Mr Nicholas Sengoba
So, it is said that it is good to strike the iron while it is hot, but it is better to make the iron hot by striking. Act swiftly when the opportunity avails itself. If it does not, do everything within your powers to avail the opportunity then act as you know best.
Two weeks ago, on July 30, this page had an article headlined “#March2Parliament demonstration ‘flopped’ but achieved its intentions.” The arguments raised were that the so-called march against corruption by a purportedly, nameless, tribeless, partyless, fearless, leaderless group of youth was orchestrated or stage managed. It was not an organic movement acting spontaneously. There was even a subtle encouragement from a senior NRM government minister of Internal Affairs (which ministry oversees the police,) Gen Severiano Kahinda Otafiire. It gave the impression that the police was born again and would uncharacteristically stand aside and simply watch the marchers enjoying their freedom of expression as guaranteed by the Ugandan constitution. It did not happen.
The police came down very hard on the marchers and the minister remained silent.
It made the march appear like its main intention was to pre-empt a youth uprising; the type that was witnessed in neighbouring Kenya, which put the government under immense pressure. A controlled march which focused on Parliament, highlighting the Speaker, Ms Anita Among, as the poster girl of corruption, not the executive or President Museveni, would help test the waters.
The National Resistance Movement (NRM) government would use it to assess its strength, weaknesses, opportunities and threats and prepare itself for any eventualities. It would indicate if there were genuine grievances and how far the people were willing to go to express them. It would expose those who were courageous enough to act especially with militant conviction against the government and their numbers too.
Like a blast from the past, the President then addressed the nation blasting foreign players who represent interests of neo-colonialists using local actors, trying to destabilise Uganda. He promised them a bloody nose.
This week opened with a leaked classified intelligence report in sections of state-owned media, which confirmed many of our fears. Many dismissed it as some sort of propaganda. The report claims that the July 23 protests were foreign funded. It detailed the method of mobilisation using Opposition parties National Unity Platform (NUP) and Forum for Democratic Change (FDC). Methods would include paying the youth to do the usual; ‘burn the city and loot businesses.’ That mayhem, which would include veteran security guards from Iraq who would grab guns from the police and kill many people. This would attract the attention of the international community to intervene to save the people. This would eventually lead to regime change like it happened in Libya. An uprising against the late Muammar Gaddafi, supported by Nato, led to his death and overthrow.
The army has come out to deny the allegations of the so-called classified intelligence report. The beauty of communication is that a point has been made namely that there is a threat against the NRM government and the state of Uganda. It now gives the government licence to take steps to defend itself and the country from these threats. Those who have invested are weary of losing their property just like almost everyone would not like to hear that news for fear of their lives. Uganda is a country that has a history of war and violence with many casualties.
Already, more than thirty members of a faction of the Opposition FDC party were arrested in Kenya and arraigned in court for treason. The head of security in the leading Opposition party NUP Achilleo Kivumbi is also under arrest in controversial circumstances.
One of the strengths of the NRM government is in the militant side of its character. Its ascent to power after the 1981 to ’86 Bush War was by winning an argument by blood and iron. Its removal of power from elements from northern Uganda who had dominated Ugandan politics since independence in 1962 leveraging on the army and the gun was by force of the gun. A two-decade war in the region against the LRA rebels of Joseph Kony settled that matter. Now command and control of the army is the hands of forces ethnically originating from Western Uganda like most of NRMs leaders.
This militant streak and character is one on which NRM leverages to launch its quest for power and all else it seeks in a bid to dominate and perpetuate itself.
Whenever there is an impasse be it social, economic, political or even cultural, NRM strives to turn it into a military contest of sorts. Such a contest requires strong and if possible violent methods to resolve and may need to be done outside the boundaries of the law because it is an emergency.
As the controller and custodian of the instruments of coercion coupled with the endless flow of funding from the national kitty it is going to be hard for anyone to surmount the NRM government for now.
What started ostensibly an innocent civil demonstration by concerned youth against corruption has now morphed into an apparent treasonous uprising. Any state or government has a right to self defence and that is exactly what is playing out now.
Some of those who were arrested after the demonstration on July 23 have reported being tortured while others claimed they were sexually molested.
This, coupled with the current arrests which members of the opposition call abductions, is an overt, coded message to whoever intends to take this route of opposition against the NRM government.
It is going to be a very high mountain to climb trying to convince anyone to go onto the streets for these anti- government causes.
But if there are any inklings of discontent that may go out of hand, the only way to nip them in the bud is to be proactive.
Now that there is no foreseeable solution to the major problem of Uganda which is corruption that leaves many desperately out of the social safety net without jobs, healthcare, education, food and housing, the demonstration of strong man tactics from time to time is inevitable.
Like the hunter who throws a stone in the bush to see if an animal is hiding there or like the fisherman who stirs up the water to agitate the fish and catch them, Uganda is going to witness many of these ‘threats’ , which the government will quickly control as a demonstration that it is beyond challenging.
Mr Sengoba is a commentator on political and social issues
X: @nsengoba
