Remembering hero’s day of 1980

What you need to know:

Homecoming. As a patriot, nationalist and pan-Africanist, Obote did not land in his ancestral homeland, Lango sub-region, as some tribal political leaders would have done.

Today is “hero’s day” on my UPC party calendar. Thirty eight years ago, on May 27, 1980, when Mzee Paulo Muwanga (RIP) was chairman of the ruling Military Commission and Sabalwanyi was vice chairman, the president of Uganda Peoples Congress, Apolo Milton Obote, landed at Mbarara and was thereafter driven in a convoy to Bushenyi where he was received by thousands of jubilant Ugandans.

Obote flew in a military plane from Dar es Salaam where he lived in exile for eight years as guest of president Julius Nyerere of Tanzania. As a patriot, nationalist and pan-Africanist, Obote did not land in his ancestral homeland, Lango sub-region, as some tribal political leaders would have done.

The UPC leader was received by a huge, colourful and tumultuous crowd of Ugandans dressed in red, black and blue, from all walks of life and from all parts of Uganda, including hundreds from West Nile sub-region where I come from.
As soon as he alighted from the plane, Obote knelt down for a word of prayer and kissed the soil of Uganda which he had missed for eight years. The spirit of national unity and brotherhood which filled the air on that historic day contrasts sharply with what prevails in Uganda today.

The events and especially the spirit of May 27, 1980, came to my mind when I read a sad story in the government-owned New Vision newspaper of May 18 (page 7) titled, “MPs protest ‘segregative’ allocation of tractors.”
According to the story, MPs on the Parliamentary Committee on Agriculture protested against the unfair and discriminative allocation and distribution of 40 tractors purchased by government for modernisation of agriculture.

“The committee noted that the first batch of 40 tractors that were procured went to one sub-region, that is Ankole,” said committee vice chairperson Robert Migadde, MP of Buvuma Islands. Altogether seven districts from the same region benefited.
In the committee’s report, adopted by Parliament on May 17, “MPs recommended that the second batch of tractors be distributed among the remaining regions in an equitable manner.” I doubt whether this will be done.

It is shocking, unbelievable and unpatriotic conduct unbecoming of a civilised society, but what happened did not surprise keen observers of contemporary Ugandan politics! It is indeed not an isolated case.
Take the case of the State House scholarships which are fully funded by Ugandan taxpayers, but the beneficiaries are predominantly from the same sub-region. I know of only one beneficiary from West Nile sub-region with a population of more than three million. The lone beneficiary is former MP Akbar Godi who is currently in Luzira prison. I request government to publish the full list of beneficiaries of this public scholarship fund.

The case DPCs and RPCs is an open secret. The vast majority of them come from the same sub-region, needless to mention senior officers of UPDF and the Public Service which are dominated by people from the same region. It is a disgrace, shameful and a national tragedy that public sector jobs are increasingly filled by people from one region, as if there are no suitable candidates from the east, central and greater north.

One hopes that decent men and women of goodwill from that sub-region will engage their fellow kith and kin in an honest debate on this open sore on Uganda’s body politic. If this sore is left to fester indefinitely it could cause a malignant wound.

The people of Uganda deserve better from their government and from their political leaders. In 1962, AD Roberts published an interesting book titled The Sub-imperialism of the Baganda which discusses the adventures of Gen Semei Kakungulu in eastern Uganda during the British colonial regime. If Roberts is available, he may wish to write a sequel to that book.

It is never too late to do what is right for God and our country. I hope that those responsible for the ongoing unfair, unjust and unacceptable allocation and distribution of the national cake will look critically at themselves, repent and make the necessary adjustments and corrections at the earliest opportunity. As Scripture teaches, only the truth will set us free! May the Lord have mercy!