Writer: Godwin Toko. Photo/Courtesy
Depending on one's choice of the search engine or Artificial Intelligence tool (AI), “juguo” is a Chinese word that can mean "the entire country”, "gathering the country” or "integrated whole-nation scheme”. In Luganda, the closest phrase that comes to mind is gwanga mujje (let's gather).
In 1958, China's leader Mao Zedong announced a juguo scheme called "two bombs and one satellite”. The previous year, 1957, the Soviet Union had successfully launched Sputnik, the world’s first artificial satellite, which upped the Cold War ante.The two bombs and one satellite juguo was part of China's attempt at joining the big boys’ club. To achieve the juguo, some 17,000 researchers from 40 institutions affiliated with the Chinese Academy of Sciences went to work.
Less than a decade later, on October 16, 1964, China tested an atomic bomb. For China, then a third-world country, this was a significant milestone that made it just the fifth country to possess nuclear weapons – the first in Asia. As for the satellite, in April 1970, Dong Fang Hong 1, or China 1, or RPC 1, was launched. A juguo is more than a pronouncement, as one author put it. When a juguo is in place, “cost considerations are set aside, waste is tolerated…” Nothing else matters much – the goal must be achieved.
Mao's juguo was not the last. More recently in 2022, at the Chinese Communist Party's 20th congress, President Xi Jinping announced a juguo to bolster science, technology and education. Today, Chinese EV manufacturers are selling more cars than their American competitors like Tesla, ahead of the pack is BYD, which until the early 2000s, was only manufacturing phone batteries. The same is true in almost all fields of science and technology: smartphones, software, and recently, AI. Juguo!
The last time Uganda witnessed something close to a juguo was in 2011. That year, taking the presidential oath of office for the sixth time, President Museveni warned his audience in Kololo and around the country to brace for Kisanja Hakuna Mchezo (a presidential term of no jokes/games).Even then, some laughed it off as a joke in itself! Eight years later, the jury is still out on whether that pronouncement had any significant impact. However, at the end of that term, none other than Museveni's trusted ally and Prime Minister then, Amama Mbabazi, announced a presidential bid to "move the country forward”.Among others, Mbabazi accused Museveni of presiding over a corrupt and inefficient government that did not address issues like corruption, poverty, and youth unemployment – more like Kisanja mchezo!However, as the saying goes, life gives us second chances. The tragic disasters and the photos of lifeless bodies of Ugandans cut short by water in Pakwach and Bulambuli are the writing on the wall that the government needs to address such disasters once and for all – juguo style.
It simply cannot be the norm that each rainy season comes with mudslides, landslides, floods, and death for Ugandans in the Elgon region, and displacement and death along the banks of River Nyamwamba in Kasese. It is an indictment on the government that West Nile is literally cut off from the rest of Uganda every rainy season and lives are lost.Contrast this to the 1980s and 1990s when President Museveni likened the HIV/Aids scourge to a war that was to be faced like a soldier. He meant it. In the end, Uganda was saved from the brink and went on to become a trailblazer in handling the pandemic in Africa at a time when richer countries like South Africa were failing.
I can’t think of a better time when Museveni, who saw the risk of death for Ugandans as a war to be fought like a soldier, was needed than now, with these recurrent, preventable disasters, and tragic disasters. Surely, the State would do everything to stop a terrorist who appears in the same spots and kills tens of Ugandans every year – perhaps it’s time to imagine these disasters as that terrorist.
The writer, Godwin Toko, is a lawyer with a keen interest in huma rights.
