Dialogue: NRM, Opposition must rise above selfishness

On Tuesday, the President of the Opposition Democratic Party (DP), Mr Norbert Mao, announced that DP will not participate in the national dialogue championed by the Inter-Religious Council of Uganda and the Elders’ Forum citing dissatisfaction with the framework of the talks and what he described as “sabotage of Opposition events by security officers”.

DP became the latest major Opposition grouping to show dissatisfaction with the planning of the dialogue, which organisers plan to launch on November 21.
Other Opposition figures had earlier pointed out that there was a need for the country to address what it described as a “national crisis”. They called on government to first end what they described as “political persecution, and impunity”.

Early in September, the president of the Forum for Democratic Change (FDC), Mr Patrick Oboi Amuriat, met the organisers and expressed concerns around the framework. FDC also wanted the organisers to change the moderator and choose an independent and impartial umpire for the talks.
The issues being raised by the Opposition are not new. They date back to 2011 when the first dialogue was meant to be held under the auspices of the Inter-Party Forum for Dialogue (IPOD). One wonders why the organisers of that failed dialogue, but are meant to participate in the one that is being proposed and those who are organising what seems to be destined to be a failed dialogue, have never taken the necessary steps to address those concerns if only to lay the ground for a successful dialogue.

The different political actors too need to subordinate their interests to those of the nation. While the Opposition might be right to think that it is foolhardy to walk into a dialogue organised in a hostile environment, we think that it is necessary that it makes a few sacrifices in the interest of nation building. Mr Nelson Mandela and the Africa National Congress (ANC) did not baulk out of talks with Frederik Willem de Klerk’s government even if the apartheid structures had not yet been dismantled and the white minority government still controlled all the tools of repression.

The government also must adopt a more gracious approach in its dealings with the Opposition. Tensions that arose out of the recent elections in Kenya have largely been cooled because the main protagonists, President Uhuru Kenyatta and Mr Raila Odinga, are working together.
We too ought to see the Opposition as a whole, not as individuals, playing a part in national development. President Museveni must emulate Mr Kenyatta. He and the NRM owe it to the present and future generations.