for how long he is allowed to dominate our politics, let term limits be written back into the constitution!

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Selective justice -when young men die for old men! The story of Chandi Jamwa

Thursday, March 10, 2011 at 11:58pm

As usual Philip, you lay it out quite clearly.

There is no problem at all with the way you feel about this. Its what friends and family do. It is said, that a mother will cry for her son even if he is a thief. And families visit their loved ones in jail even though they maybe guilty.

While I read most of the details in the papers, I long ago arrived at the same conclusion as Justice Katutsi -that there was something suspect about the short selling of the bonds to Crane bank. Some of them simply could not be explained -and I do not have to be financially savvy or a genius to say so! I do not see how Justice Katutsi could have arrived at any other decision except guilty. It is good that he pointed out the issue of selective prosecution.

That short selling a bond a few days to maturity when not under duress causing a loss of billions (and a profit of billions to the buyer) to your employer is really suspect. I really would have loved for this trial to go beyond this and look at any financial dealings between Crane Bank and Chandi! It would also be interesting to use this to explore other such dealings between NSSF and other banks. I remain intrigued by the motivation for Jamwa’s decisions to sell bonds when he did not need to causing so much financial loss!

There is also the matter of gambling in a Las Vegas casino and buying expensive jewellery using a company credit card.

Furthermore, there was the abuse of office and extending of credit to himself and Kagonyera his deputy to the tune of hundreds of millions of shillings without board approval!

There is also the little matter of a real estate transaction with Nzeyi at the same time as they were negotiating the Temangalo affair. The details of this remain fuzzy but this would constitute a clear conflict of interest! None of these last three was the subject of his recent trial.

What I find amazing is that a guy who had everything going for him and had such a good track record allowed himself to get into the situation he is in right now! This guy was headed for good things!!!

The only conclusion I can reach is that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. That he was suddenly elevated to this position where because he was sitting on the largest caboodle of cash in the country, powerful people who wanted to access it had to be nice to him and be “friends”! The ‘confessions’ of Jamwa show clearly that powerful men were courting him! In his testimony, he claimed that Amos Nzeyi was in his office practically everyday. That he was always trying to impress upon him how powerful and well connected he was. He was name dropping all of the time including mentioning his connections to the highest office in the land -the president!

He also mentioned that Suruma his then supervising minster sought him out at a social event to pressure him and impress upon him the importance of investing NSSF money in this deal. Can you imagine, a young 36 year old man suddenly becoming one of the movers and shakers and having powerful people wanting to be his friends and actually asking him for favours? Which young man would not let that go to his head?

In “No Longer At Ease”, Chinua Achebe, deals with the transformation of Obi Okonkwo from an idealistic and educated young man with the world at his feet, to a corrupt and depressed individual taking bribes for services. He demonstrates that once the idealistic young man drunk from the chalice of corruption, there was no turning back. He was on a slippery downward slope henceforth! From the first bribe he became a far cry from the young man who turned down an offer for a quid pro quo -sex from a young girl who was willing to bare all and give all for the chance to travel to the white mans land on scholarship!

The presence of powerful “Godfathers” must have made Chandi feel invincible and untouchable -and allowed him to act with seeming impunity!

But it all got unravelled when the proverbial “chicken dung” hit the fan and he panicked -trying to get out of Temangalo. He “confessed” forcing powerful men to fight for their political lives! Being a soft middle class kid, he had never heard of “kuffa ki offiisa”, “kuffa kisiri” or “cowboys never tell”! Essentially for those hardened boys who grew up in hard boarding schools like Matale, if you are caught stealing or cheating, you “died” like “an officer” and took the punishment alone without outing your colleagues. Your social capital went up immensely if you protected your mates! But woe betide you if you refused to die alone! Jamwa refused to die alone -BUT at the end of the day ended up dying alone!

While his powerful partners in crime got off with the loot and still have not even handed over the land at the centre of the scandal, 3 years after receiving payment, he ended up coming under the spotlight in what is seeming revenge for having outed his bosses and partners in crime! You see they knew that in exchange for him allowing them to use workers money as a playground, he too had played around with some loose change! It is this loose change that got him!

