Photo: YouTube
Ugandan General Salim Saleh, who is the chief coordinator of the shadowy Operation Wealth Creation (OWC) outfit, has been revealed as the real boss of the National Social Security Fund (NSSF).
We do not need to rehash recent news stories revealing this. However, we may look at how Ugandans were up in arms when they heard that this was the case.
Many online commentators warned Gen. Saleh that if he dared touch Ugandans’ NSSF savings, there would be hell to pay. While others wondered what Gen. Saleh, known for his sticky fingers, was doing even within a mile of Ugandans’ savings.
As Ugandans spat bile about Gen. Saleh, some wise heads mentioned that Ugandan online noise was nothing but sound and fury, signifying nothing. That’s because Gen. Saleh and his brother Gen. Museveni have always treated Uganda and Ugandans as mere items in the ledger of their get-rich-quick-or-die-trying scheme otherwise known as the National Resistance Movement.
They have robbed the country this way and that, so people’s current righteous indignation is a day late and a dollar short.
Truth to tell, Gen. Museveni can rape the nation and pillage all our resources but Ugandans will still do nothing. That’s because Gen. Museveni’s misrule mirrors Idi Amin’s. And the latter (as with the former) stayed so long in power due to a number of underlying factors which have overlapped and joined to express replica regimes.
Amin and Museveni both benefit(ed) from being military rulers, backed by state organs of coercion such as the State Research Bureau, Public Safety Unit, Chieftaincy of Military Intelligence and Internal Security Organization, to name but four. The army was loyal to Amin the way it is loyal to Museveni.
In Amin’s case, soldiers would even betray their colleagues as was the case when the chief of the air force, Smarts Guweddeko, in 1974, reported to Amin that air force pilots were planning to assassinate him and thereby foiled the plot. In Gen. Museveni’s case, he pits soldier against soldier as each and all are encouraged to spy on one another to ensure nobody threatens him or his misrule.
Two, Amin used the “Obote factor” to consolidate his misrule. He presented himself as savior of the Baganda and positioned himself as the man who removed Obote and would prevent his return to power. By demonizing Obote or anyone other person who threatened both Museveni and Amin’s reigns, they have scared Ugandans into line.
Amin went so far as to talk about “The Lango Development Master Plan” based in Akokoro County, Obote’s home village and Museveni was known to blame everything wrong in Uganda on Obote. This alienated many people from the north and also touch off a 20-year genocide there, much the same way Amin wantonly killed Langi and Acholi right from the inception of his murderous rule.
Also, there were opportunistic Ugandans who were and are ready to serve Amin and Museveni for material gain as against their fellow Ugandans wellbeing.
This could also explain why academics at Makerere University awarded Amin a degree he surely did not deserve. Similarly, on 12 December 2010, Makerere University awarded Gen. Museveni an Honorary Doctorate of Laws. And Ugandans were heard saying “Bagala aliwo, Basiima Bagaaya’ (meaning: they praise the one in power, they praise the one feeding them).
Then, foreign aid also sustained Amin’s regime with Libya, Saudi Arabia and British companies supplying goods, provisions and services to his regime…the latter through regular flights to Stanstead Aiport in England. The USA also bought two thirds of Uganda’s coffee under Amin. Likewise, Gen. Museveni has been propped up by a host of international countries, many the same which helped Amin.
Hence, Gens Amin and Museveni are two sides of the same coin flipped against the declining fortunes of a Uganda which increasingly takes instead of makes history.
