LINDA TUSIIME SHOOTS BACK!

ABWOOLI RUJUMBA OMURUNGI W'ABASAMBU, the Linda I talked of in my last correspondence with you shot back rather scarthingly. Here is the full text of her reply:

"Clearly you are rash in delivering opinions and more so with no candor what so ever. And while you may in the same spirit throw accusations at the Monitor, give it time, maybe you'll find your article in next weeks' paper. But what I can tell you is that the I completely understand the basis for your reaction to what you called a reckless opinion. And as much as it may seem unfair, biased, pick any word you may. I still firmly believe that something needs to be done about the large numbers at the university.

By having so many students government universities have resorted to creating courses just to cater for the huge numbers. I know what Iam talking about here because I did one of such courses and have heard potential employers say over and over again, ‘When was this course created? X should have been enough!’’ And I can’t be blamed for this. It was not my fault that I had to get a degree so had to opt for the course I was given because so many already were enrolled in my original course and nothing could be done.

So sir, I understand why you may think Iam simply cultivating beliefs sowed by what you referred to as the NRM cadres but don’t you worry about the trend our education system is taking. I mean, don’t you worry that at the rate we are going where everyone is fighting to get ‘papers’ very soon even those with post graduate diplomas will be deemed useless.

I’ll admit I am upset by the unrealistic financial trend Makerere is taking but it upsets me more to have parted with so much money and still not have attained nothing much of substance. I always thought we were too many in the lecture rooms, that the lecturers didn’t really give some of us the attention we needed, that as much as I paid for so many of the services, I couldn’t even access them.Reason;the numbers! It always comes back to the numbers. To our society that thinks no body is worth their salt without a degree. The potential employers who start judging applicants basing on degrees even for the simplest of jobs that a high school leaver could have done. Why does everyone all of a sudden think that attaining a degree is a matter of life or death? One doesn’t need to have a degree to make it in the world.

It is this belief that is making us think that university education is a right. It is Secondary education that is a right. But what point is this right if after completing, one can’t make a name for themselves because unemployed graduates have reduced themselves to taking the jobs meant for them. What point is this right if children are convinced to go to the university, waste time studying baseless concocted courses just so they can attain a degree and apply for jobs they could have done 3 years ago!

And then again, maybe the answer isn’t to increase tuition fees at the rate they are going but then it’s not my place to look for solutions to the problems that are plaguing our education system. God knows I have plenty of ideas up my sleeve but at the rate decisions are made in this country, the best one can do is look at a solution weigh its pros and cons and see how best to support it. And, because I am upset by the large numbers of unemployed, under qualified and immature graduates walking the streets, that my friend is what I did.

In conclusion, though I may not know who you are, my best guess is that you are a student of law because of your obvious and loud outburst,throwing facts all over the place because you believe your ideas and notions to be superior to others. I do not mean to wage war. I am not a reporter.I am simply a citizen of this country who has had enough of the carelessness of the government universities-Makerere in particular and the impact on its graduates. I was simply giving my comment. Surely, a student of law(if that is what you are) should comprehend its meaning."

Son of my father, So precise was my reply:

My Dearest Sister Linda Tusiime,

Pardon me for using that tone I chose to use in my last correspondence with you over the heart-breaking Varsity hikes. Allow me also take occasion to salute the civility you so admiringly exuded whilst responding to my letter of complaint. This country needs many more of your tolerance and ilk. Bravo Sister.

Your guess is right! Am a Law reader at Makerere, the once fittingly- named 'Harvard of Africa'. How spot-on that resemblance was!

However that aside, am still lovingly married to my well-held belief that the over 100% sporadic hike in the tuition fees of University fees is utter segregation, annihilation of the hopes of the deprived, and a design of mischief with the sole purpose of wiping the poor student from the face of Makerere.

Linda, whereas I see no tangible reason to disagree with you that the tuition hike is inevitable if Makerere is to recapture the glorious ages long gone, I vehemently detest the way this was unfairly done.

