It is well over a decade now since
Uganda, once a “no-party democracy” in
which political competition happened
among individuals seeking office and
not among political organisations,
reverted to multiparty competition.
Years before, soon after it became
independent and for some years
thereafter, it had experimented with
multipartyism. That was before the then
ruling party, the Uganda People’s
Congress, succumbed to the temptation
to monopolise power and turned Uganda
into a de facto one-party state, and
before UPC, increasingly numerically
dominant but ideologically incoherent
and institutionally weak, was thrown out
by the military.
The military dictatorship was felled by a
determined insurgency that Tanzania
supported enthusiastically, led by an
exiled political elite that were organised
in a range of groups with very little in
common and lots of different, often
contradictory, agendas for post-Idi Amin
Uganda.
It was that insurgency that first
introduced most Ugandans to young and
restless and, according to some who
knew him then, power-hungry Yoweri
Museveni.
Soon enough, the lack of harmony in the
insurgents’ agendas, inexperience, and
the simple assumption many had
embraced, that the biggest problem for
the country was Idi Amin, and that once
they were rid of him everything else
would be sorted out, plunged the country
into renewed chaos.
A few years later, their organisational
superiority, a clear sense of purpose, and
common aspirations enabled a group of
young insurgents to seize power from a
government whose leadership and
supporters had given in to the pleasures
of being in power and neglected the
imperative to remain focused, build
consensus, and engage in collective
action.
I was reminded of all this recently as I
pondered the goings-on within Uganda’s
two major political parties, the ruling
National Resistance Movement, and its
offshoot, the Forum for Democratic
Change.
One feels a certain sense of déjà vu
simply from watching the two groups
evolve, and from listening to or reading
about the conversations and arguments
that go on among their leaders and
supporters.
At the time it came to power, the NRM
was a truly impressive outfit.
First, it had a leader in whom all of its
members believed, with conviction.
Then it had a clear, believable agenda
around which it had recruited cadres
from among some of the brightest young
and not-so-young minds the country had
at it disposal, and around which it
amassed goodwill from a very large
number of Ugandans before and after
the war.
Today, however, there is a certain
feeling among its detractors and its more
thoughtful supporters that the party has
degenerated into something of an empty
tin generating more noise than
substance.
Aggrieved members whose motivation
for joining up was to contribute to
building an outfit that would make a real
difference to the lives of the majority
and stand the test of time as a party of
principles, now complain of their
organisation having become a refuge for
a wide assortment of crude self-seekers.
Well, for a long time now, detached
observers and political opponents have
been saying these things. NRM cadres
preferred to argue or pretend they were
not true.
The change may have come rather late in
the day, but that it has come is in itself a
remarkable development. Now some
party activists who feel it is harmful to
stay silent or to hide their concerns from
the wider membership and public have
joined the fray.
Writing in a leading daily, one has
identified “political, ideological,
leadership lethargy, lack of creativity,
dishonesty, intrigue and greed” as
threatening the party’s wellbeing and its
capacity to retain support.
Museveni, its chairman, has decried the
party’s invasion by ideologically
disoriented, careerists, opportunists, and
jobseekers.
How times change. Only a few years ago
the party decided to get rid of (kwejjako)
members who, driven by principle and a
sense of duty, stood up against what they
saw as unprincipled internal
manoeuvres by their leadership.
Perhaps those who see the NRM as in
terminal decline and incapable of
withstanding a well-co-ordinated and
focused opposition have a point? If only
Uganda had an opposition with such
potential.
Which takes me to the Forum for
Democratic Change. It is the one party
that, for some years, large numbers of
Ugandans who wanted to look beyond
Museveni and the NRM saw as suited to
the task of edging it out and putting right
what they believed had gone wrong.
Years