Adjustment and anti-terrorism policies have saved Museveni presidency
First and foremost, Museveni is president of Uganda to advance his own interests. In true democratic sense Museveni is not popular because of corruption and sectarianism as can be deduced from elite and peasant comments. He has used a combination of security forces, impoverishing Ugandans and collaborating with western powers in structural adjustment and anti-terrorism – areas that are not popular in the Horn and Great Lakes regions – to stay in power.
When structural adjustment ran out of steam in Ghana, the experiment was transferred to Uganda in 1987. Museveni adopted the extreme version (shock therapy) of structural adjustment favored by western sponsors the implementation of which required an authoritarian leader who would not tolerate riots. Museveni was also needed in great lakes geopolitics that resulted in changing governments in Rwanda in 1994 and in Zaire in 1997.
In return Museveni was saved from early multi-party politics which were imposed on others, allowed to strangle pre-independence Uganda Peoples’ Congress (UPC) and Democratic Party (DP), received huge amounts of money and training for his security forces and consolidated military, economic and political power in his hands. He threatened Ugandans that he would go back to the bush and cause another hell if not elected president in 1996. Most development partners did not raise a finger when all these things were happening because they did not want to upset a reliable ally.