Kampala — SPEAKING ON the Capital Gang last weekend, President Museveni said that Col Kizza Besigye is free to return to Uganda. He is presently in self-imposed exile in Pretoria, South Africa.

Museveni's challenge comes at a time when Besigye has made several controversial statements on the need for armed struggle in Uganda. Members of his Reform Agenda group say that they are still committed to democratic change but others have joined the LRA and possibly the PRA.

The danger of Besigye remaining abroad and making increasingly bellicose statements is that it will stigmatise the Reform Agenda and undermine its growth potential as a new political organisation in Uganda. His exile is becoming a roadblock to the emergence of a progressive opposition in Uganda.

The risks involved in his return to Uganda are minimal. His wife Winnie Byanyima is in regular correspondence with Besigye, spent Christmas with him, and is frequently covered in the Ugandan media. She seems to be able to survive in Uganda and she is almost as prominent a figure in the Reform Agenda as Besigye himself.

There may indeed be some inconvenience for Besigye if he returns to Uganda. He may well be watched and monitored by government after beating the war drum so loudly. But that is hardly abnormal for an opposition politician in Africa.

If Besigye is truly committed to capturing power in Uganda, he should come home. It will be far more complicated for the Movement to compete with a vigorous outspoken local leader than to quietly ignore a political exile who is gradually being forgotten by Ugandan voters.