Oscar Wilde was an Irish author, poet, and playwright. He also once said: “Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give a man a mask and he'll tell you the truth.” That is why we support the CDF; there is no requirement for security personnel to be identified.
They should be allowed to wear masks, the way we wear masks on social media and in everyday life. On social media, we create fake names like ‘Mr Swagnificent’ accompanied by a profile picture of Stallone in Rambo. Such a mask can disguise us, change our appearance and allow us to become something or someone else. There’s more. With the obligatory online mask on, we are also freer to be ourselves and thus tell the truth about ourselves. It is our masked anonymity that spawns the truth, no less. In everyday life, we smile at one another when we would like nothing more than to kick each other’s patooties. A patootie is a backside, by the way. And the word fits.
You know, our backside is often masked by our front side. This is what the CDF is saying: keep the backsides of security personnel as masked as they should be. They are not strippers, after all. They are there to strip Ugandans of their human rights. So it is Ugandans who must be unmasked as powerless to the state. As for the security personnel, their identities must never be known. They must be costumed to personal anonymity, just like Dikula.
So if they commit a crime, we won’t be able to pick them out of a police line-up. Instead, we will identify a cloth with two stretchy bands at two ends. As it covers the face, it acts as a barrier to the rest of the world. That way when the judge asks us “who did it?” our description of the criminal leads to the arrest of the mask.
Not surprisingly we are seeing an upswing in anti-mask sentiment across the country; while everyone loves the NRM. People want masks to be arrested every “wear”. Fashion expert Mr Kabindi has studied masks for the last 40 years. His argument is that masks are “muzzles”, muffling free speech.
So he is dead set against the use of masks. Kabindi, who surname is Fashions, even began a “Burn Your Mask Challenge” where people post videos on social media of themselves burning their masks and use the hashtag #FreedomCannotBeMasked. At a meeting of local leaders in Masaka, several people attacked Mzee regarding the wearing of masks by security personnel. Speaker after speaker (at the meeting) said not only do masks literally cover up crimes committed by security personnel; they also “throw God’s wonderful breathing system out the door”.
by such antics. I mean, what if these security personnel show up on Judgement Day wearing masks? Hell might freeze over. Everybody there will be too scared to move, frozen by fear when they see the masked security personnel. Thereby proving that the afterlife is either too hot to handle or too cold to hold. Some experts say the wearing of masks could stem from an increase in the number of unhandsome security personnel.
Many of them are said to be about as good looking as a Baboon’s butt. So ‘masking up’ will ensure they are not monkeying about when pressing their knees on the Oppositions’ neck. Other experts have noted that the army is full of man-children who love to play hide and seek. By wearing masks, they become better at playing that game. But be careful, some hide down the barrel of a gun.
So if you look there, you could lose your head. And that will only add to the tensions between the army and civilians. We stand with the CDF. Security personnel should look like they are at a masquerade ball. It suits them.
Again, let security personnel tell us the truth by wearing their masks. And that truth is that Uganda is not a democracy, it is not even a meritocracy. Rather, it is the Theatre of the Absurd. Our acting like it’s won’t not mask this reality.
Disclaimer: This is a parody column