You just cannot afford any reason for this cruel act to a poor coffee farmer in the deepest and most remote part of Kijunjubwa- Masindi who hoes his day away to see to it that his son attains University education.

Should it then be taken, as you convincingly argue in your published article, that University Education is a lucrative and precious prize that the poor peasant cannot claim however dire his efforts? Is it also humane that such a hardworking farmer and committed citizen should cry and lick the salt taste of his own tears simply because a privileged few cannot reverse this evil policy? This is a beautiful epic of how humanity can tend to be cruel to its own!

Linda, how many ministers do you know of, if there is at all, that cruise or are cruised in cars of less than 400 Million and maintenance of which require engineering expatriates imported from London whose emoluments are counted in hundreds of dollars?

How much of tax-payers money is lost to corruption annually?- 500 billion to the exact, a proud figure that makes your pearl- motherland Uganda stand out and occupy a place in the envied balcony of the world's ultra- corrupt countries.

To be specific, how much of your money was handsomely parceled out to Super- minister Hon. Amama-Mbabazi in the Temangalo act- of- coffer slaughter even after flouting rules of procurement?

How much did your your patriotic President's monster jet cost?- 88 billion Ushs!

How much did the renovation of a megastructre designed to shock and amaze, the People's State House of Entebbe cost you, your friends and all Ugandans?- 100 million again counted in dollars!

And how much is the budget of Makerere?- A paltry 55 billion Uganda shillings if am to take the estimates of the academic year 2008/09 given to me by a friend.

Linda, as I stated earlier, I believe that the tribulations of Makerere and other collapsing tertiary institutions can so ably be solved by an unusual intervention of Mr. Museveni's government.

Imagine the government forking out all those monies mentioned above not to buy sleek cars with the functions of humans, world- acclaimed megastructures and Jumbo jets but in the alternative sinking all this money into our crumbling institutions.

If our 'liberators' are not kind enough as to be that benevolent, let then the tuition hikes be limited to such a ceiling as 7% 'for the love of God and charity' as those denied Justice in the courts of law could petition the King in medieval Monarchical England. This can from then on be gradually increased at a reasonable tune of 3-4%.

Dear Linda, such is a brief of my contentions but may I once again salute your commendable trait of tolerance. Those who associate with you must be a lucky and proud lot for they benefit from such an unusual endowment.

May the Omnipotent guard you.

LINDA TUSIIME’S STANCE ON TUITION INCREMENT REDICULOUS.

ABWOOLI RUJUMBA OMURUNGI W'ABASAMBU, I write to counter Miss Linda Tusiime’s richly arrogant and unbelievably reckless opinion ‘ Increasing university tuition fess not a bad idea’ about the so called 40% increment in the tuition fees of in the five public Universities published in the Daily monitor of October 22nd 2009. It is not only deceiving but is also tainted by that snobbish and inconsiderate tone that is characteristic of only NRM cadres and proven Mr. Museveni Sycophants.

I highly detest the irritating way with which she seems resolved to justify a discriminatory policy. It still pains my heart that there are Ugandans who still absorb the lies of this government and the Makerere top brass that the suspiciously high Tuition increment is the only way through which our intentionally ill- funded public institutions shall be saved from going to the dogs.

Madam Linda, for your information, going ahead and alleging that the hike in tuition fees for University students is 40% is an intended move to propagate lies to the unsuspecting general public with the sole motive of defending your ignoble designs and for that you need to have your signature fully appended on an apology to the people of Uganda and have it published in this good daily. Here is why:

At our beleaguered and neglected Makerere University, to enroll for a Bachelor of Laws day programme (BLAW) in the academic year 2009/10, one had to cough Uganda Ushs. 1.260.000 way far divorced from the Ushs. 600.000 of in the intake of the academic year 2008/2009. This is an increment of more than 120% if one seeks aid of elementary arithmetics. Madam, 40% is so much unconnected with 120%. Am also appalled that the media has also abetted this inaccurate reporting that the increment is 40%!

