Tag Archives: museveni

Museveni has no legitimacy to govern in Uganda

Museveni has repeatedly stated that the people of Uganda are sovereign. Ipso facto, Museveni cannot govern without their consent. There has to be a contract between him and the citizens of Uganda. Without this contract, Museveni has no legitimacy. Without legitimacy at home, Museveni and his government cannot be recognized abroad and welcome into the community of nations. Thus, without legitimacy, Museveni cannot represent the people of Uganda abroad or enter into agreement (contract) on their behalf. Museveni may have power through the barrel of the gun, but that does not confer legitimacy. Using power without legitimacy is tyranny.

The people of Uganda have withheld consent because the 2011 elections from the highest to the lowest level lacked a level playing field. They were organized by a discredited electoral commission, some five million Uganda voters were disenfranchised, an equal number of foreigners voted for NRM, there was massive intimidation by security forces, and NRM used public resources to fund its campaigns. The international observer teams have concluded that the elections were not free and fair.

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A profile for future Uganda leaders

Disappointing political and economic performance of Uganda leaders since independence in 1962 has raised questions about the profile of future leaders. The leaders we have had so far have not passed the test in large part because we did not know them well or were imposed through coups and the guerrilla war.

Obote spent much of his time in Kenya. He came back to Uganda a few years before he formed the UPC in 1960 to contest elections in 1961 and 1962. Although his economic performance in the 1960s passed the test, the same cannot be said for political performance.

Ugandans had known Amin to be a rough individual militarily going by his record in Kenya in colonial days and his handling of the 1966 political crisis in Buganda. He became president in the 1970s through a military coup. He was never elected by the people of Uganda.

Museveni shot his way to power from the Luwero jungles through the barrel of the gun. He had worked for a few years as a government research assistant. And he has been with us since 1986.

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Museveni’s despotism must be stopped

Greetings fellow Ugandans and friends

We have agreed to adequately prepare an all embracing case for rejecting Museveni as Uganda’s despotic ruler who is increasingly relying on foreigners as Ugandans abandon him. We have also agreed that our grievances should be anchored on facts – not emotions or rumors.

Museveni has violated the constitution of Uganda which recognizes the sovereign and inalienable right of Ugandans to establish a socio-economic and political order based on the principles of unity, peace, equality, democracy, freedom, social justice and progress. Museveni has ruled unilaterally using others as rubber stamp through bribery or people with little or no interest in Uganda.

We have analyzed at some length Museveni’s abuse of our political rights through, among other things, rigging elections since 1996 and using mercenaries from the great lakes region.

When Museveni had an interview in 1994 with an American journalist Bill Berkeley he sent a message to Ugandans that we did not pick up. He said that “I have never blamed the whites for colonizing Africa: I have never blamed these whites for taking slaves. If you are stupid, you should be taken a slave”(The Atlantic Monthly September 1994). This was a powerful message. Why should he blame his white cousins? Museveni believes he is white! I am told that in 1986 he was sworn in by a white judge when he became president! He cannot blame white neo-colonialism which has been imposed on Uganda on his watch.

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Museveni has not felt the wind of change

On February 3, 1960 former Britain’s Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan addressed both houses of parliament in South Africa. He warned the Nationalist Government of South Africa of ‘the wind of change’ blowing through the continent. He served notice that Britain could no longer support the policy of apartheid. He stressed that Britain rejected the idea of any inherent superiority of one race over another. He added that ‘individual merit alone is the criterion of man’s advancement, political or economic” (Fifty Correspondents of Reuters, Putman 1967).

Museveni came to power in 1986, at a time of economic and political crisis. The leaders of Africa had been discredited for economic mismanagement and one party political system. There was a search for political and economic stability. The new breed of African leaders shot to the scene through the barrel of the gun including Museveni.

Economic reforms through structural adjustment necessitated curbing freedom to make sure opposition groups did not emerge. In order to implement the austerity program of structural adjustment in Uganda Museveni with tacit support of proponents of structural adjustment allowed abuse of human rights. His abusive actions were conveniently described as boldness. Museveni unlike other leaders was given room to postpone multiparty politics, enabling him to crush DP and UPC.

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Kale Kayihura can’t impose Museveni as president of Uganda

In 1993 Museveni declared that if the people who are the sovereign force don’t want their leader, then he/she should go. He added unambiguously that the role of the army is to guard borders and maintain internal peace. “The army should guard what the people want, not do what the people don’t want”. The police force also has responsibility to maintain law and order.

Following the massively rigged elections of February 2011 with some five million Ugandans disenfranchised and many foreigners brought in to vote, the people of Uganda have rejected the results of these rigged elections at the presidential, parliamentary and local levels. They want to exercise their right of peaceful assembly and freedom of speech to denounce the results and stop the formation of an illegitimate government. International instruments and Uganda’s constitution allow peaceful assembly and freedom of speech. Kayihura cannot violate these rights and freedoms with impunity.

By banning planned demonstrations under the pretext that they will be violent, Kale Kayihura is in effect imposing Museveni as president of Uganda. This imposition goes against Museveni’s own understanding of the will of the people as he articulated in 1993 namely that security forces should guard what the people want, not do what the people don’t want. The people of Uganda have rejected the February 18 elections so Museveni cannot be president without their consent. Millions of them were disenfranchised.

