To maim or to kill, a desire underlined to harm

Am perturbed by the constant support accorded to President Museveni for the manner he handled the Buganda riots by many people whom I considered responsible and am equally irked by his recent stand on shooting to maim. If find the difference between shooting to kill and shooting to dismember a matter of semantics underlined by an entrenched desire to harm which should concern Ugandans. It is unconstitutional for a man who swore to uphold the constitution and protect citizens and their properties to make such outrageous public utterances. Morally it defiles convectional wisdom for any popularly elected leader to turn against his electorate, unless our president was elected by Kenyans or Malawians. A ruler ought to take more care of his people’s happiness than of his own, as a shepherd is to take more care of his flock than of himself? It is most certain that at the pyramid of causes of these riots, a general feeling of frustration played a central role in fanning the emotions and our leaders are running away from issues. It is factual that the main rioters are unemployed Ugandans frustrated by their current conditions. The severity of these conditions is exacerbated by revelations of people in government or those connected to it by kith and kin who have amassed wealth. In any human society this causes envy but it transforms into hatred when all this wealth is seen to be possessed by people from one region. This could explain why a bus carrying passenger from Western Uganda was torched. To be specific Baganda youth who by nature were raised in this part of Uganda might feel deprived as to be relegated to mechanics, petty traders and boda boda riders when their counterparts from from the ethnic group associated with the ruling government are enjoying the benefits of state patronage. To this Sir Thomas More in Utopia asked. Who does more earnestly long for a change than he that is uneasy in his present circumstances? And who run to create confusions with so desperate a boldness as those who, having nothing to lose, hope to gain by them?
President’s statements to shoot to maim civilians indicate a desperate leader. This would be the last thing to be said by a president. If a leader should fall under such contempt or envy that he could not keep his subjects in their duty but by oppression and ill usage, and by rendering them poor and miserable, it were certainly better for him to quit his leadership than to retain it by such methods as make him, while he keeps the name of authority, lose the majesty due to it. We can call Uganda’s past leaders all sorts of degrading names but the line between the past and the present is becoming thinner by the day. Obote attacked the Lubiri, arrested Mengo ministers and Bataka, he later pounced on the royals incarcerating them in Luzira. Haven’t we seen Baganda ministers in the recent times being accorded a state tour to western Uganda prisons on charges of terrorism, haven’t Bataka been incarcerated in the aftermath of the riots in Kayunga or haven’t we heard about the impending charges against Prince Nakibinge for using foreign sources to destabilize Uganda.
He is an unskillful physician (he)that cannot cure one disease without casting his patient into another. He that can find no other way for correcting the errors of his people but by taking from them the conveniences of life, shows that he knows not what it is to govern a free nation.

ENACT LAW ON CHILD SACRIFICE

ENACT LAW ON CHILD RITUAL SACRIFICE
Each day newspaper headlines carry stories of a slain child, a kidnapped toddler or a foiled attempt at dissapearing an infant on grounds that the said would be victim had marks of ever having split blood. Parents now had to endure the pain of pinning the ears of their children including boys not as a luxurious expression of beautifacation but of one of neccesity to safeguard their children from monstrous natives keen on earning a quick buck by murdering innocent children in the name of appeasing spirits to accumulate wealth.
A recent ANPPCAN report reveals a lot about the current state of children especially on child sacrifice. The 2008 Uganda Human Rights Commision report has classified the issues as an emergent human rights catastrophe. Parents like their children now live in constant fear of these criminals and this has affected their lifestyles. The morning and evening traffic jam on main city routes is caused by a delibarate attempt by parents to see their children safe to and from their points of study. Consequently schools have been fortified like military barracks and parents with children in boarding schools have to endure a rigorous identification exercise for the safety of their children just because some crooks in society are so desparate as to postpone reasoning to kill for money. Children are no longer free to play at ease without keen watchmen for their safety.Most intriguing is the fact that parents or people related to the children have been reported to be some of the leading accomplices in the ritual murder cases and the rampant kidnappings in the country. Ugandan society is increasingly becoming not only unjust but also unsafe to the children.
Yet something can be done to curb this growing insecurity with the goodwill of all concerned stakeholders. The light in the darkness is the enactment of an anti-ritual sacrifice law to strengthen the fight against this criminality. While there has ben considerable work done in reporting cases and interesting the intervention of prosecution, there’s still a lacunae in describing the criminality and thereby prescribing the appropriate punishment. Accused persons are charged with murder and manslaughter and accorded undeserving treatment. A focus group constituting of the Police anti-ritual murder Unit, Traditional healers body, ministry of education, child rights advocacy organisations and the law society should be formed to formulate a law to strengthen the existing weak laws. With a law in place, government can be able to pass guidelines to operationalise the law to safeguard the children.
Moses Kalanzi
The author works with Daniels Dream Uganda, a child welfare organisation.
mkalanzi@gmail.com