Linda’s other contention that Education is a privilege that only a few should access is deplorably worrying and legally wanting. Education being a formidable tool for social transformation cannot be risked to be a preserve of only a few coincidentally who sprout from affluent families. The success of Social transformation rests on the masses that form a powerful engine for its proper propulsion. I assign Linda and those who think like her to read the success stories of the Asian tigers.

Legally also, the right to Education is not only clearly embedded in Article 30 of the 1995 constitution of this republic but also in international human rights instruments that Uganda has ratified inter alia Art. 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) 1948 and Article 13 of the International Convenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) 1966. Allegations that Education is a privilege are therefore baseless with intent to baffle.

Saying that ‘we may end up with an exploding market of degree holders’ if even the peasant is allowed to access University education is not anticipation but a reality. Uganda now boasts of one of the world’s highest unemployment rates. The fear I expected Linda to harbor was not that Uganda will move towards the same for this is prevailing but how logically and effectively this worrying impasse is being countered by Mr. Museveni’s good regime. In answer, it leaves a lot to be desired but this is not the topic of today.

Finally, the triple-digit increment in the tuition bills of students is not only a suspicious design but is also fundamentally segregative, narrow-minded and one of those grotesque acts that a government can inflict on its impoverished people. Mr. Museveni, prevail over this policy for it contravenes your valued principles of ‘prosperity for all’. This is state- engineered illiteracy.

MAKERERE DESERVES BETTER

Abwooli Rujumba Omurungi W’Abasambu, top Don Prof. Venasius Baryamureeba has been lined up to ascend the managerial throne of East Africa’s premier tertiary Institution, Uganda’s cherished but neglected 87-year old Makerere University Kampala.

The other suitors for the throne are Mathematics Professor Livingstone Luboobi, the senior most in age at a towering 63 years, Celebrated Economist Professor John Dumba- Sentamu and everyone’s Ndugu, Faculty of Social Sciences charming Strongman Professor Kirumira Edward. They all present commendable credentials and an immensely rich marketplace of ideas, plans and aspirations for our beleaguered tower of Ivory.

Professor Livingstone Luboobi has presided over the institution since the year of their Lord 2004 when he inherited regalia from the retiring Prof. John- Mary Sebuwufu. There is probably nothing that has served to summarise the tenure and legacy of the good old Muganda Professor than his own words of lamentation to a certain media house.

The said Leading daily of Uganda quoted the Mathematician’s words to the letter when in one of those numerous interviews he accorded the fourth estate described the University as ‘being in state of limbo’!

As precise as a mathematician can be, the courtly professor had accomplished, with the artistry of a bard, what other scholars of name and fame like Prof. Mahmood Mamdani had failed to describe in heaps and leaves of paper! Professor Mamdani has written a deeply resourceful book about the trials and tribulations of Makerere, Scholars in the Market place.

During the tenure of Livingstone, we have seen the Public University degenerate into a profitable bazaar where students and parents have been turned into customers in the purchase of knowledge and the University into a derogatorily capitalist hub where the whims and aspirations of the poor peasant have been wantonly sidelined.

Education in itself being a formidable tool for social transformation as my friend and comrade Nuwagaba Vincent prefers to aptly put it, the share of blame for this discriminatory design can also be deservedly apportioned to Yoweri Museveni’s thieving Junta that has deliberately refused to learn how best to lay priorities!

During the same period of time, the University has been battered with deeply embarrassing scandals! It was under the nose of Professor Livingstone Luboobi that a handsome amount of the Peasant Parent’s remittances were irresponsibly swindled by one of his Deputies who oversaw the building of a Ushs 2 billion ‘Berlin wall’ around the University that crumbled as fast as it was built. It was not the victorious conquest of capitalism over socialism that prompted this uncommon happening this time round but the lack of cement. The magnanimous wall, it is reported, was supported with only sand!

This is not to cite all those ‘small scandals’, contented oiled throats and financial misappropriation of the University monies that are yet to see the light of day!

Academic research during this gray haired’s reignal years has progressed no better, the quality of the products that Makerere has been churning out is deplorably worrying leave alone wicked scenes of Professors copying from their Student’s theses! All in all Makerere has tested Luboobi and found amiss in him the steel that is a prerequisite if one is to successfully occupy such a demanding office!

