Gen. Museveni and son Gen. Muhoozi; heir-in-waiting?
In recent weeks there have been a tirade of attacks on Andrew Mwenda, by Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) members and supporters on social media and other media of communication.
Mwenda is a renowned Ugandan journalist and a social and political pundit in Kampala who recently provocatively attacked Dr. Kizza Besigye who was the FDC flag-bearer in last April’s presidential election in a podcast for being equal to Gen. Yoweri Museveni in as far as thirst for political power is concerned.
Mwenda has over the years consistently accused Dr. Besigye of having no vision whatsoever for transforming Uganda. According to him, Dr. Besigye, like his erstwhile nemesis, Gen. Museveni, is pursuing political power as an end and not as a means to an end.
That is why, according to Mwenda, Dr. Besigye invests very little time and resources to developing his party, the FDC, into a political institution with the requisite organizational infrastructure and capabilities for winning elections.
While appearing on a television political talk show, NBS The Frontline, on Thursday 29th December 2016, Mwenda repeated his accusations against Dr. Besigye for failing to provide the leadership and strategies that the opposition needs to defeat Gen. Museveni and his ruling cabal from power.
Mwenda said, in spite of the odds against his candidature, Dr. Besigye’s four “unsuccessful” (2001, 2006, 2011, 2016) attempts at the presidency clearly illustrates his ineptitude to provide the leadership that is needed to solve the conundrum that Museveni’s oligarchic tyranny has become.
He ended by saying Ugandans should not change from Museveni to another Museveni (read to Dr. Besigye). Therefore, according to Mwenda, Dr. Besigye should retire and leave the space for another capable leader to cause the change that the country is yearning for.
As I have already pointed out, the social media has been awash with this story. Besigye’s supporters have attacked Mwenda and called him all sorts of names. But other than attacking Mwenda, whom I disagree with on many other issues, I would like the opposition political parties in Uganda, a part of which I am, to do a deep soul searching, self-introspection and a sincere and honest evaluation of themselves to determine whether Mwenda’s criticism is legitimate or not. I find a lot of sense in Mwenda’s comments. Certainly, knowing Mwenda’s cordial relationship with Gen. Museveni, Gen. Paul Kagame, et al, makes it very difficult to know what his motive is, or, whether he is working for someone or not.
I have personally been in the politics of Uganda for 10 years now. I have been witness to internal weaknesses and external challenges that opposition political parties face in this country. It is very easy to point out the external challenges and thus apportion blame rightly on the current regime for not fulfilling its constitutional mandate to political parties. These challenges mainly have to do with the unlevel playing ground for parties to freely organize and participate in the political processes of the country.
On seizing power in 1986, the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) regime banned political party pluralism in the country. This consequently emasculated political parties capacities to mobilize and organize for a decade. Secondly, the NRM regime has continually starved political parties of the financial resources needed to build strong political institutions.
Thirdly, political parties’ members have suffered grotesque harassment and intimidation in the hands of the security agencies of the regime. These and many other factors not mentioned here have continued to hinder the functionality, growth and development of political parties in Uganda.
However, as opposition political parties, we have many failings that are attributable to our own internal weaknesses. We must be honest about these weaknesses if we want to cause the change that we so desperately need.
Foremost, almost all opposition political parties in Uganda do not have well functioning secretariats with competent human resources assigned specific functions and responsibilities to execute. This disallows political parties to plan and implement their programs effectively. The hub for running any political party is its secretariat. It must thus be well equipped with competent human resources and facilities such as computers and internet connectivity, telephones, scanners, cameras, radio and television sets, and so forth.
Secondly, opposition political parties in Uganda do not have a strategic and coherent action plan that defines activities of the party in the short-term, mid-term and the long term. So they do undertake implementation of whatever activities they may have haphazardly planned on an ad hoc fashion.
Certainly, some of the parties have plans of action, but lack the organizational infrastructure to implement their planned activities.
Thirdly, opposition political parties have failed to build functional grassroots structures that are supposed to anchor the base for any political party worth its name. We all know that it is the grassroots structures that campaign for party candidates to win elections but we pay very little attention to this. For that reason, when time for elections arrive, we become helpless and fail to deliver electoral victory to our parties.
We then begin to heap blame only on the NRM regime after rigged elections. It is indeed absolutely true that the NRM regime has in many ways hindered the proper functioning, growth and development of multipartyism in Uganda.
It is however, also true that political parties in Uganda, especially those in the opposition, have deep-seated internal weaknesses that impede their capacities to organize to compete for political power. Opposition political parties must therefore be honest with themselves and as thus put their houses in order.
Only and only then, will they give the NRM a run for their money. Therefore, rather than attack Mwenda, let us listen to him and pick whatever’s worth from his criticism.
