Today's Bobi Wine better than 3 years ago – Ssemogerere

Retired politician Paul Kawanga Ssemogerere has recently held various meetings with a number of players on the Opposition side with a view to forging unity and possibly forming a joint front for the coming election. Eriasa Mukiibi Sserunjogi interviewed him on a wide range of issues surrounding the forthcoming elections.

What is your take on the campaigns as they have moved so far?
As it has been the case since independence, there are many concerns about the way the elections are being conducted, in particular the law that governs the process and the basis of the management of the elections. Take the Electoral Commission, one of the institutions which have become very prominent and their activities are a big factor in the management of elections.

Look at it critically and you will find many faults there, from Independence up to today. The faults will be in many areas, be it in bias, the appointing authority, which is often tilted in favour of the party in power, and in many operating democracies this is one aspect of the electoral process which is subjected to critical examination and many times amendments are made to make it truly independent, authoritative and qualified to do the job.

Even in Africa you find that the Electoral Commission in Ghana now is far better in terms of independence, quality and authoritativeness. Even in South Africa, I think they have also been making some improvements. I think some of the best models are Sweden, Switzerland, and I think we should have our eyes on those other operating democracies to learn where we have got faults and weaknesses which we can correct.

I think Africans and Ugandans in particular cannot be declared inferior in seeing what is right and what is wrong. We have got competent people in all fields, people equal to the task to examine these things critically. You will find that because of weaknesses in the electoral process we ended up with a failed programme after Independence. After Independence we had a Constitution in 1962, it was abolished in 1966 and in 1967 a new Constitution was enacted under close watch of the military, which at that time had taken a political side, it was a kind of support military for the Obote I regime and if you go in history you will find that the Parliament was surrounded by the military when it enacted the 1967 Constitution.

So that was a failure. Then you come to 1980 when we had another election after 1962. The military was a big factor in that election and it affected the results and that formed a justification for our friends in the NRM to go the bush and overthrow the government in protest, as they said. Then we come to 1996. We just have to go back to the deliberations in the CA [Constituent Assembly] where some of us found it necessary to take a special stand as the National Caucus for Democracy and some of the issues that were raised there, which divided the CA, again were political. The security bias or disregard of a working multiparty democracy where you had the NRM installed as the party for everybody.

Some of us protested and even refused to sign the conclusion of that assembly and in the end some of us went to court and secured a few benefits but that journey is still not yet completed because the Constitution as it still is now is still biased in favour of NRM. If you look at the High Command of the military, you look at the Movement Act, which is still on the statute books, you look at the institutions in the country – RDCs, by the way we nearly succeeded in abolishing the office of the RDC.

You know it is something that was created in the bush and the argument was that the holders were expected to be senior civil servants at the level of undersecretary just overseeing government programmes but within two years there was a run on the Constitution – the omnibus amendments of the Constitution – and the RDCs were accepted to be regarded as politically appointed officers and now they have ended up being chairmen of security committees in the districts when they don’t have any credentials of being military or police people.
But the moment somebody is appointed RDC he chairs meetings on security, and that security has to be widely interpreted. When Covid-19 comes, the RDC is the chairman of the district taskforce. He is not a medical doctor but he controls everything. So these are things that have affected elections in the past and are affecting the elections today.

Two days ago, I heard of a lady, I think from Rakai, an RDC. She made a very strong case in favour of candidate Museveni and this is an RDC, paid from public funds. And these things go on and I am sure if you exchange this consideration you find it in the military, in the police. When the President holds a press conference the next day they take action, may be even shoot somebody because of not doing what the President said in the press conference. And some of the laws have been made retrospectively to legitimise what has been said or has been done.

So all these have had a very big impact on elections in the past, they have a very big impact on the elections of today. And the role of the military, the role of the police and other security agencies has been extended to be the main governing institution of the electoral process. You hear an RDC, you hear an army officer in Masaka barracks, you hear them invoking powers and authority because they got into power with a gun, they say you don’t expect them to bow to what elections have decided.   

There is a process you have been involved in recently….

