Kampala — Those who missed The Monitor on Wednesday, 9 April, owe a substantial debt to themselves.

They missed Andrew Mwenda's Counting Costs Of 3rd Term, Life Presidency; Richard Kavuma's interview of Local Government Minister Jaberi Bidandi Ssali titled, I'd Rather Be King-maker Than King... ; Sheila Kulubya's Shs 850m Spent On Meetings; a selection of BBC e-mails on "Talking Point" titled, Africa's Presidents: Are Three Terms Too Much? and Mr Mulumba and Ms Kulubya's joint Museveni's Men Guess Next Move.

They comprehensively covered today's twin hot issues: freeing of political parties, and the "third term."

On 1 April, I humbly confessed: "About the merits of the third term, the president engaged in such mystic dialectics that I am unable to understand his proposals." And now Mr Mulumba and Ms Kulubya observe, "Mr Museveni was at pains to explain that the issue of the third term should be de-linked from him."

Mr Bidandi Ssali told the BBC: "It was all wrapped up and stage-managed... The whole thing was orchestrated by very, very senior people. They clearly did not anticipate the political storm that their scheme has brought about." Neither did the president!

Yes, the "third term" seemingly cascaded out of turn, spilling cabalistic beans. It now behoves MPs, selfless community leaders - people's custodians and trustees of democracy, to emulate the stout hearted who boldly broke out of the land of make-believe, acknowledging realities. The Bidandis, the Kategayas the Wapas, the Muntus, the Matembes, the Rukikaires... -moderates who have shed white feathers and come out as self-reliant men and women, holding the banner of equitable peace aloft, not mice timidly gnawing at a piece of cow hide.

Yet the third, fourth, fifth... term pursuers have real misgivings - shared by their fat cat courtiers - the discomfiture that is the price of overstaying.

On 7 July, 2002, I mentioned a student who asked me point-blank why presidents will not let go. On the spur of the moment, I enumerated; let my will be done; the credentials of poverty, including rudimentary debauchery; and the backlash of lingering.

I had omitted the most compelling element purely because, at that time, it seemed so remote, and so seemingly undocumented, that it would be pointless to mention it.

But about two years ago, I attended a seminar at Makerere University where I mentioned "the curse of Uganda's oil reserves" said to be in the Semliki and Lake Albert valleys. I was bewildered - and disappointed - that no one seemed to take interest in the subject. During the break, I raised it with Prof. Dani Nabudere. He was outwardly silent. But I knew it gave him food for thought.

I believe I similarly got Dr Jean Barya chewing on it. I had occasion to write about overstaying chief executives later (I have misplaced copies of my essay) in which I suggested that the president in whose reign the Uganda oil (found mainly in the kingdom of Tooro) began to flow would need not go to donors.

They would come to him. And with Libya's Col. Muammar Gadhafi lurking in the wings, the incumbent might well tell the "donors" to do as he says or go hang. On 5 April, Mr David Ouma Balikowa outlined the reality of Ugandan oil. Either we dance with joy or worry about enslavement. Why?

I have had time to worry about Col. Gadhdafi's love and excessive goodwill towards the Tooro monarchy and First Family (Gadhafi who deposed his own king, Idris in 1969) and the money he has poured into the kingship and kingdom. The daft simplistically talk of a "love affair" between him and the Queen Mother; as if there were not thousands of attractive women in Libya or Uganda; as if astute Gadhafi was the most absolute fool among the oil oligarchies.

I know not of an oil rich country that is governed democratically. Nor where the rulers' terms are limited. Let those who value democracy watch out about the Tooro oil and resist extended terms. It is do or die; it is now or never - FOR "THIRD WORLD" UGANDA'S FREEEDOM AND DEMOCRACY!