Why birth control in Uganda will be difficult to implement
Suddenly Uganda is witnessing a flurry of birth control activities. Where the urgency has come from is still baffling. Uganda is a country that has lost – and still losing – so many people since the 1970s due to the Amin murderous regime, the guerrilla wars in the Luwero Triangle and in northern and eastern Uganda, AIDS pandemic, malaria particularly in Kabale due to climate change that facilitated mosquito invasion of the district with devastating outcomes and increasing diseases of poverty. According to Shifa Mwesigye (Observer {Uganda} August 2010) there is a conflict between on the one hand Uganda leaders and politicians who want more children and on the other hand donors and experts who want fewer children. That is already a major stumbling block that needs to be resolved first.
Birth control programs in Kenya that started in the late 1960s experienced implementation difficulties because they were imposed on an unwilling national leadership soon after independence that was won after a devastating Mau Mau liberation war. But since birth control was a prerequisite for foreign aid, the Kenya government went along but was not keen on birth control implementation. This lesson should not be lost on those eager to implement birth control in Uganda where resistance is still very strong.