By M. Suleman

17^th Dec 2012: An emotional, grief-stricken, and openly tearful US President Barack Obama led his country’s moaning of the innocent children and their teachers who were gunned in a senseless shooting spree in Newtown.

Obama showed that apart from being the President of the most powerful nation on earth, he is also a parent – and above all, a human being who is often touched when innocent lives are lost.  He therefore showed both leadership and compassion – a far cry from Uganda’s Museveni.

Museveni’s life is embroiled in blood.  He seems to have a special obsession with blood. His life has been about fighting and killing. His speeches are always dominated by killings in battles and his personal triumph over his enemies.  He has shown no remorse for all lives lost in the many conflict circumstances associated to his name.

He has never apologized or showed regret for the loss of close to a million people in Luwero Triangle where his NRA rebels conducted a campaign of terror.  In his recent reply to Charles Onyango Obbo’s article on Somalia, Museveni talked with pride about how his NRA annihilated the UNLA forces as they fought their way to power.

And when the northern Uganda insurgency erupted, he was at the fore-front – always boasting about how his NRA soldiers had massacred the rebels in the north.

While the country was shocked by the senseless massacre of close to thirty un-armed civilians during the so-called “Buganda Riots” of 2009, Museveni was upbeat about the murderous actions of his security forces.  In fact, he even threatened to unleash the same brutal tactics if the riots occur again.

During the walk-to-work demonstrations, people lost their lives.  Dr Kizza Besigye, his former personal doctor and friend, was brutalised to the point of death – but Museveni never showed an ounce of compassion or remorse.

His latest show of callousness and insensitivity was displayed in his last address to Parliament. As expected, any public address is all about himself!  What was most absurd, however, was that he measured his greatness with the defeat of Joseph Kony and the Karamojong.

His insensitivity and thirst for blood has blinded him to the deep emotions and resentments that some of the victims of the Kony war still have in their hearts.  For some of these people, that war was caused by a southern-based group of bandits (the NRA) whose sole objective was to revenge against the UNLA which was dominated by their sons.

That “revenge” saw millions forcefully herded into IDP camps, saw countless atrocities committed against innocent civilians, and saw thousands upon thousands of unnecessary deaths.  For this group of people therefore, Museveni is as culpable as Kony.

There is no doubt that there are many traumatised souls in Karamoja who feel exactly like the group of northerners mentioned above.  This conclusion acknowledges the most human fact that all violent conflicts cause death and leave many traumatised people in their wake.

So unless one is a psychopath, issues relating to such vulnerable victims of war often demand extreme caution and compassion, not bragging about how you caused their suffering.  This partly explains why many people – including opposition MPs, are increasingly boycotting Museveni’s speeches.

One therefore wonders whether Museveni is not a deranged psychopath with a very serious psychological disorder.  END: Login to www.ugandacorrespondent.com every Monday to read our top stories mid-week for our updates

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