Gen. Museveni
Violence begets violence.
Gen. Yoweri Kaguta Museveni acquired power through a violent conflict waged in Central Uganda. To be specific, in Luwero triangle, the heart of Buganda land, one of the largest ethnic groups in Uganda.
Museveni rode on the acrimonious relationship between Buganda and the UPC government dating back to mid 1960s to mount his war against Dr. Milton Obote’s government from 1980 to 1985. Before that, Museveni had participated in the war of national liberation against Gen. Idi Amin through his military outfit, Front for National Salvation Army (FRONASA).
It was noted with curiosity that Museveni, instead of joining the larger fighting group of Uganda National Liberation Front (UNLF), the exile army backed by Tanzania, he chose to use his own military organization to participate in the liberation war of 1979. In hindsight, it is clear that Museveni was already preparing an army to wage war and seize state power in the future. As a student, Museveni wrote his degree thesis espousing the idea of employing violence to seize state power.
These bear testament to the values, beliefs and psyche of a young man who eventually wages war to seize nd monopolize state power in Uganda. These values, beliefs and psyche do not stop at orchestrating violence to seize power. They go a long way in informing his methods of consolidating and retaining absolute power as well. That is why for the last 31 years that Gen. Museveni has been in power he has always fomented or resorted to violence to manage any form of dissent.
Soon after he took power, he mounted a military operation against the people of the resource-rich northern part of Uganda that saw hundreds of civilians unfairly incarcerated and many killed. This left the people with no other option than resisting these arbitrary arrests and killings. He unleashed a war of extermination that lasted through 2006. In Eastern Uganda, Museveni’s soldiers burnt hundreds of unarmed, innocent civilians in a train wagon at a place called Mukura.
In the Ruwenzori region, Western Uganda, his soldiers recently murdered thousands of civilians; Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have called for an independent investigation. People there, left with no option, have declared war against his government so as to be safe. Gen. Museveni’s atrocities and mass killings are designed to instill fear in the people of Uganda so as to discourage any resistance to his illegitimate military rule having again stolen the presidential election last year. Through mass killings, detentions and torture, Gen. Museveni consolidated his military authority in Uganda. It has rewarded him and his family handsomely. Gen. Museveni has presided over a predatory, kleptocratic, abusive and murderous regime for more than three decades.
Gen. Museveni thrives from violence. He does not believe in debate or dialogue and places no value in human lives apart from his family’s. His life and his rule are anchored on violence. That is why he has sown mayhem and aggression across the Great Lakes’ region. He waged war in Democratic Republic of Congo, the Central African Republic, Rwanda, and Kenya. Now, in South Sudan he is supporting the regime of Gen. Salva Kiir –having even used cluster bombs— to murder his own citizens without remorse.
Then, he dupes the world by shedding crocodile tears about the South Sudanese refugees, even hosting an international conference to raise funds. His regime, given its record on corruption and embezzlement, which the U.S. ambassador to Uganda Deborah Malac criticized last year, is poised to siphon hundreds of millions of dollars being mobilized for these refugees who have fled the nightmare he helped create. This is the definition of blood money. Domestically, he has mastered the art of divide-and-rule like a good student of colonialism. Gen. Museveni uses the same violence that helped him seize power to prolong his regime.
The armed forces and police are his private enforcers. They mete violence to the citizens and taxpayers whom they are constitutionally mandated to protect. The different ethnic groups in Uganda that have been living together in peace and harmony for centuries are today arch enemies who are slashing each other with machetes and swearing by the sword never to live together again.
That is why the Bakonjo people were recently massacred. That is why, the Bakiga and the Banyoro who lived together for ages in Kibaale, Hoima and Masindi districts respectively, can never live together again in peace. That is why, in 2009, Gen. Museveni rejected the attempt by the king of Buganda, Kabaka Ronald Mutebi, to visit parts of his administrative domain, Kayunga. Dozens of Baganda people who protested were killed in Kampala, the capital. The Itesot and the Jap’ Adhola who have been living together for hundreds of years in Tororo district, Eastern Uganda, are up in arms.
Since the armed forces owe allegiance to Gen. Museveni, not Uganda, he is the only one that can make “peace” by ordering an end to violence. He sows violence which can only be ended by him. This makes him the ultimate problem starter, and, solver. The alpha and omega. In stirring these violent eruptions, he exploits the selfishness and ineptitude of the pawns in his regime who hardly think beyond their political survival in parliamentary constituencies and ministerial appointments.
This is the tragedy of Uganda.
In Apaa, in the northern part of Uganda, Gen. Museveni’s acolytes foment violence over land between the Acholi people and Madi. This is designed to force people to flee so land can be seized for himself and his family and foreign investors. The two ethnic communities will slash each other’s necks. After appropriate level of blood is shed and people have fled both Acholi and Madi will lose the land. It is a historical fact that the Acholi and Madi lived together for ages in Apaa in harmony long before Museveni was even born.
He has divided people in Uganda and exported the genocidal policy to Rwanda and South Sudan with his invasions, respectively, in 1990 and 2013, of those neighbors. The war he launched in Rwanda led to massacres four years later between Hutus and Tutsis after the assassination of President Juvenal Habyarimana; the South Sudan invasion has sparked killings between Dinkas and Nuers. He promotes regional chaos so deflect attention from domestic tyranny. His control over Rwanda ended when Gen. Paul Kagame crushed his army in Kisangani, Congo, August 1999 and in June, 2000.
The citizens of any country that shares a border with Uganda are at peril before sunset for this African vampire.
