Why I think the Luwero blood was shed in vain
| By Shelly Nambozo14th March 2011 |
I read Mr. Jaberi Bidandi Ssali’s recent letter to President Museveni and there was one particular paragraph that struck me the most. According to the veteran politician, following the hotly disputed elections of 1980, the Uganda Patriotic Movement [UPM] leadership [Museveni included] met to discuss the way forward.
| Bidandi said the UPM Executive Committee discussed two options. The first was to go back to the people and build UPM’s capacity for the next election. The second option was going to the bush to take up arms to fight the Obote regime. Bidandi also told us that “…in anticipation of what would be the cost in human life that had to be paid by Ugandans [if they went for the bush war option], the [UPM] Executive Committee resolved for the former option to which some of us stuck”. |
| In other words, the UPM Executive Committee had chosen the option of building UPM for the next election. But Museveni was having none of that. In Bidandi’s letter, he not only reminds Museveni of what happened, but also gives some us very valuable information with which to assess Museveni’s private and public character.“…You stormed out of the meeting declaring that you had taken the armed option. To date your decision is epitomised by a devastated Luwero Triangle scattered with monuments of human skulls and a devastated northern region still wailing the massacre of more than one million Ugandans with more unaccounted for”, Bidandi said.I applaud Bidandi Ssali for producing such a master piece laden with great information. Coming from an undisputed UPM “historical”, it finally revealed to us that more than thirty years down the road, the ills that Museveni’s NRM claim to have fought for are still very much in our midst and in fact, not about to go away.
Museveni went to the bush following a disputed poll. NRM historians have told us that the hundreds of litres of blood absorbed by the fertile soil of Luwero were shed for a good cause. That from then henceforth, we as Ugandans and our children would be able to vote in free and fair elections. I was only three years then. At the time, I would like to think that my parents were full of hope that by the time I came of age, I would be able to enjoy the fruits of Museveni’s five year struggle. I am now 34, with a child of my own and Uganda is still very far from achieving something as simple as having free and fair elections that may or may not lead to a peaceful transfer of power. How can I tell my child that Museveni fought a bloody but justified war to restore democracy to Uganda? I simply can’t; because I would be lying to my own child. Instead, as rightly noted by Bidandi Ssali, we are quickly slipping back into the so-called “dark days”. It pains me deeply to know and see that today, several decades after the belligerents’ guns fell silent in Luwero Triangle, Ugandans are still denied their constitutional, and in fact, fundamental rights to freely and peacefully demonstrate against socio-political injustices in their own country. Police boss Maj. Gen. Kale Kayihura seems to believe that there never be peaceful demonstrations in Uganda. And he may be right; right because his own police officers often turn peaceful protests into riots by mercilessly attacking protesters (including small groups of women protestors) with tear gas and live bullets in some cases as we indeed saw on Wednesday 9th March and during the Kayunga demos before that. Today Ugandans cannot gather freely. Where four or more Ugandans are gathered, there is likely to be something sinister being plotted against the State. We saw a police spokesman defending the arrest of some opposition supporters during the LC elections by claiming that they were violating this exact law that outlaws gatherings of four or more people. The simple truth is that the opposition supporters had merely gathered at their candidate’s home. Can some NRM ideologue show cause why I shouldn’t conclude in my mind that Uganda is now exactly like Nazi Germany? According to NRM apologists, Uganda is a democracy. But NRM’s interpretation of democracy is also that anyone who holds a dissenting view must be viewed by the State as an enemy. Whereas opposition parties and leaders in modern and even emerging democracies are highly regarded by the governments they oppose, in Uganda today, our opposition leaders are viewed as enemies of the State. They are constantly threatened by the State for merely doing their job. They are seen as enemies who should be crushed “like samosas” with powerful despotic jaws. |
In Britain for example, the opposition is referred to as “Her Majesty’s Opposition”. And the leader of the opposition stands side by side with the Prime Minister during State functions presided over by the Queen. Tune in next week for the concluding part of this article, ED. END. Please log into www.ugandacorrespondent.com every Monday to read our top stories and anytime mid-week for our news updates.
