Can religious fanatics save Uganda?

The pastors are particularly bitter that Uganda’s Roman Catholics and Anglicans are indifferent to this supposed anomaly.

I am always puzzled why the three men cannot grasp this simple matter. 

I may be wrong, but in my layman’s ignorance, I assume that Uganda having been under British rule, with a quite successful Christianising agenda, colonial laws on marriage and divorce strongly reflected Christian values and customs.

Uganda was being governed as part of the Christian world, any differences in dogma, ritual and worship between different denominations notwithstanding.

However, there were substantial differences between the Christian and Islamic traditions. Muslims rightly needed separate marriage legislation to prevent criminalisation and reduce social alienation.

As far as I understand, Uganda’s Catholics, Anglicans and Orthodox’s have no quarrel with that long-standing position. It is unlikely their leaders will be dragged into the obsession the Impact FM/Dream TV talk show trio have over this law.

Moreover, a roll call of Ugandans who claim to be pastors will assemble a substantial number of secret polygamists, cohabiters, fornicators, homosexuals, wife abusers, wife thieves and undivorced wife changers, some of them claiming to act at the behest of the Holy Spirit.

To ‘follow what they preach, not what they do’ is for followers who do not understand the value of integrity, the importance of example and the sin of hypocrisy.

Twenty-first Century lawmakers cannot respond to the aberrations of the thousands of neo-pagan Christian variants and other spirit-worshippers and make laws that satisfy all their needs.

On June 3, the Catholic and Anglican churches as usual used the 1886 execution of scores of Kabaka Mwanga’s rebellious functionaries to converge at Namugongo and display their might in devotion and sheer numbers in Uganda.

It was probably not a coincidence that, on June 4, the Impact FM/Dream TV talk show trio wandered into demography. They repeated their old scepticism about official statistics that put Born Again/Pentecostal Christians below 15 percent of the population. They claim the true figure is about 30 percent.

You may believe that claim if you are mesmerised by the Pentecostal church crowds in Kampala’s suburbs, including congregations of the State-registered fake ‘NGO’ churches that the Dream TV trio often trash; plus if you take seriously the loudspeaker (empty-tin?) noise with which street preachers bombard our urban centres. It is a claim hard to sustain when you view the countryside; or take a national census; or go to Namugongo next June 3. 

Ironically, the claim also invites the question why this supposed rapid spread of Pentecostals has seen very rapid expansion of corruption, social disintegration and violence.

But in a State characterised by neo-feudal patronage, and where vampires thrive, exaggerated demographic claims by prosperity gospel merchants can bring in more spoils on the pretext of reforming society.

There is probably no Ugandan pastor with the integrity to reject compromising gifts from the State; just as a rejection by a Catholic or Anglican cleric would be a miracle.

Stable marriages and happy unions can indeed benefit the broader society and the State. But apart from targeting taxpayers’ money, where is the high ground on which our pastors stand to save marriages or reclaim a degenerate society?

Alan Tacca is a novelist, socio-political commentator.
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