Unfortunately for him, a lamb does not play with wolves without getting eaten! It so happens that Museveni badly needs a ‘pin up boy’ to send to jail right now on corruption charges! If that boy happens to be an outsider so much the better! Chandi was an outsider who deluded himself he was an insider -and got burned! In the recently concluded elections Museveni was running against a candidate called “corruption”! He was his most powerful opponent! All of the rest were trailing far behind. And even after winning, museveni knows that this man corruption is going to eat him up if he doesn’t fix him soon!

There are a few other outsiders who thought themselves insiders and got burnt too. The most recent one being Teddy Sseezi Cheeye. Cheeye wrote a sycophantic article devoid of morality in his capacity as “advisor to the president on economic affairs”, one of those many useless people that cost the taxpayer money, arguing the retrospective merits of the Temangalo affair and trying to sweep all of the improprieties under the carpet on the grounds that it was still a viable and profitable deal for NSSF essentially, the means justifies the ends! I wonder how profitable a transaction you cannot take possession of three years later could be! The reality remains that the whole Temangalo deal was corrupt with all of the elements of corruption, insider trading, conflict of interest, cronyism, coercion, abuse of power/office, name it! It was powerful men leaning on a subordinate and coercing him to allow them to dip their hands into the caboodle of cash he was meant to be the guardian of! But they got away with no consequences!

Cheeye a ‘mulebeesi’ who pretended to be an insider ended up in jail for eating GAVI funds making him one of a very small minority! Interestingly there were never any charges of causing financial loss to his employer against the boss of GAVI! An unknown woman also went to jail! If she is not out she would be the only one that has gone to jail on corruption charges and stayed there in the 25 years of Museveni’s rule! The other outsiders who have gone to jail include Ekemu who ended his career by going to jail on corruption charges. He received a presidential ‘pardon’ at the request of his tribesmates who made delegations to Rwakitura asking that their son be released after all he was not the only one, nor the biggest. While Ekemu was a minister, he was one of those beneficiaries of ‘regional balancing’ in the movement government but not an NRM cadre!

Cheeye somehow ended up back on the street after a few short weeks and remains free! All of the other thieves who belong to the right party remain on the street with president Museveni claiming they are innocent! Kiggundu of Greenland bank who together with Salim Saleh, brother to president Museveni, virtually ended up bringing down the whole banking industry in Kampala, ended up facing the music alone and actually went to jail for a few months but still ended up on the street! He later joined the opposition! Leonard Mpuuma, Chandi’s predecessor received what really was a slap on the wrist and paid a hundred million shilling fine in place of a custodial sentence and walked off with a hefty profit as he got to keep the proceeds of his crime! Katto a scion of the now defunct Katto banking family, who brokered the junk helicopter scandal and paid a bribe of 800k USD to again Salim Saleh, was charged alone with irony of ironies, Salim Saleh as a witness against him!!! Saleh was ‘forgiven’ by his brother without being subjected to the courts!

Chandi stays alone to face the music! He goes off to jail like a common thief. But who am I to complain. I would have been the first to complain if he hadn’t! Am one of those who have always found it unfair that a common chicken thief gets killed by a mob or sent off to jail for several years while big thieves who steal billions get away scott free! I should be happy but instead am sad that such a promising young man has while taking his own punishment as he should, has also taken the punishment of powerful and vengeful old men!

As you can see Chandi joins a very small list of people who have faced corruption charges in the 25 years of the NRM, and part of an even smaller number who have actually been been convicted. If he manages to stay in jail for 12 years or any significant part of that, he would have broken a record for probably being the first person to whom the charges stuck and he actually served out a custodial sentence. If he does manage to stay in jail, it will only be because this government so badly needs someone to stay in jail so they can claim to have ever convicted someone on corruption charges!

Without wishing to influence events, I pray that Chandi in future rejoins society and contributes to the development of our society! But then I forgot -his conviction means he cannot hold a public job for another 10 years! What a waste! As for those who sacrificed a young man, while they went scott free, shame on them!

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