Boda boda swoop:More to it than just helmets and licences

Boda bodas are pherhaps the most convinient medium of transport inUganda that they could not evade the conscience of legendary croonerElly Wamala. If you are not a chauffer driven politician or socialiteyou cannot evade their services unless your work is not conviniencedby Kampala’s traffic chaos. They have attained political significancestarting with candidate Yoweri Museveni’s 2001 campaign trail where hearrived at his campaign launch at Kololo aboard a boda boda much tothe surprise of many who considered the man fit for another term ongrounds of his ‘simple character’ exhibitedby associating with themost down trodden, the cyclists. Then like the president’s cowboy hat,stammering and gesturing, the boda boda was adopted as an officialelectioneering strategy with many politicias in this country fightingfor paparazzi shots aboard boda bodas. I have a newspaper cutting ofone minister who defied his ernomous size to jump on a boda boda forthe sake of being seen to associate with the “electorate” Everywhereboda boda cyclists became increasingly influential in politics and allother popular activities that involve mass mobilisation. When SeyaSsebagala returned, they lined the streets from entebbe to Kampala,when Gaetano Kaggwa exited the Big brother house after representingthe pearl of africa in that event, a heroes welcome awaited him andthe boda bodas were readily available to add colour to the occasionthat citizen number one was alarmed as to ask “Who is Gaetano” in aBig Headline in the national paper. He was to later know him asanother socialite but not as a homecoming exilee that he invited himto his ranch. Boda boda cyclists became empowered by the governmentthat they were soon on collision with Ssebaana’s KCC. Loans were givento youths to acquire Cycles after the elections and boda boda cyclistsincreasingly became associated with the president through RDC’s. Likestreet hawkers and market vendors,boda boda cyclists side-stepeedinstitutions like KCC to reason that their problems could only beunderstood by the president of Uganda.Everywhere on campaign trailsthey were assured of ‘per diem’ and free fuel at stations owned bymembers of the regime. With the return of Dr. Besigye and the increasein opposition against the NRM, Mr. Museveni’s role as patron of thedown-trodden shifted to Mengo and other political forces whereindividuals like Nambooze and Betty Kamya made them aware that whilethey could benefit from election loans for survival, there was lifebeyond politics. Nambooze’s Central Civic Committee comprises mainlyof Boda boda cyclits and market vendors as on –ground volunteers.Support for Kamya’s Uganda Federal Alliance has mainly come from thedown-trodden previously identified as Mr. Museveni’s soft spots. Inthe past there have been attempts to force cyclists to wear helmetsand observe road regulations but this has been resisted with supportfrom RDC’s who have instead suggested that KCC sits with lawbreakersto solve the situation. The climax of the fallout with Mr. Museveni(not NRM) has been the recent Buganda riots with their percieved rolein mobilising support in the town centers and surburbs. Because oftheir mobilisational role in hyping campaing trails and abettingdemonstrations by whisking off demonstrators, they remain to be sen asan important force in the election planning that they featureprominently in what has been consistently called ‘logistics’ so muchso that even in a University election, the candidate has to mobiliseresources for the “entourage”.My concern is that while they offertheir services at election campaigns, the posturing politicians ofthis world are quiet while an estimated 1000 cycles have beenimpounded for engaging in ‘lawless activities’ read expressing theirviews over the blocking of the Kabaka to Bugerere. Where isMuseveni’s simple character of 2001? Something said about the grasssuffering in a battle of elephants.