However on the other side of the scale is Professor Venasius Baryamureeba. At 39, he is one of the youngest Professors at Makerere and the Dean Faculty of computing and I.T, one of those faculties considered ‘wet’ if am to scrounge the jargon of my good friend Osuna George Jerome.

Baryamureeba found the Faculty of computing an impoverished lone traveller at Makerere and gave it company to where it proudly stands today. At the faculty of I.T, he found a vacant plot and has built it to the sky let alone winning for it lucrative contracts with such reverered I.T barons like Microsoft Founder Bill Gates and Michael Dell of the Dell group.

Makerere’s Faculty of computing and I.T is a model of I.T excellence in Africa all over. In fact, Baryamureeba is such a true patriot that he has put his country’s flag flying high on the mast of I.T excellence the world over than those that purport to love this country when the taxpayers offertory they so mercilessly swindle is counted in billions! Recently in June, his services were accoladed with the prestigious recognition of being one of the 2009 world’s top 100 Dons for his service to the I.T sector and the globalisation drive.

I stand to be corrected if there has been any scam and money laundering cited at his Faculty!

Rujumba, Uganda and in particular Makerere University has a prolific talent in Dr. Baryamureeba that has to be tapped and harnessed to its fullest. At his age (39), he has accomplished for his Country, himself and Makerere what others die longing to achieve. He is a rabid performer, a brisk administrator and a horrendously multi- talented academic. In fact, he is like a comet that appears once in a century.

Let us take pride in such men with astonishing endowments as Baryamureeba whilst they still command vigour. Makerere deserves industry, proficiency in administration, connections and energy to recapture her long lost crown of virtue as ‘The Harvard of Africa’ and all these admirable qualities I find in the man with the signature gap in his teeth.

THE TWO TRIBES OF UGANDA!

Rujumba Abwooli Omurungi W’Abasambu, ethnic Uganda is largely a constitution of strictly two tribes. One has to pledge allegiance to either one of the two. However what is fashionably striking about the two tribes is their numeric standings. One tribe totally outsmarts the other numerically. Thus if it was a race of numbers, one is miles ahead of the other. These two tribes are the rich and the poor. One has a mandatory obligation of belonging to one. There is no other to belong to. These tribes are the rich and the poor!

The children of one tribe can be spotted with kwashiorkor- hit stomachs, showing ribs, running noses, dilapidated manyattas, dry or no bank accounts and a long strewn thread of problems that have accumulated over time. This description firmly fits the tribe of the poor. Thus the poor man’s kith and kin enjoy a lamentable way of living, is more disease prone, has the benefit of being syringed in a skeleton like structure with no drugs and sufficient qualified medicine men. But amidst all these woes, he goes on to survive!

On the other hand, the ones that belong to the tribe of the rich have such symptoms like fattened, round bellied stomachs, walk with bulging wallets and have their own walking fashion as though they are going to cause cracks in the earth, get the attention of the world’s finest neural surgeons in case of the slightest headache, fly abroad to deliver million – dollar babies, don’t trust their own medicine-men, are creative vote counters, sky the clouds with monster metallic birds that don’t come cheap. It is alleged that each bird goes for $100 million. The houses they live in are adjacent in quality to the biblical paradise exclusively for the doers of good or Janna for the followers of Nabbi Muhammad!

Yet amidst that gap in standards of living, the rich man and his tribesmen wantonly disregard the aspirations of the poor man and his henchmen as though he is not part of the human race! They segregate against them right from the schools they go to, clothes they cloak themselves in not to mention how they laugh at their modus operendi. For how can an adult man with a family go on to show the thighs and back that produced his children by going around swinging them in tattered clothes?

In yet another show of how the poor man is determined to segregate against his disadvantaged cousin, one of the rich in charge with Education nodded in affirmation to the proposal of tuition increments in all public universities namely; Makerere, Gulu, Busitema and Mbarara. The increase was not a slight one that a poor man can hoe to achieve, but a mind-boggling 40%. Yes, Rujumba, by 40%! It was communicated by none other than the NRM minister in charge of higher education- Mwesigwa Rukutana.