So against that background, although I am retired from elective politics – you will not see me running for office for LC1, LC3, district chairman, Member of Parliament or president, that chapter is finished – but I am still a human being and as I said on October 7 at [Hotel] Africana [in Kampala], having been considered fit to get this precious award from the Kabaka in recognition of my little role in political life, to get this award when I am still alive, because these sorts of awards are never granted when you are alive, they are granted to people who are in the grave.

Then I said since I have got this when I am still alive, I suppose it is an assignment for more work to be done. So what I can do, I will do it. And that is why I joined many others who are concerned about the fate of this country, who see that elections can be clean, they can help this country to overcome some structural problems as has been the case in other countries, so I join the struggle, peacefully, and do my best to work against a situation where people just give up on peaceful change and resort as they have done in the past to seek other means of bringing about change – taking a gun and going to the bush, or taking a gun and shooting somebody in power, or all sorts of violent actions.
I think there is a chance, and I have thought about this from early last year, and each time I talk to people I find there are many who are encouraging this move. Starting about March (2020), I wanted to write a paper for normal programmes for the Foundation for African Development (FAD), which we used to do.

So I thought about that and we had an internal discussion with my colleagues and friends and as the discussions went on, a friend of ours in USA, Richard Otto, a former secretary general of the Democratic Party, who I have known for a very long time, encouraged me to broaden it and reach out to other people in other parties who were looking forward to participating in elections, and other leaders.

I broadened my scope of discussion and I found it encouraging. And as the broadened discussion progressed, I received additional encouragement from other people and then I thought it was no longer a discussion, it was a dialogue. So we have now turned it into a dialogue with more ambition and it’s a dialogue which will hopefully have a positive impact on these elections which are around the corner, but then continue even beyond, whatever the results are and then be a peaceful way of resolving disputes.

We would like it to continue whatever the results of the elections will be. I am not one of those who would encourage anyone to resort to violence just because the process has not been good and the results disputed. I don’t believe in violence. I was the first featherweight boxing champion here in my younger days in school, but I have never taken the route of resolving conflicts by fighting. I only do it in self-defence if I am attacked, and I have done it on a number of occasions.   
 
Where did the talk about having a joint Opposition candidate end?
I have told you how the whole thing expanded from narrow base, them to open up and reach out to other parties, and even the confidence in (Hotel) Africana Two, even Africana One, showed it and took us further where in respect of candidates vying for leadership, even for the presidential level we have written evidence that they agree on these issue.

They may even increase or decrease but that is a very big achievement historically which I compare to the CA where we agreed, some of us in the national caucus for democracy that Uganda needs to be bases a multi-party system which they not used to take as important although when I look at what has happened since, some of the people who voted against this multiparty business are now with us, so this is good target, an alliance based on principle rather than favouritism and so on.
 
And when we finish, it is like a tree, like a fruit tree when it grows, the season comes, and your reap the mangoes but the tree continues, and next season you get more and this one the dialogue has now had one season and people can reap from here and bring leaders at the presidential level together and maybe next will be to encourage them to consider what they have committed themselves to do. For instance to collaborate, so how do you collaborate in a practical way?

There are methods to do that. You can do it, for instance, with the leadership of the different parties where the candidates belong, if you can get presidential candidates who are all committed to the same cause you will find that the presidency is going to be examined, the form of governance is going to be examined. That the services, the public servants, the role of the police, the military, the intelligence, they have got to be scrutinised to be in conformity with democracy. If they can reach that far, then it brings mutual trust.

And now that they are in the field, for instance, they are experiencing the reaction of the people, how they are being received. They are also seeing the challenges awaiting them, whoever becomes president. They know that when I become president I will encounter this problem in Bunyoro, I will find this problem in Karamoja, I will find this problem in Buganda. So it informs the judgement and at the end of the day you find that is too much for me, I think Jane is going to be better than me.
 
Even if his ideas are very good but Jane appears to somehow charm the voters more, he can withdraw in favour of Jane. I am looking at what I see in other countries, how these coalitions work out. That is how they develop. And sometimes the most intelligent person is not necessarily the favourite. I saw it in America when [John] Kennedy became president. At the very beginning, no one took him seriously. Even (president-elect Joe) Biden, he was not expected to emerge winner but as the dynamics of politics went on his challengers withdrew in his favour. This is what happens in a multiparty democracy.

