Will Ssuubi deliver the hopes of Buganda?

Will Ssuubi deliver the hopes of Buganda?
In late July 2010, apologetics of the Mengo establishment launched a political mobilization platform code-named Ssuubi 2011 with an aim of mobilizing masses in Buganda region to support the country’s opposition in next years general elections. Ssuubi 2011 which plans to use the leverage of former Mengo Katikkiro’s Dan Muliika and Joseph Mulwannyammuli Ssimwogerere has also enlisted the support of a cross-section of Buganda opposition politicians including renegade Democratic Party Members opposed to the manin stream DP leadership led by Norbert Mao. The renegade members led by the Party’s former spokesperson and Mukono North MP Betty Nambooze and former Party Legal Advisor Erias Lukwago have voiced their support for the Inter-Party Cooperation. This realignment of forces in Buganda has added a new twist to the already fragile relationship between the Kingdom of Buganda and the National Resistance Movement government.

Another Kabaka Yekka?
The project has met with significant criticism from a wide section of Ugandans across the political spectrum with many calling it a rebirth of the Kabaka Yekka, a political group credited for having abeted violence and rigged the 1961 elections to the disadvantage of the Ben Kiwanuka led Democratic Party. According to observers the realignment of forces galvanizing support around a cultural entity purportedly under state threat will only be able to elevate certain individuals to political office but also widen the rift between the central government and Mengo. Accordingly the promoters of this group now seek to resuscitate the Federo idea as a rallying point for massive kingdom-wide support.

This coupled with long held grievances of the Kingdom politburo which include the return of the 900 sq miles, re-opening of the Kingdom radio CBS, Return of the kingdom properties and misunderstandings over the proposed regional tier system of government throws the Central government into a precarious situation. While they may not manage to uproot the incumbent from power, this group is more likely to influence majority voting at parliamentary level. Buganda MP’s especially those from the NRM have been blamed for having betrayed the Kingdom by appearing hostile to the interests of Mengo on various occasions in Parliament most vividly, on the occasion of the passing of the Land Bill 2007.

In 1961 when Kiwanuka was attacked for trying to become an alternative to the Kabaka, the custodian of the interests, culture and identity of Buganda. KY supporters pitted Kiwanuka against the Kabaka to discredit him but that was more than 40 years ago and the conditions on ground were favourable. KY anticipated support from the UPC and held access to the instruments of coercion which are now held by the NRM. While launching the group in Masaka, promoters of Ssuubi 2011 promised to show them the presidential candidate who the Kabaka would have chosen.

While this can be brushed aside as another opportunistic statement calculated to sway votes, promoters of Ssuubi seem to have gained the explicit recognition from the cultural authority. While granting leave to his two former advisors and Ssuubi main promoters, Kabaka Ronald Mutebi acknowledged their contribution to the Kingdom and expressed his acceptance for their timely decision to actively take part in national politics.
In Buganda the King pleases (Kabaka asiimye) and this is a vague term that could also mean that the King supports, wishes, abets or recognizes a certain decision or action. The Kabaka perhaps aware of the trend of events has encouraged his subjects to massively register for next years elections to influence decisions to shape their destiny as a people (and under threat) The tone and timing of the events of the past few weeks points to a premeditated arrangement to foresee the realignment of forces to combat what Mengo call the Central government’s continued harassment of the cultural institution. The stage was set with the failure of the Kabaka-Museveni talks and the Kasubi tombs fire all having roots with the closure of CBS radio and the September 2009 riots in Buganda.

Will Ssuubi deliver the hopes of a Kingdom
Critics point to circumstances surrounding the formation of the group as lacking ground to sustain a successful opposition to Mr. Museveni. Ssuubi bears the DNA of the Inter-Party Cooperation a loose coalition of Ugandan opposition groups and its this reason that impedes its entrenchment in Ganda society. The Democratic Party which is opposed to the IPC enjoys wide support in Buganda and the unsteady relationship between the two will affect voting patterns. Its founding memers including renegade DP members will have to cut a balance between accepting to be viewed as destablising agents of DP riding on the back of opportunism or as members of the Inter-party Cooperation which is largely viewed as a construction of the Forum for Democratic Change.

Following a failure to resolve feuds within the DP, a section of DP members utilized the disagreements between the DP and the IPC to gain leverage by using the IPC as an alternative force to front their interests. The need to tailor their interests to suit the demands of their electorate in Buganda elicited the formation of Ssuubi to isolate Norbert Mao as guarantor of the interests of Buganda.
Bearing in mind the unquestionable authority of the Kabaka in rural Buganda and utilizing the recognition and wide popularity of Daniel Muliika a radical former premier , the vocal Betty Nambooze and Medard Ssegonna, the IPC’s formation of Ssuubi 2011 was meant in all manners and purposes to resuscitate the Kabaka Yekka conditions under which the Kbaka wish or pleasing holds supremacy over the interests of modern political party activity. In this instance Ssuubi 2011, is a mutation of the Kabaka Yekka which was formed from the Kakamega Club, an exclusive inner circle of the Kabaka’s close confidantes and friends.
But the hopes of the 800-year old Kingdom appear enormous to rest on the shoulders of a loose coalition of political forces even when these forces have the confidence of a monarch. Not so possible especially when the forces have only allied for a year against an antagonistic force that has ruled for the last quarter of a century. This is however not to appear pessimistic, true that the Ssuubi members will be able to gain parliamentary seats but even when all the 80 Buganda seats in Parliament are held by the IPC it will be no match for the over 200 NRM MPs.

It rests therefore that for as long as Mr. Museveni wins the executive position, the Ssuubi project will remain a total failure. What will happen to the aspirations of a Kingdom in the event of putting all its eggs in a basket with a hole.
Will it signify the defeat of the Kabaka?