Tag Archives: uganda

Uganda government is warned to move cautiously on birth control

The sudden upsurge of interest in birth control (family planning) in Uganda has coincided with the rising anti-immigration mood in the developed western world. When family planning began after World War II, there was fear that population in developing countries was growing faster than Europeans’. The main fear was that there would be competition for scarce resources and consumers in developed countries would be forced to scale down their lifestyles. They were not prepared for that. To avert this threat, developing countries had to reduce their population growth through contraception. To avoid controversy, the proponents of birth control came up with a ‘sugar-coated’ idea that contraception would ease the suffering of women who produce too many children in rapid succession. They also replaced the unpopular birth control terminology with family planning to disguise the fact that in the end population at couple and national levels would decline with adverse national security and economic development implications.

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Uganda’s development is being sacrificed again

Uganda is sacrificing its development – for the third time – as government directs its attention to hosting the United Nations peace keeping force of 50,000 military and police contingents, and 11,000 civilian staff budgeted at $5 billion (about 11 trillion shillings) a year. Ugandans who don’t know the challenges and implications of a project of this magnitude may dance in jubilation, hoping jobs will be created for Ugandans making poverty history. First of all the peace keepers will be internationally recruited with few jobs if any going to Ugandans with connections. Secondly, besides being the best political donation for Museveni and his NRM party a few months before presidential and parliamentary elections which is bad news for opposition parties, Uganda will also experience unprecedented shortages and high prices.

Uganda’s development has been delayed twice already because of ideological wars – the cold war between the capitalist west and the communist east which began in 1945 and ended in 1990; and the economic war between market forces and state intervention or socialism which began in the 1980s and is still with us although it was officially abandoned in Uganda in 2009. Uganda did very well economically and socially, especially in the 1960s before the impact of the cold war became evident. Donor funds and Uganda taxes were put to good use with tangible results. Quality education and health care were realized, infrastructure such as roads were paved, agricultural production facilitated by cooperatives increased, food security improved and more money was put into the pockets of farmers and those who provided services to the agriculture sector.

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Why a rising tide of opposition against Uganda’s NRM regime

From time immemorial opposition, rebellion and even revolution against a regime develop not because the regime is getting stronger or becoming more dictatorial but because it is getting weaker and less capable of delivering desired goods and services. What triggered the French Revolution of 1789, for example, was a reaction not against the rising tyranny of the ancient regime but its weakness and inability to deliver expected results.

In Uganda, the NRM regime is following in the footsteps of France’s ancient regime. NRM’s domestic, continental and global strength and glory are fading. At home the promise of eradicating poverty has vanished. Instead absolute and relative poverty is increasing. Some twenty percent of Ugandans are believed to be getting poorer. Those in the top income bracket are getting richer leaving behind those in the middle income causing a feeling of relative poverty.

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People who come to Uganda do not leave, do not mix

This message is addressed primarily to Uganda youth and their present and future leaders. The raison d’etre (purpose) of governments is first and foremost to protect the independence, territorial integrity, lives, welfare and property of Uganda and her citizens. This message should be accorded serious attention because of rapid and uncontrolled influx of people and animals into Uganda in the wake of globalization and its borderless ramifications and consolidation of expanded East African community and possible political integration with a component of free human and animal mobility across East African borders.

The subject of population movements across international borders for economic and security reasons has become one of the most intractable challenges in international relations. Everywhere there are complaints about immigrants – they bring diseases, take jobs from nationals, become richer than their hosts, occupy key political, economic and public service positions in foreign countries and undermine cultural values. Above all new comers do not mix with nationals. Recent developments in France and Sweden are a vivid illustration of what lies in store.

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NRM ‘revolution’ has reversed Uganda’s 90 years achievements

When the National Resistance Movement (NRM) came to power in 1986, it promised fundamental changes in Uganda’s political economy and society. Ugandans assumed fundamental change meant a quick recovery from the political, economic and social difficulties they had experienced since 1971 to a path of sustained growth, sustainable and transformational development. The launch of the ten-point program gave Ugandans hope. Unfortunately the ten point program never materialized. Instead, since 1990, Uganda has experienced a reversal of its earlier achievements including land ownership, economic transformation, ecological conservation and human capital formation. No one imagined that NRM’s fundamental change meant reversal of achievements Uganda had realized in the 90 years between 1894 and 1985. The reversal has affected the following areas:

The British colonial authorities left Uganda’s land firmly in the hands of Uganda peasants. This decision was taken after intensive discussions between London and Entebbe. British authorities further realized that adequate food and nutrition security was a human right that must be observed. They developed fisheries to provide affordable source of protein for low income families.

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How Uganda became a land of thieves

The NRM government which is led by a religious president with a religious first lady must be embarrassed for presiding over a country whose citizens have largely become perpetual thieves. Everywhere you turn you read or hear stories about theft – of money and property and increasingly of children. People are no longer ashamed to be caught or accused of stealing. It has become normal to steal. There are those who steal because they are too poor to make ends meet and those who are already rich but steal to become filthy rich.

