Opposition coalition: Leave the kraal and go to the people

What you need to know:

No wasting time. Unless there is another motive to exclude Besigye or any other Opposition candidate from the ballot paper by muzzling and pocketing them in a ‘united coalition’ whose leading proponents are the Mabikkes and Bwanikas, whose political base and support is so far invisible, then there is no need to waste any more time with herding the Opposition into one kraal.

There is one intriguing aspect that dressing fashion shares with politics. Many times a new trend lands in our midst and ‘bang’ everyone is falling over themselves, spending to catch up and be part of the action. We rarely ask ourselves with a rational mind, why exactly we should adopt the new fashion.

Some of these changes may appear ridiculous, but we somehow cave in because everyone is doing it and we do not want to be called old-fashioned. So it is very common to find a grandfather figure finding it difficult to walk because they are dressed with their pants ‘balancing’ around the bottom of their buttocks after seeing a famous musician doing the same.

In Uganda around election time, the fashion is creating a ‘united Opposition.’ Efforts are made to ‘bring all forces of change under one umbrella like it happened in Kenya in 2002.’ Rarely do you hear the proponents talking about the circumstances under which it successfully happened in Kenya where Daniel arap Moi, a strong man of 24 years’ standing, decided to leave the stage, but bless a successor whom the NARC coalition defeated.

In Uganda’s case, President Yoweri Museveni, in the driving seat for 33 years and still counting, is still interested and unrelenting. The elections in 2021 will still be under an ‘Independent Electoral Commission’ which he appoints. The army and the police will more than ever be involved for the sake of protecting national security and maintaining the prevailing peace and prosperity – meaning the status quo. The national Treasury will be wide open to the ruling government to spend on ‘development projects,’ which usually gives the ruling party a huge advantage.

So, however united the Opposition is, without addressing these issues, nothing tangible will change. Instead many people will become disillusioned and stay out of some vital political processes, like elections. Interestingly, almost all Opposition political actors believe that Uganda’s elections are rigged in favour of the incumbent and that the playing field is not levelled. Now in such a situation, we may ask, why then do they fight to unite and take part in a process where they are hopelessly disadvantaged and dead on arrival?

How do they draw conclusions that FDC’s Kizza Besigye, the man who has stood against Museveni on four occasions and has not beaten him is ‘a failure’ yet they agree that the elections were not free and fair? If as the leaders and proponents of the DP-led united coalition, which include people like PDP’s Abed Bwanika and SDP’s Mabikke claim that the ‘current trends’ show that Besigye no longer has support, why not simply ignore him and let him stand? The people will reject him going by the ‘current trends.’

Why not let the people speak for themselves as democracy demands, after all, on all those famous four occasions when Besigye stood and lost, there were other Opposition candidates who scored less than 4 per cent? These include the perennial candidate PDPs’ Bwanika and DP’s Norbert Mao on one occasion.

All things remaining constant, what will happen this time in case the ‘current trends’ are realistic and not a fantasy, DPs Mao with all the forces of change behind him excluding, Besigye the enduring loser, will get the 50+1 per cent votes or more and defeat Museveni. Besigye will come out with the 4 per cent or less that the Opposition candidates who have stood with him in these elections have always managed to achieve.

Figures can help us illustrate a comment about the worthlessness of this fashion of uniting the Oppostion. In the 2016 election, FDC’s Besigye got 35.61 per cent (3,508,687.) Go Forward’s Amama Mbabazi got 1.39 per cent (136,519.) PDP’s Abed Bwanika 0.9 per cent (89,005.) Venansius Baryamureba got 0.54 per cent (52,798.) Maureen Kyalya 0.43 per cent (42,833.) FPU’s Benon Biraaro got 0.26 per cent (25,600) Joseph Mabirizi 0.25 per cent (24,498.) and NRM’s Yoweri Museveni got 60.62 per cent (5,971,872.)

Percentage wise, the candidates other than Museveni managed 39.39 per cent. Assuming they had all united under one candidate, all things remaining equal, they would still not have matched Museveni’s 60.62 per cent. One of the things any serious politician would be talking about is the people on the register who do not bother to turn up and vote.

In 2016, about 15,277,198 Ugandans were registered as voters only 67.61 per cent turned out to vote. What about interesting the 32.39 per cent to vote for the Opposition instead of demonising members of the Opposition? The battle cry should be ‘if you are for the Opposition, you are for us; and not ‘if you are not behind the coalition you are against us.’

Unless there is another motive to exclude Besigye or any other Opposition candidate from the ballot paper by muzzling and pocketing them in a ‘united coalition’ whose leading proponents are the Mabikkes and Bwanikas, whose political base and support is so far invisible, then there is no need to waste any more time with herding the Opposition into one kraal.

Let everyone go in there and try their luck. The voters were not born yesterday. They will weed out the jokers and pretenders like they have always done. We say all this with the assumption that there will be a level playing field.

Mr Sengoba is a commentator on political and social issues. [email protected]
Twitter:@nsengoba