Kivejinja: Powerful, controversial  figure who wielded power lightly

                                                     
On the eve of Uganda’s Independence in 1962, thieves broke into the embassies of the United States of America and several other foreign missions, but this was a strange kind of robbery. The only valuables they made off with were the flags of those nations.

The attacks were coordinated by Ally Muwabe Kirunda Kivejinja, a member of the Uganda People’s Congress (UPC) youth wing, who at the time was also a secretary at the party’s research bureau.

“After getting the certainty that the Ugandan flag was to be hoisted… Some of our youth clandestinely moved to the American embassy and the embassies of all nations that we considered to be enemies of Uganda and stole their flags,” he said.

For his part in the flags’ fiasco, Kivejinja was unable to visit the United States until the early 1990s when the ban on his entry into the country was lifted.

At the time of the flags’ fiasco, Kivejinja, who was known as KK, a young firebrand who had just returned to Uganda from India where he had met pan Africanists and freedom fighters committed to the fight for social justice and equality. It was a mission to which he committed the last 63 of his 85 years of life.

KK arrived in India in 1957 after he won a government of India Cultural Scholarship for a pre-university course at Madras Christian Collage, and later enrolled for a Bachelor of Science in Zoology at the University of Delhi.

His election as a treasurer of the Delhi African Students Association paved way for his introduction to the then Prime Minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, and meetings with African independence leaders such as Kwame Nkrumah (Ghana), Kenneth Kaunda (Zambia) and Julius Nyerere (Tanzania) changed his life forever.

“The interaction with communist leaders and the literature that I read persuaded me to become a socialist, an African nationalist and a pan-Africanist,” Kivejinja said in 2014 in the run up to the launch of the book, “The Sapoba Legacy,” which he co-authored with former prime minister Kintu Musoke, and Mr Jaberi Bidandi Ssali, a former minister of Local Government. 

Protesting in Delhi
In 1961, following the assassination of the Congolese independence leader Patrice Lumumba, Kivejinja led a section of African students in demonstrations against Belgium and the US. He later named his first born son, Kakaire, after Patrice Lumumba.

Thrown out of UPC
KK was in 1965 thrown out of UPC as the then secretary general, Grace Ibingira, sought to rid himself of those who were loyal to his predecessor, John Kakonge. KK, Wadada Musani, Mr Bidandi Ssali and Kintu Musoke belonged to Kakonge’s faction.

Early years
KK was born on June 12, 1935, to Salim Kivejinja Muwabe II and Aisha Nabuuma Naigaga. The family has its origins in the ancient kingdom of Bunyoro Kitara.

The influence of Arab traders from the East and Nubian soldiers, many of the practising Muslims attached to the Kings’ African Rifles (KAR) who were stationed in Busoga, were instrumental in his parents’ conversion to Islam.

The British had adopted a policy of working with influential personalities in order to gain influence. Their children would in turn be offered opportunities for a good formal education.

 Had this “norm” been followed, KK would have joined Mwiri Primary School, which had been established as a school for children of the ruling class and the nobility.

He instead went to Bukoyo Primary School in Iganga, Kibuli Junior School and Busoga College Mwiri from where the left for India.

Controversial figure
KK was prone to frequent shows of arrogance and never let those who ran afoul of him go without a dressing down, but he was at the same time always eager to engage those who sought to tap into his rich knowledge of Uganda’s history.

Back home in Busoga, KK usually took controversial positions in politics and other highly emotive issues such as the Kyabazingaship, which projected him as a divisive figure.

For example, in the run up to the installation in January 1996 of Henry Wako Muloki as the Kyabazinga of Busoga, KK rooted for the installation of Eriakesi Ngobi Kiregeya, who was an unpopular figure among members of the Busoga’s clan leaders and political class led by the then vice president, Dr Speciosa Wandira Kazibwe. KK later backed down.

Mr Daudi Migereko, a former minister, who is now the chairperson of the Uganda Tourism Board (UTB), says KK always fell back to history in order to justify his actions.

“He was never scared of taking on controversial issues and would defend his stand. He would use his rich knowledge of history to justify many of his positions and to persuade others to accept his position,” Mr Migereko says.

Kevijinja was able to compile some of his knowledge about Uganda’s history and the years of the NRM struggle in a book titled ‘Ugandan: The Crisis of Confidence,’ which was published in 1995. Whereas the book only mentions events that led up to the NRM’s capture of power in 1986, he became one of the first party leaders to publish a book about the struggle.

Sense of entitlement
KK, like most historical members of NRM, seemed to feel that politicians from Busoga who joined the NRM much later needed to pay allegiance to him. 

However, the 1989 elections that allowed for the expansion of the National Resistance Council (NRC) were conducted through electoral colleges and returned a mix of old and new faces such as Mr Henry Kyemba,  Eng Daudi Magezi, Ms Irene Wekiya, Ms Victoria Ssekitoleko, Basoga Nsadhu, and Ms Rebecca Kadaga. Some of them were too independent minded to do his bidding.

The result was that he moved to prop up a few loyalists to join politics, starting with the 1994 Constituent Assembly (CA) elections, which led to the emergence of Justice Faith Mwondha (Jinja District), Ms Irene Kalikwani (Kamuli) and George Patrick Bageya (Kigulu North). 

Mr Charles Kiwanuka, a former deputy RDC of Jinja, says what transpired during the CA elections and the 1996 sparked off a fight between KK and other emerging forces.

“Dr Speciosa Wandira’s appointment as vice president saw her emerge as a big power broker. She seemed to gang up with Kadaga against Kivejinja, who was at the time viewed in certain circles as Busoga’s undisputed leader. After Kazibwe was dropped, the contest remained largely between Ms Kadaga and Mr Kivejinja,” Mr Kiwanuka says.