This prolific reflection of outsourcing and the junta’s commitment to the universally acclaimed benefit of education for all follows another resolution by the rich that there shall not be any meals in the students’ halls of residence. The government and the creatively set up university council of Makerere University, majorly a reserve for the rich, have now reminded their poor cousins that the use of a University is academic. It is not a catering institution. It is hub of academics. Period!

Rujumba, now I suspect two things here and pardon me if they may in any way hurt you.

1. The rich are finally implementing their long harbored prosperity for all design of creating a Varsity that is exclusively their preserve, a fitting symbol of class and brass. They are tired of rubbing shoulders with people whose bodies are friendly to ticks. They are now gazzetting themselves a no go area to avert the danger of contracting those small parasites.

2. The Junta head is at his old tricks again. Cause outcry the country over and drop from heaven as messiah. This fees thing is unallowingly high and not good for the poor farmer. In a show of gratitude, the peasant farmer will shower you with votes like a sheep that has survived slaughter!

Abwooli, I beg to be protected.



KYOMUHENDO- ATEENYI

OF HOW TIMES CHANGE!

Abwooli Rujumba Omurungi W’Abasambu, the rock of the Ugandan opposition, FDC strongman Dr. Kiiza Besigye Kifeefe has been quoted in an interview saying that Junta head President Yoweri Museveni can only chose when to retire from grazing his cattle and not from the peoples’ state houses of Entebbe and Kampala!

Rujumba, the man actually said that the Sabagabe, as Toronto-based Ugandan pediatric Dr. Muniini K. Mulera prefers to fondly call him, can only have the choice of quitting his mastered art of dung- management and not the evil art of mercilessly plundering Africa’s Pearl in the very same way Spanish conquistador Hernando Cortez and his crew were able to loot and mop from the face of the earth the prosperous Aztec civilization.

The good brave doctor was responding to some reckless statements made by the dictator on WBS, a local television station, that he was fit and strong, whatever his age, with the charisma of a youth to preside over this country till the constitutionally set age- ceiling of 75 even after his wondrous thieving escapades that have lasted close to a quarter a century.

What amused me however was not Dr. Besigye’s well-wrapped and spot on reply to the reckless statements of his former commander and patient but the pace at which time, that incorruptible relater of truth, can so swiftly locomote.

Before you were born, my dear brother, there came a time when the geurillero and his No Resistance Junta/Movement (NRJ/M) was generally loved and accepted by the unsuspecting peoples of Uganda. During those glorious days of the movement, the son of Kaguta was virtually above public scrutiny.

He was a darling; a timely savior who enjoyed cult status throughout the country. Thus his words were sometimes obeyed like law, his courtiers respected like gods who took on the role of emissaries to the Supreme deity that was him. Thus it was an unpardonable sin to be seen or heard incarcerating the patriot, as he then was, at any public fora lest you be rubbished as one of those hopelessly defeated UPC ‘failures’.

It follows then that before the myth of infallibility was finally burst, any sharp critic of the junta was considered an ungrateful misfit in society who would be christened all kinds of names overnight. We the children of the day were taught by society to gaze with nothing but scorn at the houses of UPC aristocrats for we ran the fear of being roasted alive on barbeque as they were crowned cannibals!

Society also tutored not to ever be ungrateful like those unthankful men. Generally in my native Bunyoro, Dr. Obote’s confidantes like Ausi Rwakaikara, Muhamood Kazimbiraine, Amos Bendebule, Mugasa, Amisi Gahwerra and the ilk would be taunted to the tunes of NRM liberation songs that did nothing but tell of how their regime failed hopelessly with no single achievement and of how they were the perpetrators of the very same failure.

One such ballad of which I was a clever husker was that one that had lines like: Rwakasisi we akajaribu akasindwa, Tom Rubaya………… akasindwa and it was at this stage of the song that we chipped in those ‘failures’ in our own locality like Rwakaikara and Mugenyi which lines were imprinted into our heads by our indoctrinated parents.

