In Summary
President’s Museveni’s letter last week on the Libyan crisis has raised both praise and fury. Mathias Ssekanjako in Boston, USA, writes blaming the president for playing two flutes;
Those of you who have been following political developments in Uganda should have noted that in the recent days we have received three letters written by prominent politicians. The first letter was written by a veteran politician Jaberi Bidandi Ssali in which he criticised President Museveni of his divisive rule based on tribalism and corruption.
The second letter was written by a prominent journalist and politician Andrew Mwenda who accused former presidential candidate Kiiza Besigye of being intolerant and politically naïve. The third letter was written by President Museveni who has attacked United Nations for playing double standards when they attacked Libya. All these are great letters that could not go without a note.
I am particularly concerned with President Museveni’s letter. It reminds me of one writer in The Metro a local news paper in Boston who wondered thus “Why should we be bothered when Libyans decide to slaughter each other? Let them kill themselves they will reach a point where they will not kill each other anymore”
No difference
President Museveni’s letter re-sounds the same words.
President Museveni’s letter re-sounds the same words.
However, we are human beings and our nature compels us to respond with pity to the suffering of other people. We cannot simply look on and laugh as innocent people are being slaughtered. The brutality that is going on in Libya is unacceptable to any grown up person of normal sanity and reasoning.
While I cannot claim that whatever shown on CNN exhibits the absolute truth, there is sufficient reasons to believe that Gaddafi has acted so ruthlessly and beastly beyond his humanity.
I wish to remind the president that the world today is not judging Gaddafi for what he has done in the past, but for what he is doing against his own people right now in a desperate move to save his power. Aristotle one of the great philosophers noted that to be virtuous is a continuous life journey; a single act cannot make a person virtuous, while a single evil can make him wicked. Because of his own deeds today, Gaddafi is seen as one of the most notorious political monsters on the planet.
President Museveni praised Gaddafi for being an independent minded leader and that he (Museveni) hates puppets over independent minded leaders. I wonder whether the president is using the word puppet as a jargon.
By the time he came to power he was one of the reckoned independent minded leaders, however, his failed barter system, his sending soldiers to Somalia when the rest of African countries refused, and his constant endorsing of western policies all indicates that he stopped being an independent minded leader decades ago. Today, Museveni is one of the famous American political puppets in the region.
However, the president is right when he argued that Western countries are to be blamed for growing problems in Africa. This is particularly true because most dictators in Africa have been sustained by western support for fear that when they retire from political offices, the al-Queda and other terrorist groups may overtake the region.
The president should also distinguish the difference between being an independent minded leader and being a nationalist. All leaders of the countries the president numerated from his historical memories all of them were not only independent minded but nationalists as well. Can we think that it is the foreign policy and political intervention that leads government officials in Uganda to steal the money mean for medication for HIV patients? Or are potholes in Kampala caused by the foreign interference?
It is quite surprising that the president can admire good roads in Libya which he sees from his multimillion plane, whereas roads surrounding state house at Nakasero are impassable. If he is an independent minded
leader as he claims, what is he waiting for to construct infrastructures at least around Kampala city? Therefore Museveni’s claimed allergy to foreign economic, political and military interventions is irresistible, because African leaders have disowned their own selves.
leader as he claims, what is he waiting for to construct infrastructures at least around Kampala city? Therefore Museveni’s claimed allergy to foreign economic, political and military interventions is irresistible, because African leaders have disowned their own selves.
The current crisis in Libya is not economic as it was the case in Tunisia and Egypt, but it is political. It is not the lack of jobs in Libya that has ignited the strike, but it is the failure to share leadership. Just as corruption one day will spark off civil strife in Uganda.
Like many other African leaders, Gaddafi wanted to be the one and only one who can champion Libya’s affair. The tendency to visualise opposition as enemies, opportunists, terrorists or intruders who want to grab power from the incumbent is the essence of dictatorship in Africa and the cause of political turmoil in Libya today.
A dictator is a leader who denies others the opportunity to competitively participate in political affairs under the disguise that their involvement is dangerous for the nation. Such a leader uses all types of threats to discourage voters from voting any other person using intimidation, excessive power and deployment of heavy guns as was the case in Uganda before and after elections. Museveni’s argument that Libyans should be left to fight their own war lacks moral essence and judgment and raises many questions as to what is hidden behind his argument.
For I believe that Museveni is not insane to support such actions of brutality. The argument he started with only 27 guns to win the war contradicts his reasoning because in the same letter he acknowledged that Gaddafi’s arms consignment played a big role to jumpstart his struggle for power. Was Gaddafi a Ugandan when he helped him?
His foreign involvement was perceived as good, but when it comes to people in Benghazi to cry for support when the dictator is brutalising them; Museveni judges their action as unnecessary and un called for. I think it is the president who plays the double standards but not the UN. Museveni’s Machiavellian belief that when it comes to defend power one can use any means is barbaric and long outdated.
Pretence
Similarly his shrewdness that people can be fooled through staged elections so as to give the world impression that there is democracy in the country is soon coming to an end. There is no government that should be allowed at any cost to terrorise its own people under the pretext of defending its power. The long list of historical developments in the world Museveni quoted, will be the very standard that will be used to judge him when his time comes.
Source: Daily Monitor, Posted Sunday, March 27 2011 at 00:00
Similarly his shrewdness that people can be fooled through staged elections so as to give the world impression that there is democracy in the country is soon coming to an end. There is no government that should be allowed at any cost to terrorise its own people under the pretext of defending its power. The long list of historical developments in the world Museveni quoted, will be the very standard that will be used to judge him when his time comes.
Source: Daily Monitor, Posted Sunday, March 27 2011 at 00:00
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