The situation was at some point so charged that in May 2007 Mr Museveni publicly lashed out at the protagonists for fermenting trouble.

“I have learnt that the deputy Speaker, Ms Rebecca Kadaga, Information minister Kirunda Kivejinja, and the State minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Isaac Musumba, are among those behind the crisis.

 There is urgent need for party members to observe discipline, otherwise the party will crumble. I am not going to tolerate indiscipline. I am not going to wait for the worst to happen,” Mr Museveni said at two separate rallies.

Simplicity
Kivejinja dressed and conducted himself so casually that it would be difficult to imagine that he was the occupant of very high offices in government. He wielded his power so lightly that it was always easy to dismiss him for some inconsequential wayfarer.

Whereas the Traffic and Road Safety Act provides that only ambulances and official vehicles of the President, the Vice President, Prime Minister, Speaker and Deputy Speaker of Parliament, the Chief Justice and the Deputy Chief Justice and bullion vans have a right of way, a host of government officials have in recent years acquired lead cars, escort cars and dozens of body guards that they use to bully ordinary motorists off the roads.
Kivejinja was not the type to do so. 

Kingmaker who sought to be king
He also seemed to have forgotten that those who seek to be kingmakers should never have their sights on the throne.

During the CA elections, he beat the former deputy governor of Bank of Uganda, Mr Perez Bukumunhe, to the Bugweri County seat before romping to victory in 1996, but those election cycles had served to lower his stature to the level of those whom he had sought to domineer.

In 2001, he lost to the Forum for Democratic Change’s Abdul Katuntu, but bounced back in 2006. Mr Katuntu, however, successfully challenged the result in court, paving way for the November 2007 Bugweri parliamentary bi-elections, which Mr Katuntu won. KK never recovered from the losses.

Loyalty to Museveni
Between 1987 and 2005, KK was so frequently dropped from Mr Museveni’s Cabinet that he became the subject of ridicule among comedians and his main opponent, Mr Katuntu.

But if he felt humiliated, he concealed it well. On February 12, 2005, when the remains of his uncle, the late former minister for Works in the Obote I government, Shaban Nkutu, were reburied at his home in Busesa, KK took to the microphone and declared his undying loyalty to Mr Museveni.

“However much you toss me up and down, I will never let go (of you). I will remain loyal to you and the Movement,” declared Kivejinja who had the year before been kicked out of the Ministry of the Presidency and named Deputy National Political Commissar (NPC).

That public avowal seemed to have inoculated him in a way. A year after the events of Busesa, Mr Museveni fell out with KK’s long term associate, Mr Jaberi Bidandi Ssali, when he and other ministers opposed moves to scrap presidential term limits. Mr Bidandi formed the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) and even contested the 2011 presidential elections.

 That, however, seemed not to have an effect on the relationship between KK and Mr Museveni.

Wealth
KK was in June 1997 forced to resign as minister of Works and Transport just as Parliament sent into motion a process that would have seen him censured for abuse of office. His crime had been to direct the Uganda Railways Corporation (URC) to give a former state minister, Mr Muhammad Mayanja, 2,000 litres of fuel to fix some roads in Pallisa District.

“There was an allegation against me and I resigned to pave way for a genuine inquiry (which never took place). I never accepted guilt,” he told Daily Monitor in an interview 17 years ago.

The biggest criticism against KK has, however, been that he failed to use his positions in government to amass wealth.

His only known investment is Buwenge Hospital and Medical Centre, a not-for-profit organisation, which he has been running under the watch of  his wife, Ms Rahil Kirunda.  His nephew, Mr Ali Balunywa, says: “He was not driven by primitive acquisition of wealth. He was not a thief.” 

Timeline

-   Born June 12, 1935
-  1962 joined UPC as Secretary for Research 
-   1965 expelled from UPC and retreated to form Sapoba
- 1979 member of the National Consultative Council (NCC) representing Iganga District
-  1979, he co-founded the Weekly Topic newspaper
-  1980 participated in formation of the Uganda Patriotic Movement (UPM)
- 1981 fled into exile in Kenya. Joined external wing of NRM as Editor of the Resistance News which articulated justification for the war against the Obote government
-  November 1983 fled Nairobi and took refuge in Vienna, Austria, on the invitation of Mr Erin Lance, the Minister for Foreign Affairs in the Socialist Government of Bruno Kreisky. Worked with Mr Ben Matogo to publicise NRM struggle in Europe.
-  1984 played crucial role in recruiting William Pike to give rebel leader Mr Museveni his first interview in the international media.
- Jan 1985, KK organised final consultative meeting of the NRM executive in Vienna, Austria, which confirmed Mr Museveni as the new chairman of the NRM, taking over from Prof Yusuf Lule, who had died earlier.
- 1985 returned to Nairobi and was member of NRM delegation to Nairobi Peace Talks
- Aug 1985 re-joined the NRA forces in Muchwa, Kabarole in August 1985 as the commissioner for finance in the NRM interim administration set up in western Uganda.
-  1986 served in both government and the NRM Secretariat. Served as NRM government as Minister of Relief and Social Rehabilitation; Works and Transport, Minister without Portfolio; Minister of State for Foreign Affairs; Deputy National Political Commissar; Second Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of East African Affairs.
- 1994-1996 Constituent Assembly delegate for Bugweri County
-   1995 became first NRM leader to publish a book, “Uganda: A crisis of confidence”
-  1996-2001 MP Bugweri