When we were growing up in the 1950s and early 1960s all religious faiths preached against stealing. If you found money, handkerchief, etc, etc, you took it to the nearest Protestant or Catholic priest so the item could be returned to the owner. On Sundays there would be announcements of the lost and found items. Those who found them would be praised. As a result, employees, housemaids, gardeners etc would not steal from their employers. Those who still managed to steal would be denounced in public and punished. This served as warning to potential thieves. At school, thieves would be called names and teased by fellow students until they left the school. Some thieves would confess and be forgiven.  Priests, church wardens and teachers never stole church money or school fees. They served as role models. These early exposures prepared many people from stealing in their adult life. Unfortunately, when economic hard times set in caused by political instability and economic decline, and corruption, stealing crept in and started to gather speed. 

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From ten-point program to evangelism

President Museveni’s address to the NRM special organs conference at Namboole on Tuesday September 7, 2010 portrayed him more like a religious preacher to a flock in disarray and adviser to a government that has done a poor job than a president who has been in power continuously for 25 years. It is not surprising given the unprecedented chaotic performance in the recent (September 2010) NRM primaries for 2011 elections and the overall economic, social and ecological decline. The promised industrial and social revolutions and poverty eradication are nowhere in sight.

In Uganda, politics under the NRM is about power: how to get it, monopolize it and use it to become filthy rich relying on family members, relatives and friends. Knowing full well that democracy would not secure him the presidency, Museveni chose the military option and became president in 1986 and has no plans to retire soon. The army and other security forces are used more to silence dissent against his regime than to keep peace and stability as Museveni and his foreign backers would want us to believe. The demonstration by unemployed and unarmed citizens in Kampala was met with disproportional military force resulting in many deaths and injuries.

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Dividing Uganda into Nilotic North and Bantu South is not correct

When I wrote that dividing Uganda into watertight Nilotic North and Bantu South was not entirely correct, some people sought clarification and elaboration. Earlier on some people had also raised the question whether the people of southern Uganda who are linguistically the same (Bantu-speakers) are also racially (or ethnically) the same.

For Uganda’s northern region one can safely use the Nilotic classification. For Buganda, Bunyoro and Toro one can also safely use the Bantu classification since intermarriage between Nilotic and Bantu peoples was so thorough that new communities emerged, adopted a common Bantu language and practiced mixed farming thereby ending the pastoralist and agricultural specialization between Nilotic and Bantu peoples respectively. However, in south west Uganda (Ntungamo and Rujumbura in particular) the situation is different.

Bantu people who speak Bantu language or Bantu Bantu-speakers (BBS) from Cameroon/Nigeria border arrived in southwest Uganda first through the Congo region. They practiced mixed farming of crops, short horn cattle, goats and sheep and poultry. They also manufactured a wide range of products particularly those based on iron ore. Centuries later, Nilotic Luo-speaking people with long horn cattle arrived in the area. Their ancestors came from southern Sudan. Although the Nilotic people (Bahima and Bahororo) adopted Bantu language, hence Nilotic Bantu-speakers (NBS), culturally and economically they remained distinct from Bantu Bantu-speakers (BBS). Separate identities were retained through a combination of strict restrictions on inter-marriage and specialized economic functions.

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External influence has destroyed Uganda’s independence

Ugandans struggled for independence to have freedom and determine their destiny. They had seen their resources exploited for the benefit of the mother country. They had witnessed their industries and markets destroyed to make room for European manufactured products. Uganda’s demand for independence grew out of the struggle by Africans to have a stake in the cash economy which was dominated by Europeans and Asians, keeping Africans as small holder farmers.

When British authorities finally agreed that Uganda should become independent, they retained the power to decide who would be the leader and which party would form the government. The Catholic dominated Democratic Party (DP) under the leadership of Benedicto Kiwanuka, a Catholic, won the 1961 pre-independence elections. The British and Church of England leadership was not happy. They wanted a Protestant Party led by a Protestant leader. Fresh elections were held and a coalition of Protestant parties (Uganda Peoples’ Congress {UPC} and Kabaka Yekka {KY}) formed the independence government in 1962 with Milton Obote (Protestant) as prime minister and Freddie Mutesa II (Protestant) as president. The Vice President was also a Protestant. The Democratic Party complained after it lost the 1962 elections that the Church of England led by the Archbishop of Canterbury played a decisive role in its defeat.

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Immigrants and population growth in Buganda

Uganda’s ‘explosive’ population growth has become the single most important development challenge to date. It has been reported in major newspapers in Uganda and at international conferences. Seminars have been conducted on the subject and more are planned. The population topic has attracted people from many disciplines, many of them with insufficient knowledge, experience or data to handle the subject professionally.

The causes of Uganda’s problems – poverty, unemployment, environmental degradation, crime, violence, food insecurity, urban congestion and slums, poor quality education and health care, lack of adequate savings and investments etc – are being blamed largely on Uganda’s high fertility rate. Development partners and experts are increasingly concerned about the future of Uganda if the fertility rate is not checked. One reporter in Observer magazine (Uganda) of August 8, 2010 suggested that “Uganda must start aggressively [using force] promoting and funding family planning services” reminiscent of what happened in India and China. Some readers have supported the suggestion without indicating how it should be done and on what groups.

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