Teacher Mpamire and endless possibilities with being President Museveni’s look-alike

They were clearly excited to meet me and told me they were thrilled about my presidential campaign and were fully behind me. I’d make a good president for Uganda, they said. I realised who they had mistaken me for, but each time I tried to interject to introduce myself, they waved me down impatiently with “gwe, you be quiet” airs.

Defeated, I just listened. Fate bestows meat to those who have no teeth: had I been a bright, really sharp Kampala boy and asked for money there and then for my ‘presidential campaign’, I’d have reaped big – it’s one of the things looking like someone can do for you.

A while ago, an avid reader of this column, my good Tanzanian lawyer friend Eli Bahati Lowassa in Dar es Salaam, laughingly sent me a video of President Museveni in really comical Taekwondo spurring session with a group of young men. 

I was suspicious, but the looks, the voice, the accent, told only one tale – this was Museveni. I passed the video around, and after a very lengthy inquiry, Jerry Magimbi, one of my Namilyango classmates (everyone has a classmate who knew everything about everyone) declared that it was not the President, it was famous comedian Herbert Ssegujja, also known as Teacher Mpamire.

If anyone ever perfected imitation, and imitating the President at that, it is this boy. Gifted! 

Things have gotten so bad that as matter of fact on most occasions, the comedian makes a much better job of looking and being Museveni than Museveni himself can manage. At times it is no longer clear whether Ssegujja is imitating Museveni or it is Museveni imitating the comedian.

Strategically, therefore, this boy is a double-edged sword and several permutations are possible here.

It means that by merely strolling down Kampala Road, and in the mood to pick up a classy dame or two for the weekend, Teacher Mpamire, properly dressed and talking like the President, will have a field day, especially given that there are too many vain chicks all over town who fall for office and money, rather than the person.

And owing to our notorious lack of systems and structures, our good Teacher Mpamire could walk into Bank of Uganda, cause people to scatter and prostrate and order a few million dollars loaded into a van and taken to some cool hideout before anyone in Central Bank is any the wiser about who they are dealing with.

Let’s escalate this a notch: with his yellow shirt, wide hat and a mug of porridge in his hand, our comedian can comfortably drive into a ministry and introduce a policy or into a military barracks and order the soldiers to do anything…anything. 

And if the President has a sense of humour, he can pack Teacher Mpamire on the presidential jet and send him to the United Nations General Assembly to represent him, as he attends to far more important matters, like his cows in Rwakitura. 

Or the President can go on holiday in New Zealand and leave Teacher Mpamire to deliver the customary Christmas address on December 24 and the State-of-the-Nation address on New Year’s Eve. Boy can even do the campaigns in 2025/2026, as the old man, 80 or 81 by then, takes a much-needed snooze in State House – and no one will have cause to suspect anything.

And if the boy is bright, by now he’d be contacting Hollywood to star in a Museveni movie. Then he’d be able, if he so chose, to retire in Hawaii or the Bahamas and sip Pina Colada cocktails at the beach or sunbathe on the deck of a cruise ship for the rest of his life.

Gawaya Tegulle is an advocate of the High Court of Uganda

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