Writer: Benjamin Rukwengye. PHOTO/FILE.
When you sift through Uganda’s history over the last 40 years, two key events tower over everything else. The first is the discovery of Uganda’s first Aids case in 1982, while the second is the coming into power of the National Resistance Movement.
Many people would have predicted that things were about to change when they saw the young new revolutionaries walk into Kampala. Nobody could have predicted at the time that they would eventually fiddle with the Constitution and resort to methods employed by their predecessors to hold on to power.
In much the same way that nobody at the time could have predicted how the stories of almost every family were going to be impacted by the discovery of Aids. Ironically, Aids was the first strategic threat to the new government’s hold on power. The debauchery and indulgence by the young soldiers had quickly pushed the prevalence rate to 30 per cent by the early 90s. It took the realization of the vulnerability that came from relying on a sick army for President Museveni to swing into action and lead from the front.
This week, as Uganda commemorated World Aids Day, it was announced that our national prevalence rate is 5.1 per cent. This success is down to the initial actions taken, such as the establishment of the Uganda Aids Commission, TASO, spirited campaigns in churches and mosques, and the gallant efforts of individuals such as Dr. Peter Mugyenyi and the iconic Philly Bongole Lutaaya. Others in government and the NGO world have since taken over and it is to them that we owe the successes.
The Uganda Aids Commission reports that new infections have reduced from 83,000 in 2021 to 38,000. They say that Aids-related deaths reduced from 53,000 to 19,000 and babies with HIV have reduced from 30,000 to 4,700 in just over a decade. But that is still not good enough. My math abilities weren’t always nifty but I believe a 5 per cent prevalence rate means that of every 100 HIV positive people, five are Ugandan.
The numbers look grimmer when you zoom in some more. Like many things Ugandan, we can win if only we get our priorities right. But when do we ever?! This week, the East African Community market made 25 years since it was (re)started in 1999. Of its founders, only one is still alive – and in power. I will let you take a wild guess. By any stretch of the imagination, the community is a white elephant that in theory sounds like a good idea but it just doesn’t exist on ground.
Its members are always on the brink of war, constantly and consistently impose tariffs against each other’s goods, curtail the movement and settlement of people, compete with rather than complement each other, and its leaders are eternally suspicious of and can’t tolerate each other. No wonder, many of them can’t even put their money where their mouths are, when it comes to picking the community’s tab.
Yet it also represents the idealism of chasing grand ideas – which can be a good obsession if you are doing a shabby job of running your country. While our President was busy talking about going to the moon, scores of his citizens were getting extracted from underneath the earth after yet another round of landslides on the slopes of Mount Elgon.
The annual event in which we lose tens of people, the burst river banks in Nyamwamba, the road accidents, insecurity, deaths by hunger, and negligence in hospitals sit right within the same realm as that HIV prevalence rate. They are indicative of how far we have strayed from the time when every life mattered and death moved us to act decisively. Now, we would rather pursue unattainable things. It would seem like the kids would say, that ‘Delulu is the solulu’.
The millions of people who put in the work to fight the scourge of HIV/ Aids because they couldn’t bear to lose another life couldn’t care if we went to the moon. The families that lose their loved ones every day or annually to these avoidable catastrophes certainly don’t care. Focus, Mr President, focus!
Mr Rukwengye is the founder, Boundless
Minds. @Rukwengye
