Does Mr Museveni have the performance speed for 2021?
Last Sunday, in this space, the question was whether President Museveni, who often advises people to act in ways that discourage ordinary criminals, had himself acted in ways that discourage political criminal activity.
Just looking at the recklessness of the Museveni-guided NRM-led Parliament in its constitutional amendments, any observer would have warned that the people would probably resist, sometimes unlawfully; and the State would attempt to force total obedience with characteristic shabbiness, banking on its impunity.
As things stand now, the arrogance and cynicism displayed by the regime’s spokesmen give the impression that the NRM machine could imprison, maim and eliminate thousands of people before the ruling elite started asking whether the price of keeping one man in power was going too high.
But if the NRM regards the prize of power as virtually priceless, it is reasonable to ask what Mr Museveni would do with that power beyond 2021.
Surely, the NRM elite cannot want to argue that power is acquired and retained just ‘for its sake’; or because ‘(they) fought’; or even because of ‘where we came from’ 35 years ago.
Deluding themselves, or deliberately deceiving the gullible, there will always be people proclaiming that President Museveni is about to transcend himself; end corruption, trim government, reform the electoral process, and so on.
Unfortunately, beyond 2021, as has happened in all cases in the past, every new term will probably be more disappointing than the previous one.
But let me focus on one shortcoming that is currently not at the fore: his ‘speed’.
In the middle of the anxiety of our people at the time, President Museveni’s September 9 address to the nation clocked over four hours. Josef Stalin, Fidel Castro, Muammar Gaddafi and a few other champions of that ilk would have admitted him in the league of marathon speech athletes. You have to be very self-centred and despise your audience to hold them hostage to your voice for so long.
The rambling delivery, itself a form of torture, meandered through boring NRA Bush War stories, the usual economic recovery and glorious tax collection accounts, biblical references, African proverbs and folk tales.
Maybe it was deliberate protracted distraction. But it occurred to me that this was Mr Museveni in his time scale element.
Museveni often brags about the many years he spent fighting dictators; not the speed of his war enterprise.
Museveni wants one presidential term for basic ‘economic recovery’, two or three terms for ‘pacifying the north’, another term for ‘poverty alleviation’, then a different term for ‘wealth creation’ before he demands another term for ‘poverty alleviation: youth edition’. Then, of course, a separate future term – or two future terms – for ‘fighting corruption’.
And ‘professionalising’ the police and the army can be spread out more than 40 or 50 years, allowing for unanticipated reversals that become necessary because of rogue fishermen, murderous ‘pigs’, people-powered ‘hooligans’ and other uncooperative citizens.
When the ghetto’s children grow into young adults, Mr Museveni probably thinks the kids have leapt out of a laboratory after a week on growth hormones.
Verdict: Mr Museveni is in fact a slow-motion operator, which would have been all right in the age of free-range long-horned cows and fat kings who ruled for life, but not good enough in a high speed digital era where rulers are audited for real-life performance, not folk tales, in the first 100 days.
A poor preventer of serious political crimes, and a slow operator; these things make Mr Museveni a weak presidential candidate for 2021.
Mr Tacca is a novelist, socio-political commentator.
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