Tarehe Sita: 44 years later, the military remains Uganda’s foremost problem

I read keenly without looking up until page 70; then I paused and went back to page 67 for another read. Thereafter, I got up and brewed myself a cup of coffee to clear my head. Then I read again, a third time, very, very slowly.

“The military has played a major role in Uganda since independence and at times that role has not been positive in terms of the progress of democratisation and the promotion of the rule of law,” the CJ wrote, quoting the Benjamin Odoki Report of the Uganda Constitutional Commission, 1993.

“It is against this sad background discussed in the previous section where the military has over a period of many years not only molested its people but also installed unpopular governments and sustained them in power that the people gave their views and concerns about the principles they believe should govern the military in future.”

“From the mid-1960s, civilian governments depended heavily on army support, and as a result, the army became an ever more important political actor. Under [Idi] Amin’s regime, army personnel dominated the political scene and even took important administrative positions, as district commissioners and even local administration chiefs. Army personnel did not have training or experience for such political and administrative roles and were often intent on self-enrichment. As a result, terrible abuses occurred and the democratic rights of the people were often totally ignored. Many people are, therefore, concerned that the future role of the army should be strictly limited.”

I paused again, sipped my coffee, and then continued.

“In general, the people believe that for most of the period since 1971, the army has suffered a severe lack of discipline… Low morale and lack of a clear sense saw many soldiers commit offences of all kinds with impunity. They used their guns to terrorise innocent people and enrich themselves.”

Had I been in court, I would have stood up and asked the CJ to pause and clarify just which army he was discussing!

Do you think that sounds ever so familiar? Yeah, me too!

Anyhow, the CJ then summed up on Page 69:

“The army was implicated in various human rights violations; and so extensive was the trauma that some people felt the army should be abolished altogether.”

We are now in the 40th year of the National Resistance Movement (NRM). There has been a lot of talk about the Uganda People's Defence Forces (UPDF) being a “professional army.” And Uganda being what it is, one is much safer agreeing with the propaganda.

I’m sure the powers that be feel good hearing all those praise singers do their thing. But I am a lawyer who finds the army involved (soldiers grabbing land) in eight out of every ten land cases I take up.

I have found the army behind every habeas corpus application I have filed in court when people have mysteriously disappeared and then turned up badly tortured and barely alive.

Every time I’ve had a court order for the release of a detainee and it has been ignored contemptuously, it’s been the military.

I have found the military behind it all when I have gone to secure police bond for suspects, only to watch helplessly as they are dragged from the police cells and whisked to unknown destinations.

Don’t take my word for it; just take a quiet survey within the army itself, and you’ll come up with the same observations.

I, therefore, find absolutely nothing romantic about Tarehe Sita (literally, “date, the sixth”, referring to February 6, 1981, when the National Resistance Army (NRA) fired the first shot of the war that brought the NRM into power).

I find it very easy to rank the military—the use, misuse, and abuse thereof—as the foremost problem that Uganda faces in our struggle to build democracy and the rule of law.

The writer, Gawaya Tegulle, is an advocate of the High Court of Uganda
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