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Whether he jumped or was pushed, Kabushenga will have the last laugh
Author, Musaazi Namiti. PHOTO/FILE
What you need to know:
- Mr Kabushenga has been in the job for nearly 15 years and announced his resignation last week — he will continue to oversee the transition until a new executive is hired — sparking speculation that he saw the axe coming and jumped. (I do not know the reason for his quitting.)
When he was appointed CEO of the New Vision Printing and Publishing Company in 2006 — it trades as Vision Group — Robert Kabushenga immediately started attracting media attention for obvious reasons.
He was going to lead one of Uganda’s largest media companies (in which the government has a vested interest) and was succeeding a British journalist named William Pike, who had been in the job for decades and had built the company from scratch, setting it on a sound profitability footing.
In the beginning, there were naysayers, as often happens with appointments such as Mr Kabushenga’s. They said he was going to fail.
The mzungu (White man), they added, had set high, unmatchable standards. And they dredged up stories of what they termed Mr Kabushenga’s humble beginnings at Monitor Publications Limited where, as a young man, he worked before he joined Vision Group.
But that was only to be expected. If, for example, you began your career working for a small bank as a messenger and go on to work for a major bank as a senior manager, many people, especially those stagnating in their careers, will talk almost endlessly about how you used to work as a messenger.
Mr Kabushenga has been in the job for nearly 15 years and announced his resignation last week — he will continue to oversee the transition until a new executive is hired — sparking speculation that he saw the axe coming and jumped. (I do not know the reason for his quitting.)
For me, the most interesting bit about him is that he has proved his detractors wrong. They said the company would go bust; it is still around. If it has profitability problems, as some reports suggest, that is because many media companies, especially those in the publishing business, are struggling. I suppose Mr Kabushenga can point to success stories for which he takes credit.
The key lesson for Ugandans is that good managers do not have to be necessarily White, although businesses and offices in Uganda run by Whites tend to do better. Incidentally, Vision Group had hired a Belgian, Els De Temmerman, to serve as its top editor, but I do not think there is much she did that could not have been done by New Vision’s senior journalists.
Having said that, Vision Group’s editorial independence, or what remains of it, is likely to shrink further when the new CEO takes over — and that is likely to turn off even more news consumers. The company’s editorial policy, it seems, has to cater to and pander to Mr Museveni’s power-hogging project. That is why Ugandans on social media joked that the best person to succeed Mr Kabushenga is Fred Enanga, the
police spokesman who cleans up for the regime.
For Mr Kabushenga, retirement begins in earnest in a few months — and it should all be plain sailing since his remuneration has been the talk of the town.
But appearances are deceptive. In 2016, Dr Maggie Kigozi, no ordinary Ugandan and with a track record of landing cushy jobs, was asked by Sunday Vision if she missed the salary she earned as the boss of the Uganda Investment Authority (UIA).
She said: “Absolutely! It comes in handy, and I do not encourage people to resign or retire until they are really ready, because whatever business venture you go into, the beginning is hard.”
When she was asked whether money from the businesses she embarked on after she left the UIA was footing all her bills, she said: “Like I said, the beginning is hard.”
Mr Namiti is a journalist and former
Al Jazeera digital editor in charge of the Africa desk
[email protected] @kazbuk
