Charles Onyango Obbo
12 November 2009
column
"Energy fight now goes to Museveni", the Saturday Monitor told us, in a story about the strange row between Energy minister Hilary Onek, and his Permanent Secretary Frederick Kabagambe-Kaliisa, over the power sector.
In the last 10 years, headlines about things "going to Museveni" must have appeared in the Ugandan papers more than 1,000 times. Museveni must also have the Africa record for dealing with the smallest problems personally. In the last few days alone, the dispute over the election of the Kyabazinga was taken to him. Now he is handling the issue of the continued closure of the Buganda radio, CBS FM.
Part of this is because President Museveni wants it that way, as a vehicle to accumulate his power by turning dispute resolution into personal political goods handed out by himself, and also for control. My best example of control was the case of a prominent Ugandan who returned home after Museveni took power in 1986.
He brought his terminal benefits from abroad and started completing some buildings that he had abandoned when he fled during Idi Amin's rule. The President heard that he was back, and was going about his life quietly – which was a problem. He sent him word asking why he was rebuilding his life "without asking for help from comrades"! It's for this reason that village disputes over land have in the past ended up in State House.
This criticism of Museveni as a power hog who has killed all institutions so he can rule like ancient absolute is an old one, though, and we needn't go into it beyond this point. The more interesting is that even if he refused to meddle in all these petty issues, they would still be brought to him—because it is also the way most Ugandans like to do business.
Before we go there, though, let's note one wider reason why this is so. To appreciate it, compare Museveni with Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki. Kibaki is in a league of his own when it comes to being hands-off. One reason could be because he graduated from Makerere University when it still imparted the "gentlemanly manners" of the Buganda court. Kibaki has surrounded himself with many aging men from the late 50s and 60s era.
Kibaki is content to go a whole year and speak only on Independence Day, give a five-minute New Year speech, speak briefly at a major conference once, and maybe on Kenyatta Day. He does not give press conferences, and shuns public appearances. On one occasion I went to the same church service with him. We didn't know he was coming. He sneaked in quietly five or so minutes to the start of the service. At the end, people gathered, asking him to speak to them. Microphones appeared. He stepped forward, wished them a happy Sunday in five words, and disappeared into his car.
Men of Kibaki's generation are generally like that. Museveni, on the other hand, went to Dar es Salaam University at the height of its radical days. There was a lot of talk of revolution, kicking imperialists and colonialists (the Portuguese still ruled in Angola, Mozambique), solidarity with the struggling masses of the world, and so on. Even in Kenya, the Museveni generation of politicians from Dar has proved more than a handful.
When they failed to save the world, and Africa, they tried to save their own countries. When they didn't do an A grade job, they tried to save every village, and every man and woman and their dogs with their personal intervention.
That apart, Uganda itself is a country that was ruled by chiefs and kings, from the north to Buganda, on to Ankole. Those old chiefly regimes were not fair or just. To get something if you were a commoner, you needed to see the (village, parish, county) chief, or king if you were of higher rank.
That became the way we dealt with a scarce commodity. During Amin's time, and that of the UNLF government that replaced him, and the first three years of Obote II (remember those were the days when we had the Ministry of Supplies) essential commodities were scarce. So to get an "allocation" of just two crates of soda for your child's birthday, you had to see the minister for a chit. That method of work became embedded in our DNA.
So, whenever we find that justice is scarce (even if it's over a quarter an acre of land we are disputing and we don't trust the court) it goes to the MP, minister or President. When your marriage is on the rocks, and you are a Movement man, you take it to the President. When you lose a tender, or have a tax problem with the URA, you don't go into arbitration. You go to State House. When you are minister and disagree with your PS, where do you go? The President. I don't know how a man like Prof. Apolo Nsibambi, who was raised in the old proud Makerere University and regal Ganda tradition can, as Prime Minister, stand the nonsense.
Be the first to Write a Comment!
Copyright © 2009 The Monitor. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
