Of Bazukulu, hooligans and goons: Mirror of our failed politics, policies

Walking on Buremba Road in Kakoba Division of Mbarara Municipality recently, a young man walked up to me, told me his name was Gilbert and that he was a boda boda rider. He said he religiously watched my show (The Fourth Estate on NTV) and rushed to explain, “I am a graduate, I have a degree, but I ride a boda boda. That is why I am able to follow the discussions on your show…”
Our brief conversation with Gilbert came back to memory watching politicians, including the President Museveni struggle to describe “Abaana” and “Ebyaana” in characterisations of abazukulu and hooligans or goons to justify the brutal beatings and arrests of youth engaging in the latest round of political protests in the country.
To justify the brutal beatings and arrests in the latest round of political protests, a section of leaders have chosen to describe citizens participating in these protests as goons or hooligans. The choice of words is well calculated intended at mobilising condemnation for those being beaten and understanding and sympathy for those unleashing the beatings - members of the security forces.
What is sad, however, is that characterisation is coming from leaders. President Museveni refers to address Abazukulu (grand children) and blames hooligans in the same message. His apparatchiks have been parroting the same without pausing to ask where the line is drawn between the abazukulu and the hooligans!
Some people privileged by their closeness to power have previously described the country’s youth as the “unwashed of the slum” simply because in their frustration at what the holders of power have failed to do to give them a better chance at life through poor policy, misrule and economic failures, many have indeed grow up in or become the unwashed of the slum.
The tactics they use to express their frustration might be hooligan in nature, but are those descriptions actually not a mirror showing the nakedness of those that hold power and resources of this country on what they have failed to do?
I have found some of the most intelligent and most focused Ugandans among that section our leaders call hooligans. They might hold a rock or throw rubbish on the street, but pull them aside and engage them and you will be surprise.
Many speak flawless English, have a paper certificate at home called a degree or diploma, they are not lazy, but have found opportunities scarce and, therefore, have found solace riding a boda boda, baking rolex or waste away at a sports betting shop - as they await a lucky break!
Quite many have been double victims; condemned to a poor education they were not even able to complete and now without jobs, are being called names: Hooligans, goons, the unwashed of the slum - but they are in President Museveni’s new ferve word - Bazukulu!
Statistics show that out of every 100 pupils that enter Primary One, only 32 complete Primary Seven, representing a dropout rate of 68 per cent and that is a significant improvement from 75 per cent dropout rate only a few years ago. The numbers drop even more drastically at secondary and tertiary levels.
The political dividends of touting enrollment numbers as a song over the last 22 years of implementing UPE have obviously been immense, but who accounts for the atrocity of the millions that fall through the cracks?
Who is being held accountable for the likes of my fun Gilbert, who might either be caught in the melee while returning from dropping a client or going to pick one? Or even if he was carried away by the excitement that a Bobi Wine or a Mubarak Munyagwa leadership might provide him a better opportunity to dust his degree certificate and put his energies to better use?
Who should blame him if he received two litres of fuel to join a convoy be it of NRM or the Opposition to dress his motocycle in figs, a campaign poster and honk his horn for two kilometres knowing he will save a litre to drop two passengers and carry a litre of milk from that little windfall?
Mr President, political leaders and system supporters or the uninterested, no parent wants to produce a hooligan or a goon, no youth wants to waste away doing nothing with the life to attract a brutal beating. They are victims and you have contributed to their situation by both your actions and inactions. Deal with that instead of calling them names.

Mr Mwanguhya-Mpagi is a journalist