On the alternative, they can go on, all of them, go to the election and in the possible event that none of them, none including President Museveni, gets more than 50 per cent of the vote then you have to go back and campaign and do elections again and by that time many things will be clear, particularly among those who have got common goals.

The things will be very clear on who stands a better chance and the question of how the people are perceiving the candidates after the campaign becomes even more important and it becomes much easier for them to say well, I have no chance, am number three, I am number five in the race but my friend is number two, I think if I encourage and back him we may make it. That is how dialogue works and that will solve the problem.
During your meeting at Hotel Africana in October, Col Kizza Besigye dubbed you the field marshal of Uganda’s politics and invited you to lead the charge for change even if retired. I did not hear you respond to him…

I do not have to respond. You can ask him to elaborate. I think he was excited, he found where we had reached very pleasing and I think given his background in the military, that is why he brought in that analogy. The dialogue, by definition, is a dialogue. You do not dictate and it is not my character to dictate. I am not a young man as you can see, but I have never dictated. I believe in discussing, coming to conclusions. But those were nice words he said.

I should state clearly that what we are doing is agreeable to Dr Besigye. Every single significant step we take in this dialogue is commonly agreed upon. For instance, before the last meeting at Africana on December 16, the invitation went out very late because we do not send them out before every principle is agreed and we have agreed on the pillars and then it as time to say let’s have the event. Besigye is a very important pillar in this dialogue. We converge and discuss. He is not the only one but he is one of those I consult.

It would appear that many people think a peaceful change of power under the prevailing circumstances cannot be attained. What makes you convinced it can be realised?

We have not done exactly what we are doing before. We did not do this during Obote I, for instance. We did not even have many parties and the principal party that was challenging Obote (DP) was banned. The climate of organised dissent shrank considerably because Obote depended on the military and not democracy at all. Then Amin came in and he looked difficult to remove from power. The circumstances happening then opened the door for the Moshi Conference to take place and at Moshi, the groupings of different sources gathered and it happened that Amin had a quarrel with [Julius] Nyerere and the anti-Amin forces benefitted from it.

Although most of us were peaceful, not preferring to kill anybody to remove Amin, the circumstance then dictated that the two antagonists involved would resolve the problem by war. The circumstances then forced one to join one of the two sides. If that situation emerged it will not be of our own making but then you have to decide which way to go. But our own objective is to go the peaceful way and I am not discouraged, and my long time in politics encourages me to push on with this dialogue and the scope of this dialogue, the impact of this dialogue as of now, is bigger than what we had in 1996.
The challenges are big but it has potential because it is even extended to our friends in government and I am sure that some of them progressively are capable of realising that it is very bad to structure the military, for instance, the way it is now.

When you get an army man in the barracks declaring that they are not going to hand over power, you cease being a professional military and I do not think that all the soldiers believe in that. In fact recently, there was a lady, the spokesperson of the army, who did not approve of what Brig Sande said in Masaka. And there are many cases in the past. I know what happened in Venezuela where the military was the base of politics, for instance.

What in your estimation are the chances of Kyagulanyi winning the election?
I like Kyagulanyi and I am not the best judge for that one. I worked with Kyagulanyi’s grandfather. Each time we meet we talk about his grandfather whom he never saw. Once upon a time we had problems in Uganda, of national political parties because it was unknown.

There were legitimate concerns about the emergence of national political parties and Kayagulanyi’s grandfather believed in the emergence of these parties. He was a prominent member of the Buganda Lukiiko, and one of the principal leaders of the Democratic Party at its inception… he stood on principle and being together in the party brought us close and he was really a very impressive person and principled as well. He died partly in the struggle.

When I look at Kyagulanyi, I look at his grandparent. I look at an ancestor in the Mbogo Clan called Ddumba during the reign of Ssekabaka Muteesa. I think he listens and respects counsel, which I think is good for a potential leader. He is a nice person, he listens, he has charisma, people follow him and he can go to individuals and listen. The Kyagulanyi we have now is more politically educated than the Kyagulanyi we had three years ago