On the other hand, the guerillas were labeled all sorts of names ranging from Simbas (lions of liberation) to heroes that fought the bush war that was ‘heavy and encouraging’. Thus we all aspired to be not like the failures that were the Rwakasisi’s, but the heroes like Comrade Kato, Salim Saleh not forgetting our own Matayo Kyaligonza.

Rujumba, when I look back to those days and project fast forward to Dr. Besigye expressing his sentiments freely without being condemned as a disgruntled failure, I shudder and raise my hands high in supplication of how time, that incorruptible relater of truth, can speedily marathon.

It was never contemplated that one day, chief hero Gen. Museveni would eloquently be told of his deceitful tendencies!

Never was it contemplated that the cadre thieves of my taxpaying father’s money could be spot lit from Temangalo!

And never was it contemplated that a day would dawn when it was the turn of the liberation lions to wear the garments of ‘failures’. When they would turn into the new misfits of our old society!

Rujumba, at the NRM sycophants swapping roles overnight with the good UPC aristocrats and assuming the dreaded title of ‘failures’ in our huge and observant society not only reveals how tired, rotten, inefficient and corrupt the No Resistance Movement has become, but also tells tales of the victorious conquests of the jaws of time, that all-powerful vampire!



KYOMUHENDO- ATEENYI

THE STATE OF THINK TANKING IN UGANDA .

QUOTE OF THE DAY : ‘One does not slaughter a calf before its mother’s eyes !’
-THE BAKIGA OF UGANDA-


Abwooli Rujumba Omurungi W’Abasambu, when one listens to Professor Stephen Adei’s profile, one does not stop but drool on longingly in disbelief and wonderment of how a peasants’ own can rise to such lofty heights and clinch such unprecedented feats.

He is Ghanaian and a proud graduate of the famous Legon University, a career diplomat, a travelled economist, a rivetting talker, a polished scholar and most of all- a happily married man. Prof. Adei in all those honorifics was called upon by the Sundoulous African Leadership Trainning to deliver a public lecture on the role of Think tanks in emerging economies like Uganda.This was at the Primrose conference hall of Imperial Royale hotel- Kampala on Sunday July 19th 2009.

He kicked of his lecture by comparing a Think tank to a brain. That, according to him, the whole body is always dysfunctional for as long as the brain is tampered with or is static in thought. He correctly reasoned that the implementation of the activities of a think tank in any nation is always determined by the leader a country has.

Thus if a country is endowed with a selfless, visionary, patriotic, foward- leaning and transfamational leader, it is highly manifest that such a country will have a highly developed think tank capacity and that such a capacity will be equated to its level of growth.

But in the alternative, if a country is plagued with a greedy non- patriotic megalomeniac in sonata with a racket of worshiping sycophants, it is highly unlikely that think tanks in such an economy will at any one time thrive. Uganda seemed to perfectly fit in the latter category.

The good professor then cited with approval the inspiring stories of the Asian countries of Malaysia, India and Singapore where think tank capacity was harnessed to the fullest by the visionary and adorable leadership in those respective countries.

Driven by the monumental role of think tanking, the above mentioned Asian Tigers were able to hop, step and jump in a matter of just a quarter of a century amidst all the imposing impedements manned by the Brettonwood institutions and their unfailing allies; probably the same period of time President Museveni has spent destroying Uganda.

Today, singapore boasts of one of the wealthiest, most industiallised ( with the world’s finest and biggest oil refinery) most self sustaining and shockingly prosperous economies of the world. She is the proud owner of the worlds’ highest per capita income !

Yet as a sovereign country, Uganda, was at the same level of development as Singapore only three and a half decades ago ! As Uganda was still trapped in the petty ethnic bickerings and grapplings over power, Singapore was busy building her institutions, harnessing her best brains through think tanks and resolvedly developing her rudimentary technology. It was during the same time that this great Asian tiger actually grew economic claws !

