David Mafabi, a veteran journalist (PHOTO/Courtesy)
One day, arrogance will kill a man, for a child cannot be forced to love its mother; the magic between them is largely the bond that is built right from the womb, to child bearing and nurturing.
That partly explains why children are closer to their mothers than their fathers. Just this morning, I was flipping through the news and came across an article titled, “Don’t demand for service delivery if you don’t vote NRM- says Museveni’s brother”. For starter, it is a pity.
It beats human understanding that a right thinking person can make such statements in public just because he is a brother to the reigning President.
For a long time, we have been complaining about the unequal distribution of resources, Kumbe! some people were doing it deliberately to frustrate those with dissenting views from the ruling government.
The proponents of this argument seem to have forgotten that when the government borrows money from donors, the burden falls on all Ugandans who will have to pay through the nose in order to refund.
And secondly, they seem to have forgotten that when taxes are being collected, areas that do not agree with the government are also made to pay and expect services in return.
It is absurd to note that the very government mandated to provide services limits them to only the people who vote for the ruling party as if the other Ugandans have a different government in power.
When the Nzeire’s of this world are making such comments given their close proximity to the President, one would be tempted to believe such statements reflect the facts in practice.
I hear “You always deny us during elections,” Nzeire roared at a recent bursaries function organized by the ruling party’s supporter and area leadership of Bukomansimbi District.
In other words, he was telling the gatherers that they were languishing in poverty partly because they always vote the opposition. This probably explains the assertion that the NRM party only gives services to those who vote for the NRM and its candidates, referring to the unwritten policy of the “give-and-take” politics.
“We are not happy with you people of Bukomansimbi and you should stop asking service delivery from the government because you do not like us”. With this at the back of his mind, am still wondering why he still accepted the invitation.
To him, it was time for the people of Bukomansimbi to shun the opposing forces and turn their attention to the ruling party if they want to benefit from government.
Nzeire’s comments speak volumes of what goes on behind closed doors of the planners of this country; it is now evident that the government sidelines areas that vote the opposition. For instance, there are some areas in Kampala where you need to be reminded of being within the borders of the capital city with roads full of gullies akin to those created by a heavy rainfall and when you find out who their Mp is, its is always a member of the opposing forces.
When Ugandans were electing President Museveni Kaguta Tibuhaburwa, they voted him as an individual and not his brothers, wife, children and the broader Basita clan.
And for somebody to come out and make such demeaning statements speaks of a country that has gone to the kernels.
To the best of my knowledge, Shadrak Nzeire Kaguta is only important to himself, his family and may be the people of Kiruhura District where he serves as the National Resistance Movement District chairman.
For a long time, there have been loud rumours in the corridors of power that the national cake is distributed depending on the voting patterns as posted by the Electoral commission. It appears the NRM leadership ties service delivery to votes they get in a given area.
It appears to be one of the methods created to remind the voters that they made a mistake in not voting NRM. With this policy in place, how do they treat areas that vote Museveni and then vote the opposition for MPs and L.C 5 Chairperson?
However, if that narrative was true, then Karamoja would be more developed than Kampala as they always vote almost 100% for Museveni and his NRM Party. Secondly, if that was the case, some districts of western Uganda would be having cemented gardens and would have ascended to the middle income status and would be enjoying a state of the art infrastructural development in their areas.
No wonder some regions and or Districts have very many powerful ministers holding very powerful ministries where they can spill some services for the benefit of the people in their area.
It is a harsh reminder of the ongoing tension surrounding political participation and representation, where debates over democracy and governance continue to take centre stage. This means that the government is determined to diffuse all forces of change through enticements using the very taxes that are collected from all Ugandans irrespective of their political affiliation.
If indeed Nzeire was aware of the dislike the people of Bukomansimbi have for the NRM, why didn’t he turn down the invitation. The answer is that he accepted the invitation to discredit the National Unity Platform which forms the majority of their Members of Parliament.
It is unfortunate that Ugandans today like Nzeire have made politics turn into more and more about personality and popularity rather than critical thinking and debate about the cause and long-term effect of decisions and policies.
It is sad that for the last 38 years, NRM Power has attracted the Nzires in power, into politics those who have abused it and even made them worse. As Ugandans, we must stop voting for narcissistic psychopaths.
In his book Mr Douglas Adams once wrote of a planet on which humans are ruled by lizard overlords. This is a paradox: the planet is a democracy, the humans hate and outnumber the lizards and yet the lizards always get elected. It turns out the humans vote for the lizards for a simple reason: “If they didn’t, the wrong lizard might get in.”
Maybe, just maybe, that this planet is closer to Uganda than we’d like to admit, I must right away say sorry for this type of happening is related to Uganda.
We love to hate our leaders, President Museveni seems determined to provide a fresh meaning to the words “NRM political party”. While the rest of us follow the rules he has set, himself, his ardent cadres, his family members, close friends and associates brazenly break them.
It doesn’t have to be that way: we can have better choices and better leaders. But to work out how, we must find the answer to the question: why do we end up with so many people in power like Nzeire, who aren’t fit to manage a village meeting?
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