Muniini K. Mulera
5 October 2008
column
Dear Tingasiga: In the 46 years since Uganda's flag independence from Britain, the country has had three rulers of consequence- Milton Obote (1962-71, 1981-85), Idi Amin (1971-79) and Yoweri Museveni (1986 - present, and still counting).
Each of these three brothers has enjoyed a cultic following by large sections of Ugandans. Each one of them has also enjoyed deep hatred in equal measure. It is the rare Ugandan who has held a neutral opinion of them.
Yet any analysis of their true characters and contributions to Uganda must necessarily remain tentative. The passage of time will eventually enable a detached historical analysis that will place each man in his place, freed from the understandable bias of those who have benefitted or suffered under their rule.
However, one fact that we can hopefully agree on, regardless of our personal experiences, is the extent to which these three men have used fear as a weapon of governance and control. Ugandans have spent most of the last 46 years living under fear, not fear of a foreign enemy but fear of the state itself and fear of themselves.
In a contest to determine which of these rulers was the most fearsome, it is very likely that Field Marshall Amin would win by quite a distance. Amin lacked the sophistication of his formally educated comrades. His spontaneity, propelled by a combination of illiteracy and a military culture, spared him the need to pretend to be a democrat or to care about such things as human rights and diplomatic language.
Amin wore his dictatorship with pride and consummate ruthlessness. His was an open dictatorship. He never stole a single election. He removed the need for elections by suspending the constitution. He did not maintain a cosmetic parliament to rubberstamp his wishes. He simply abolished parliament within days of his coup d'état and ruled by decree. He did not manipulate the constitution to perpetuate himself in power. Instead he suspended the constitution and openly declared himself life-president.
Amin did not pretend to care about corruption. He did not feign irritation at his officers' abuse of power. He openly encouraged his soldiers to use their guns to earn a living. He did not waste time in the judicial courts of law. He publicly executed those who threatened his regime. In short, Amin was up front and, how to put this, very authentic with his dictatorship.
The fear-inducing ruthlessness of the two Obote regimes was clothed in the pretence of civilian rule, complete with parliamentary government. Yet one did not need to dig deep to discover evidence that Obote used state security organs to terrorise those who dared to challenge his claim to the Ugandan throne.
To the non-Baganda, the Obote One era of the 1960s was, for the most part, "the good old days." But to the Baganda, it was a period of constant fear and anguish, especially during the "state-of-emergency" that Obote imposed on Buganda from May 1966 to January 1971. And when he resumed his rule after the Amin interregnum, Obote presided over a period of terror, fuelled by a five-year war on Buganda soil. That war was fought by the NRA/M, with a mission to end all fear and bring freedom to the entire population.
Twenty two years have passed since the end of that war. The NRA/M has been in control throughout this period. Yet widespread fear still hangs over Uganda. The newspapers may be "free", but the citizens who value their businesses and their senior jobs live under self-imposed silence on political matters.
Like many government ministers and other government officers, these citizens take advantage of a visit abroad to pour out their true negative feelings about their ruler to the attentive ear of your columnist, before flying back to Kampala to resume singing songs of praise they do not mean. Ruling party MPs, fearing a premature encounter with death, are seeking police protection. Though they do not tell us who it is they are afraid of, it appears their fear is linked to their interest in Temangalogate, a scandal that involves the ministers of security and of finance.
After giving damning evidence, in camera, before the parliamentary committee probing Temangalogate, the managing director of the NSSF immediately seeks police protection. Who is he afraid of? If these big men are living in fear, what hope do the smaller folk have?
Had this been the Amin or Obote regime, the usual custodians of international morality and good governance would have condemned this state of fear and sought punishment for these human rights abuses, just as they did with the Mugabe dictatorship in Zimbabwe.
But Museveni is immune from such censure. His complete embrace of his role of Nyampara [headman] on behalf of American and British ruling classes protects him from such interference. He is a wiser ruler than Obote of the 1960s who foolishly convinced himself that he was first and foremost an African ruler, with a mandate to fight for the interests of the Africans. We know what happened to Obote.
In the end, of course, it is the Ugandans who must relieve themselves of the pervasive fear that is steadily leading to a national paralysis. They will need to stand up, together, in defiance against the worst enemy they have, namely, fear itself.
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