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Museveni’s absolute power and 2011 election fraud

Greetings fellow Ugandans and friends

There was a time when monarchs in Europe had absolute powers and ruled by divine right (the right to rule came from God, not from the people). In the 18th century, leading (enlightenment) thinkers in Western Europe challenged the power of absolute monarchy.

To prevent one leader or a group of people from becoming too powerful and gain total control of government, Baron de Montesquieu suggested separation of power into three independent branches. The legislative branch would pass laws; the executive and judicial branches would implement and interpret them respectively.

The independence of the legislative and judicial branches has kept the executive branch in check in mature democratic countries. Consequently executive branches do not meddle in election matters.

However, in some countries separation of powers exists in theory only. For example, in Uganda presidents have reduced the independence of legislative and judicial branches and strengthened the power of the executive branch. Legislative and judicial branches have virtually become rubber stamps for the presidency – hence opposition leaders’ decision not to go to the Supreme Court after the rigged 2011 elections.

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“If the people don’t want you, then you go…” – Museveni

During an interview, Margaret A. Novicki of Africa Report asked Museveni “What advice would you give to your African colleagues who are resisting movement towards democracy?

Museveni responded that “I have no sympathy for those who resist democracy. Democracy should not be resisted. Power belongs to the people, not to an individual. Why should you want power for yourself? Who are you? You are a servant of the people. If the people don’t want you, then you go and do other things and they elect whom they want. I have no sympathy for them”(Africa Report July/August 1993).

The people of Uganda have rejected the 2011 presidential results because of massive rigging, disenfranchising voters, inflating voter register, allowing foreigners to vote, military intimidation, using public funds to bribe voters and relying on a partial electoral commission in Museveni’s favor. The people of Uganda want to exercise their natural right to demonstrate peacefully against the presidential results and convince Museveni to step down so that free and fair elections based on a level playing field are conducted.

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Museveni’s time is running out

The people of Uganda want their country, dignity and liberty back. Ipso facto, they want Museveni out no matter what others may say.

First, the good news is that Ugandans have finally realized who Museveni is and why he has divided Ugandans up and trampled on their civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights with impunity. Museveni fought a guerrilla war on Buganda territory with foreign and mercenary backing. Some 25 percent of guerrilla fighters were Tutsi mostly from Rwanda – Museveni’s cousins. Museveni tortured a Muhima man who wanted to know the guerrillas in their midst that spoke a strange language. Museveni tortured this man to put an end to that kind of questioning.

Lest we forget here are a few names of Tutsi who commanded the guerrilla war and served in Uganda’s army. Fred Rwigyema, major-general of NRA and its deputy commander – Museveni being the commander, Paul Kagame a major in NRA and head of intelligence and counter-intelligence, Dr. Peter Baingana a major and head of the NRA medical services, Chris Bunyenyezi a major and commanding officer of NRA’s 306 brigade and major Sam Kaka commanding officer of the NRA’s military police. Some returned to Rwanda in 1994 after the fall of Habyarimana regime. Some have returned to govern Uganda with Museveni.

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Museveni’s address to journalists on eve of 2011 elections

Reading his address to journalists one gets the impression that Museveni had in mind ignorant people who have no clue what has happened in Uganda over the last 25 years. How can he transform Uganda into a second world when he has driven it into a fourth world? Uganda was a third world country when he came to power in 1986. For all intents and purposes, Uganda is now a fourth world using the yardstick of diseases of poverty that have spread to all corners of Uganda. We had some manufacturing enterprises that created jobs when he came to power. They are mostly gone. Uganda has de-industrialized and is now dominated by neglected agriculture using hand hoes and no fertilizers and services based in Kampala and dominated by foreigners.

Instead of pushing forward Museveni has been driving Uganda backward –possibly deliberately to create a marginalized and easily exploited society. Structural adjustment that was supposed to drive Uganda from third to second world failed miserably and was abandoned in 2009. Since then he has no plan to talk of, in any case, the government has been declared broke. God knows where all the donor money that was poured into the country from bilateral and multilateral sources a few months ago besides export earnings has gone. Ugandans and donors must demand a full account of what has happened.

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Museveni: The people of Uganda are coming

You have taken us for granted for too long. You hood winked us with your ten point program when you knew you were not going to implement it. Instead of development you have brought hell on Uganda soil. You have reduced a country of hardworking, innovative and cheerful people to a semi-desert where rivers are disappearing, lakes are shrinking and water tables are dropping. Hospitals have turned into hospices, maternal mortality and insanity rates are on the rise. Ugandans have become number one alcohol consumer in the world. You are selling food to earn foreign currency when Ugandans are starving to death. You have refused to allocate money for primary school lunch causing girls to drop out of school and forced into teenage pregnancy and having children they cannot afford. You are encouraging poor families to practice birth control for lack of resources, yet you are selling or leasing Uganda land to foreigners to produce food for their people. Land is the only asset Ugandans have. Education has not provided them an alternative source of income.

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