UGANDA'S FLAWED ELECTIONS: In defence of UPC, Observers report and Muwanga

Q: Why?

A: Because that is a UPC area no matter what you do. You can see it even now. Even now there are very few people who are not UPC in that region and despite the fact that 20years of non-presence of party structures, it is still a UPC area. In fact the same can be said of Teso and some extent Mbale.

So you have got to deduct those off your unopposed people. Go to Arua. In some places where they got unopposed people, UPC people would have won most of those places. I am trying to say, okay even if it was to change; the numbers would not have altered substantially from the winning side. I think.

Q: Is the image of the UPC as a party that stole elections a fair portrayal?

A: But this is because of the propaganda. The propaganda has been immense like saying that the UPC has done nothing, UPC was a dictatorship and UPC spoilt this country. If you look at the record of UPC as a party in government, the performance is superb. Even in the four years of what they call Obote II, and that was immediately after Amin, the performance compares favourably with the performance of the present government, in data in infrastructure building, in education, in trying to rehabilitate the economy.

The records are there. Look at the national projects done in the UPC period, they are tremendous, you just can’t talk anything. What has this government done in comparison except that one; it has may be rehabilitated the infrastructure that the UPC had constructed. There is no new road that has been done, and if the new road has been constructed, it has collapsed even before it runs a period of five years.

And that one is known why. It is because of internal corruption in appointing contractors; two you can look at the number of schools that were built, the hospitals, the parastatals, the forward move on the cooperative movement for rural development, you cannot compare. And the statistics will show it to you. And mark you UPC was in power for less than 12 years. This government has been in power half the period we have been independent and UPC was doing all these with less borrowing.

The UPC government borrowed to the extent that by 1985 we had public external debt standing at 1.2 billion dollars without being forgiven or anything. Two by 1971 we had only borrowed 500million dollars. If you see the things which were built, it was incredible. So I don’t think the UPC on its own record can be blamed for anything.

Yes there was a war here but who started the war? NRM started the war, or Museveni did, at that. When he started the war, what was the reason he started the war? We finished elections on the 11th. On the 15th President Obote was trying to form a government. On the 5th of January, that is when he was sworn in. A month later, Museveni was in the bush, fighting what? Corruption, dictatorship in one month? I always tell my friends in the NRM and those who are now going to FDC. How could you in one month have judged that the government is going to be corrupt, inefficient and a dictatorship?

You haven’t even exhausted the courts; you take up guns and go to Luwero. On reflection, historians will question at a later date: Was the war in Luwero necessary? No it was not. It is an interesting question because if you are to look back, in one month you couldn’t have known that the government was a dictatorship, it was going to be inefficient and corrupt. And in any case now, nobody talks about the UPC Government being corrupt. You have seen the pictures of Dr Obote’s homes in Lira, Akokoro and Kololo. That is all he has.

Compare it with the present (laughs) I hear one of the president’s daughters has a huge mansion in Bunga. Can you tell me what type of job she does? I am sure her dresses which are very expensive, cannot be supplying that big a market. So you can see that going to war was a power game. It had nothing at all to do with whether the government was going to be inefficient, corrupt or not. Unless they were gods and were looking or crystal gazing and seeing that these things were going to be happening. When the war happened, then what happened? Devastation in Luwero!

Q: Well, the bush war heroes claimed they went to the bush because the 1980 elections had been rigged.

A: Yes. Go through all those election records and see. The UPM had more than 78 candidates and only one of them won. That was Crispus Kiyonga. He won on sympathy because the DP candidate had died. Even the president of the UPM party failed, the Secretary General Bidandi Ssali failed. Eriya Kategaya, in fact he is called Tukahirwa but in his village because he had changed parties, they called him Tukaferwa (we lost). He also failed. These are issues, which people need to take into account.

Q: With hindsight today, what would UPC have done differently in the 1980 elections to save the party’s name?

A: I think people should not have been over excited and used the roadblocks you are talking about or being sticky on the law like in the case of Chango Macho. That should not have happened. Secondly, in Arua if there were those roadblocks, then they were unfortunate because if all the roadblocks were blocking all the candidates then all the candidates would not have reached the nomination centres. That should not have happened. Another thing is because of over enthusiasm; people might have over stepped themselves and done something, which they ought not to have done. In retrospect, I think we should try and avoid excesses. I am a person who believes in the middle way. You don’t need to be extreme. Anything, which is extreme, has negative results and radicalism in anything is bad. I am not a radical. If you see a radical politician, they tend to be unprincipled. They can be radical left, radical right and anything in excess just spoils everything. I think in retrospect all those things should have been avoided. But the terrible condemnation that they have put on the UPC, the UPC doesn’t deserve that.