Dear President Y. K. Museveni,
I wasn’t yet born by that time but am told people took to the streets in celebration when you and the valorous National Resistance Army took over power in1986.
In you they saw a beacon of hope. They saw a saviour who had come to hold our distressed motherland by the shoulder and lead her back onto a democratic path. A path where the wish of the majority reigns supreme. A path where rule of law is held sacrosanct. A path where dictatorship is unheard of.
Overtime, it appears that your personal ambitions, Your Excellency, have nibbled their way into and reversed the democratic gains that had been earlier registered by the regime under your visionary leadership.
On the face of it, point number one (democracy) of the ten-point programme ideal NRA came with was no doubt tantalizing, but in truth it has turned out to be one sad joke – atleast on those suffering citizens who had hope and trust in you.
In its own words, your NRA/M sought to achieve point number one after taking cognizance of the many “mockeries of democracy around the globe” at that time. Sadly, it appears to me that you are riding the very horse you sought to flog.
As I understand them, Mr. President, the cornerstones of democracy in a nation include protection of the basic human rights such as freedom of expression; freedom from selective [mis]treatment; freedom from oppression; freedom of active participation of all citizens at all levels in their own governance and the freedom of access to leadership positions at all levels.
Your Excellency, it is my belief as a citizen that democracy, which president Abraham Lincoln once defined as “government of the people, by the people, and for the people,” depends upon the broadest possible access to unsuppressed ideas and opinions.
“For a free people to govern themselves, they must be free to express themselves openly, publicly, and repeatedly – in speech and in writing.”
Now, as if the message communicated by the ceaseless political persecution and oppression of some of Uganda’s most prominent opposition politicians has not been clear, any veneer of democracy in this country has been, in my view, entirely stripped away by the materialisation of your sole candidature as it was originated by the infamous Kyankwanzi resolution.
I for one refuse to believe that he was the only NRM member who harbored ambitions to lawfully challenge you for the position of NRM presidential flag bearer during the 2016 elections. No.
I am convinced that the system of oppression and persecution of political opponents over which your leadership has presided ensured that even where there may have been willing contenders for the same position as you apart from Hon. Mbabazi, theirs remained mere fantasies; unexpressed for fear of dire political, financial, legal and other consequencies.
Indeed true to the said fears, they came alive with the release of Hon. Mbabazi’s declaration. Political campaigns to mudsling him where instantly activated. Talk of his impending arrest is rife. His business interests are said to be under threat.
“Loyal” NRM members have outdone themselves in calling him all sorts of names just because he dared to exercise his constitutionally guaranteed right, in an obscene, self-seeking bid to be noticed by you Your Excellency.
Other politicians have publicly denounced his candidature with some calling him possessed while others have accused him of jumping the succession que. I didn’t know Uganda was a kingdom in the first place.
Mr. President, in your apparent endeavour to purge the party of real and perceived competition [or what some call divisive forces], your reign as chairman of NRM has been deleterious to democracy not only internally within the party but also to the nation as well.
You have mentally bullied the party members into ceding their voting powers to fill influential positions in the party to you, thereby disenfranchising many of them alll in the name of clipping your opponents’ wings which has not only laid a dangerous precedent for other political parties in the country but also set off democracy on a downhill trajectory.
If this is the kind of ideal NRA promised; an ideal where political dissent is almost treasonable ; then with all due respect you promised over 30 million of us hot air for which amends are in order because a democratic society is one where tolerance is practiced even in the most challenging of times.
It should not be surprising therefore that a host of people are disillusioned with your leadership as they have been relegated to the dustbin when it comes to having a say in the nation’s leadership. The candidates they prefer have been deliberately frustrated by the State and Mr. Elias Lukwago is a good example here. Ironically, these are some of the very things committed by past regimes in criticism of which you were so vocal.
We have seen so many poor citizens being evicted from their land for development projects which either never take off or stall as soon as they take off. We have seen traders being chased away from their workplaces in the city yet they are also looking for ways of providing for their starving extended families a more decent life of suffering. We have seen boda bodas being threatened with banishment out of the city yet the poor who conduct business in the city but can’t afford their own means of transport see them as a godsend. How and why are these outrageous decisions made without meaningfully involving the affected people?
We have seen people losing their jobs just for “being seen” with opposition figures. We have seen news magazines being ordered out of circulation for running adverts of your opponents. WHERE IS THE COUNTRY GOING?
Why do you think your agents now have to beg the wanainchis to attend your rallies or declare their support and atimes even give them “something small”, and yet for some opposition candidates’ rallies people attend in droves even though they are not paid anything in return?
Mr. President, freedom to actively participate in the governance of one’s nation is the lifeblood of any democracy in the absence of which dictatorship reigns. I believe that despite the many challenges so far, your intention is not to create a dictatorial regime.
I trust that you still hold in high regard some of the ideals you came with. That is why I could afford to write this letter because I believe I will not see security agents whisking me away from my home for having utilised the freedom of speech NRA intended to promote, even though other people have not been so lucky in their criticism.
Per your comments about the Cranes and how you did not know it is our national football team, you depict a person so out of touch with reality but the truth is, people have had enough of your leadership, albeit no doubt a succesful one in some respects.
Uganda’s history shows that it has always been bloodshed whenever a ruling government refuses to accept a democratic transition. Frankly, I am worried for my safety as a person, that of my family and other citizens’ should the nation explode into a war zone if nothing is urgently done to address the citizen’s concerns. It is for that that I saw it fit to write you this letter, as my modest contribution to peace in Uganda.
As a concerned citizen of this young nation, I therefore demand on behalf of my countrymen and women that you give true democracy a chance to flourish. Give another person a chance to steer the country back on the right track. To protect your credibility as a statesman and your dignity, do not contest for another term. In the interest of the country, please stand down.
Yours faithfully,
Saasi Marvin Augustin,
Student, Makerere University.
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