FDC presidency and Uganda’s destiny

This can be the shining moment for the FDC, and the hope for transition to a new dispensation in which all Ugandans enjoy their full rights.

Dear Tingasiga:
The Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) chooses a new party president this week. The new leader is expected to build on Dr Kizza Besigye’s formidable accomplishments and to prepare the FDC to offer an alternative leadership to Ugandans who are near exhaustion after 27 years of a spectacularly corrupt regime.

The three candidates - Geoffrey Ekanya, Nandala Mafabi and Mugisha Muntu – are good men who have served their party with distinguished dedication and sacrifice. They each have admirable qualities and evident weaknesses that speak to their humanity. They each belong to ethnic and regional communities that claim kinship ties and natural biases.

Yet the delegates must choose a man who will lead a national party, not an ethnic or regional organisation. Therefore, regional and ethnic considerations that have been marketed during the campaign should be relegated to irrelevance. Instead the central criteria for choice should be merit, character, integrity and ability.

The FDC must take national power in order to make a difference. Whereas the man who will be chosen this week will not necessarily be the party’s candidate for president of Uganda, his work and stature will prepare the party and the country for national elections just over three years from now.

To win the 2016 elections, the FDC must attract millions of Ugandans, including members of the NRM, to join the ranks of party membership. To attract this expanded coalition, the party needs a credible leader who will allay the fears of those who are anxious about the freedom and safety of their persons and of their legally acquired fortunes once the FDC gains power.

What kind of man deserves to lead the FDC then? He must be one who will unite the party, not divide it; one that can rally Ugandans towards a common goal of national renewal and achievable hope.

He must be one who has the humility and foresight to seek a national vision from the people. He must believe in and insist on internal meritocracy, democracy and accountability within the FDC and in the country as a whole. He should be one who offers Uganda the hope of national greatness, an achievable dream if we dare to hope and to act as other nations have done.

There was no magic that led countries like Botswana and Mauritius to become true beacons of hope as they emerged from backwardness to middle income nations. There is no mystery to Singapore’s remarkable journey from Third World to First in the span of one generation. The significance of Singapore, a former British colony, is that at independence in 1965, that country was less economically advanced than Uganda. Its GDP per capita was $511.

Today, that small island nation of 5.4 million people enjoys the third highest GDP per capita in the world ($60,500) and ranks number 26 in the UNDP’s overall Human Development Index. It is ahead of countries like Britain and the oil-rich United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia. Uganda ranks number 161 out of 187 countries.

Central to Singapore’s success was that it was blest with Prime Minister Lee Kwan Yew, a leader who believed in Singaporeans; one whose vision was rooted in the needs and vision of his countrymen; one who did what he said; one whose exemplary private and public life gave him the moral authority to exhort his people to sacrifice and excel.

It is not beyond us to dream of achieving the success of Singapore. The Lord has endowed Uganda with more natural wealth and human resources than that Asian country.

Uganda can become a great nation, not because of our great athletes or artists or newly discovered oil or natural beauty or academics or mighty army or commerce. If natural wealth had anything to do with greatness, the Congo Free State would be a shining example and resource-poor Israel would be some backwater reserve.

Our greatness will come from the freedom and the latitude and the opportunities that Uganda gives to her citizens to exceed their potential. Uganda can become great if its leaders inspire the citizens to manifest a spirit of service to others before self; a noble spirit that firmly rejects the evils of corruption and injustice and deception that have taken hold of our country.

These are the dreams of national greatness that I hope the FDC will be in the vanguard of realising, led by one who fully understands that the propellant for such a vision is the collective wisdom and resolve of citizens proud to declare that they are truly free Ugandans.

The FDC’s destiny and Uganda’s hopes will be shaped by the choice of leader that the FDC makes. If we dare to dream; if we dare to transcend ethnic loyalties and regionalism; if we dare to reject cash in exchange for priceless votes; if we dare to closely examine the character and personal records of the candidates, this can be the shining moment for the FDC, and the hope for transition to a new dispensation in which all Ugandans enjoy their full rights of citizenship as One Uganda, One people.