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Rukungiri municipality is designed to dispossess voiceless communities

In a critical or dialectical discourse you look for aspects that are not written about or discussed because that is where the hidden truth lies. Rujumbura has a history of decision making process including in land matters that adversely affects communities without consulting them.

Land dispossession of indigenous Bairu of Rujumbura goes as far back as the 19th century. In 1800 Bahororo who are Batutsi from Rwanda sought refuge in Rujumbura after they were chased out of south west Ankole by Bahima under Bahinda clan rulers. Bahororo arrived in Rujumbura with a militaristic and feudal system mentality. A combination of military experience and Arab slave hunters’ support equipped with advanced European weapons enabled Bahororo to quickly subdue indigenous people and expand their territory. As in Rwanda, they appropriated all grazing land for their long horn cattle at the expense of indigenous short horn cattle which perished for lack of pasture depriving Bairu of nutritious food and means of wealth accumulation.

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Demystifying Bahima’s origin, race and civilization

Bahima’s history has been shrouded in mystery for a long time. The mystery stems from John Hanning Speke who wrote in 1863 that Wahuma (Bahima) were white people, more civilized than black people or Negroes and entered Uganda from Ethiopia occupied by a ruling white race. Other Europeans added that Bahima were more intelligent with superior qualities and born to rule. Colonial explorers, missionaries and administrators like Samuel Baker, John Roscoe and Harry Johnston in Uganda shared these views (G. Prunier 1995).

Because of racial prejudices against blacks or Negroes Europeans concluded that the civilizations they found in Uganda were developed by white people. They gave credit to Bahima simply because they resemble whites physically such as sharp, narrow, pointed and long noses. Bahima have hidden their true history of precarious nomadic life and absence of material wealth to take advantage of these attributes so that they continue to dominate other Ugandans. Before attempting to demystify the myth let us understand this:

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Why Uganda’s social and cultural fabric has crashed

Contrary to popular belief that Museveni and his National Resistance Movement (NRM) came to power to end the long suffering of Ugandans, the truth of the matter is that the long suffering has been used as a tool to keep NRM government in power indefinitely. This may sound cruel and unkind or even incredible but sadly it is true.

Museveni, his government and NRM members of parliament soon realized that it is easier to govern poor and vulnerable people because they are helpless and voiceless and can easily be manipulated through persuasion or intimidation or both. Museveni and his group also realized that Uganda elites and donors cannot be easily manipulated or intimidated because they have a voice. Therefore according to Museveni and his team the two groups needed to be accommodated and integrated fully into government actions so that they share credibility for success or responsibility for failure. To stay in power indefinitely two things have happened.

First, in 1986 Museveni created a government of national unity including representatives from all regions, all parties and all faiths. He created a political space for all categories of Ugandans including women, youth, disabled and the private sector etc. The big shots that could not be included in the cabinet, Museveni appointed them as his advisers or gave them other lucrative jobs.

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Uganda’s democracy has become counterproductive

When you talk with people – Ugandans and non-Ugandans – who support the National Resistance Movement (NRM) government led by President Museveni, you are told that Ugandans must be grateful to their leaders because the days of Obote’s and Amin’s dictatorship are over and there is no turning back. They quickly add that Uganda has now become a full-fledged democracy. So what is democracy?

According to the World Book Encyclopedia democracy means rule by the people. It is a form of government that Abraham Lincoln described as “government of the people, by the people, for the people”. According to Robert Maynard Hutchins democracy is the only form of government that is founded on the dignity of man, not the dignity of some men, of rich men, of educated men but of all men (and women).

The citizens of a democracy take part in government either directly or indirectly. In a direct democracy people meet in one place and make the laws for their community. That is what happened in ancient Athens. In a large group it is impossible for all people to meet and pass laws. Consequently they periodically choose representatives to represent their interests. This is indirect or representative democracy.

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Bahima and their culture of winner takes all

To understand why corruption has reached an unprecedented level in Uganda’s history and there are no signs that it is subsiding, Ugandans and their development partners need to understand the pastoral culture of Uganda’s present leaders. From time immemorial pastoralists including Batutsi, Bahima and Bahororo (Batutsi from Rwanda) live in hostile environments marked by shortages of pasture and water, droughts, epidemics like the 1890s rinderpest, bovine diseases and cattle theft.

In the Great Lakes Region pastoralists lived in fragile ecosystems which rendered them vulnerable and forced them to engage in fighting for survival. Most of the wars in the region since the arrival, in the 16th century, of the Nilotic Luo-speaking Bahima and their Batutsi and Bahororo cousins have been related to land and cattle. They have fought to expand territory and increase their herds, dispossessing the losers. Accordingly, they developed a mentality of winner takes all which has been carried over into governments in Uganda and Rwanda.

