As God’s dog, I am constantly watching the religious operators who tirelessly and irrepressibly con their fellow citizens, claiming to command the power of Jesus or all sorts of African spirits.
As I acknowledge that we all have serious issues and real needs for solving, which we need great resolve, thoughtful dedication and tremendous strength, the spirit men sense and even fire up your desperation, exploiting your vulnerable self to sell you their weird solutions.
I am specially tasked to watch the goings-on in the world of pastors and witchdoctors. Every sector has its dogs.

It is a thankless task. We are slaves by any description. However, I have always dutifully warned the citizens that thinking about mastering their world is far more rewarding than flocking to different altars, or making endless appeals to a God for whom the futility of your humble supplication or wild prayer antics is a matter of total indifference.
I know, because every time I peep through the keyhole to view The Lord’s condition, I find Him in a quiescent state.
When I spy on the African spirits, I find them in the same condition, or comatose, or dead.
Watching my target groups, I have observed that apart from imitating each other’s worship styles, and sometimes secretly swapping roles, even as the pastors swear that they are irreconcilable enemies, our pastors and witchdoctors exploit the dumb political state in more or less the same way.
They offer the vulnerable citizen/believer access to the magical power of God and our African spirits. 

When the misled citizen/believer fails to get relief or starts endangering self and the rest of society, the pastor and the witchdoctor turn to the State to ask for resources to ‘re-programme’ their followers and put them on a more rational path.
After they have earned their living by systematically deforming the minds of their followers into believing that demons and witchcraft are responsible for making them unwell, they want public money to teach the same believers that demons and witchcraft are not responsible for infections like Covid-19 or Ebola; that rituals, exorcism and praying will not stop the march of tough viruses.

But you cannot say that the spirits, especially Jesus or God, have unlimited power, and at the same time say that they cannot annihilate Ebola. Either the power of Jesus and Africa’s spirits must be regarded limited, or the case for this kind of healing virtually collapses.
As God’s dog, I know that such a case was never valid. Healing effects (in isolated cases) are to be traced to the patient’s inner (mental) mechanisms, not the intervention of God or other external spirits.
What the State is apparently now saying is that it is all right for Ugandans to believe any spiritual and magical trash when ill health considered ‘ordinary’ is involved, but they must adopt a scientific approach for shock-and-awe champions like Ebola.

That is a huge mistake. Mindsets formed around less frightening conditions will work the same way (perhaps even more so) around the big ones.
A smart society – and an honest enlightened government – does not wait for Corona or Ebola lockdowns to correct people’s mindsets about how human (and other animal) bodies get ill and can be scientifically treated; or to show them that failed efforts do not mean that there are demons or witchery your pastor or witchdoctor should exorcise or otherwise deal with.
And only a foolish state would pay the same frauds for undoing effects of their harmful work.
Mr Tacca is a novelist, socio-political commentator.
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