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Mounting evidence of Hutu genocide by Tutsi in Rwanda and DRC

First let us recall the definition of genocide. The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on December 9, 1948. The Convention entered into force on January 12, 1951.

Article II of the Convention states “In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

(a) Killing members of the group;

(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about physical destruction in whole or in part;

(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group

(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group (Human Rights Volume I (Second Part) Universal Instruments United Nations 2002).

The targeted killing or genocide of moderate Hutu and Tutsi that took place in Rwanda in 1994 shocked the world. There is ‘guilt of omission’ to act. The international community did nothing to prevent the genocide when sufficient advance warning had been made available (Mary Robinson A Voice for Human Rights 2006: 222).

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Rujumbura history must not be repeated

I was trained in and have practiced the art of diplomacy at the highest level in international relations. Simply put diplomacy includes the art of establishing contacts through which problems are solved in a subtle manner or behind-the-scenes if you will. When circumstances force me to speak or to write I have used language – body, spoken or literary – to convey messages without divulging sensitive details or naming names.

As mentioned elsewhere I have studied the history of the Great Lakes Region especially my home area of Rujumbura for over forty years. I have read extensively and listened carefully to oral stories. Because I did not get much information from using questionnaires, I decided to use other techniques including travelling by bus between Uganda’s capital city of Kampala and my home town of Rukungiri – a decision that frustrated many people particularly my relatives because as a senior United Nations staff member I was not expected to travel that way.

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Uganda’s economic growth alone is insufficient for poverty eradication

In May 1987, the National Resistance Movement (NRM) government under the leadership of President Museveni signed an agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for assistance. The government opted for the ‘shock therapy’ or extreme version of structural adjustment or Washington Consensus. The agreement called for the abandonment of employment policy in favor of disciplining inflation, promotion of economic growth and export-orientation, privatization of state corporations, retrenchment of public servants, and significant state withdrawal from the economy and virtual abandonment of social policy especially in education and health sectors.

Investments in infrastructure and the economy generally declined considerably. For example in 2008 budget allocation to agriculture, Uganda’s economic mainstay, declined from 4.2 percent in 2007 to 3.8 percent against African Union’s 1993 decision to allocate at least ten percent of national budget to the sector.

The government handed over responsibility for economic management to the invisible hand of market forces and laissez faire (let alone) capitalism as required under the neo-liberal economic ideology. A trickle down mechanism was expected to distribute the benefits of economic growth through employment creation in the private sector. As expected under the Washington Consensus the government focused on law and order by investing heavily in the armed forces, police and intelligence sectors to contain any resistance against the harmful effects of structural adjustment. To mobilize resources for this effort, the government had earlier imposed a 30 percent charge for converting old currency into the new notes against the advice of the IMF.

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Ugandans need to understand the causes of population growth first

Of late there has been a resurgence of writing and debate about Uganda’s population ‘explosion’ or ‘bomb’ that will destroy development efforts because savings are going into feeding unproductive mouths of children instead of investing in productive enterprises. Increasingly we are witnessing people who are not trained in population much less experienced in this complex subject writing and commenting with confidence like they know more than any other Ugandan or for that matter any other expert. Some of these may have had one day or one week’s seminar in population matters and begin to talk with authority.

Population dynamics are very complex in time and space. We have seen the regrettable results of countries that rushed into reducing population growth rapidly by force or couples that did not want children or just one or two. These countries and their governments are now rushing to reverse the trend. Have you heard of “Conception Day” in one of the developed countries where a national holiday has been declared so that the citizens can stay at home and increase their population? Have you heard of a wide range of incentives that are being offered in developed countries so that their populations can have many children? What I am saying is that rushing into curbing population growth can be costly in the long term.

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Uganda’s diseases of poverty may worsen under the dev plan

The NRM government was unable to detect the diseases of poverty (jiggers, scabies, trachoma, cholera, under-nutrition, pneumonia, insanity and malaria etc) – which have embarrassed the development partners and damaged the image of the government (as it prepares for presidential and parliamentary elections in early 2011) that had presented Uganda as a success story in neo-liberal economic growth and poverty reduction – for the following principal reasons.

First, the government followed strictly foreign advice that focused on inflation control, economic growth and per capita GDP without paying attention to the equity aspects. The distribution of the benefits of economic growth by class and region was left entirely to the invisible hand of the market forces which would not be interfered with at all.

Second, the government focused on producing excellent blue prints such as the modernization of agriculture, poverty reduction action plan and universal primary education with the assistance of renowned development experts from around the world. These blue prints were received by the international community as a model of success story before they were even implemented. The government was satisfied with that assessment which boosted its international standing and did not bother with implementation as long as the donors and the media were happy with what they were marketing on behalf of the NRM government.

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