Thus at the peak of those very decicive two decades of transformation ie 1965- 1985 in the history of Singapore, Uganda inherited a new power status quo that shot itself to the helm. That was the National Resistance Movement of guerillamo Yoweri Kaguta Museveni.

What was actually bequethed to it at the overthrowal of Obote II was a ramshackled and exploited economy manned by inexperienced individuals. The untested guerilla band that was the N.R.M had to develop the economy from a pile of ruins to a success story. This seemed to have been the promise of the junta for the first reignal years.

However things degenerated drastically as the junta head sought to enlogate himself into power. He now turned into a crafty merchant willing to splash any amount of taxpayers remmitances to buy off dissenting voices. The Peoples’ state house of Nakasero became the market-place for these shoddy transactions. He then chose to preside over a thieving regime-- perhaps modern times most gifted and still unbursted racket of goonery.

He circumvented Article 105 of the constitution and imposed himself as Uganda’s ruler for life thanks to a generously rewarded legislature full of favour- seeking and praise- singing sycophants. He consolidated this evil deed by wantonly rigging the polls with gun totling mercenaries- the Supreme court attested to this !

The evil one has now presided over our country for almost a quarter a century but unlike Singapore with a thriving economy propelled sharply during the same period of time, with drastic results. Uganda is now home to the worlds endagered speecies of the greediest and most fearless vultures perhaps ever known to man ! They consume what belongs to the state in broad day light!

Unlike the good Prof. Adei who chose not to go into the cemantics of the state of think tanks in Uganda, i now choose to mildly take on this moral obligation.

The lack of fully fledged and independent National and University think tanks, i believe, partly explains the mess that is in our country. The lack of this critical fora necessary for national development has unfortunately seen the prized role of think tanks being hijacked by a clique of individuals called presidential advisors whose only vocation is to impress their employer if they are to have the next meal on their tables.

It is also accurate to observe, i so believe, that the resurgency of these advisors over think tanks is an intended ploy by government to hoodwink Ugandans from what is actually happening. A think tank is an unremitting fountain of a variety of ideas touching on the general state of governance in a country. It is in itself a pressure block that hatches and presses for implementation a string of policies bent towards propelling a national economy and a country to the top.

Thus the President and his government cannot accept these think tanks to thrive and unravell the web of deceit, theft, coersion, incerceration and the state of fear and hopelessness that Ugandans have been plunged to. It therefore follows that any attempt by an individual, think tank or institution to come out openly and expose the excesses of his administration will readilly collide with his ruthless wrath.

This partly explains why in the Universities, think tanking and student activism in national governance is at its lowest ever. These agile minds have been tactifuly kept in a state of fear, looming arrests, supression, tear- gassing and intimidation. Thus any student revolt and demonstration these days is remorselessly given the attention it deserves- rapid deployment, shoot on sight orders and tear gas cannisters !

KYOMUHENDO- ATEENYI

WHAT IS THE MOTIVE OF THE GOVERNMENT ?

QUOTE OF THE DAY : ‘What forgets is the axe, but the tree that has been axed will never forget.’
-THE SHONA OF ZIMBABWE-


Abwoooli Rujumba Omurungi W’Abasambu, when a government intentionally refrains from answering the calling of help from its citizens in times crises, It in the alternative aspires to dismantle them!

There is no purer test of the effectiveness of an administration than when a citizenry blares a clarion call for help. When an administration swiftly intervenes and answers that desperate call, it can safely be branded effective but when the reverse is true, then the people do not deserve such a government. In fact they should aspire to overhaul it with whichever means possible!

Last week, those who died of hunger and starvation related diseases in the Nothern and North Eastern part of the country were being counted in their hundreds ! It was also related that three million of your brothers were on the brink of starvation by the turn of the week!

The press was awash with grim pictures of women crying after missing out on the last of the World Food Programmes’ (W.F.P) hand outs, a two-year old Karamojong boy crawling after a cockroach, teenagers feasting of poisonous cassava tubers, an elderly woman rabidly rubbing her stomach as if to intimate that exactly that could reduce her hunger and Peter Oduluse, a 70 year old resident of Amuchu parish, Amuria district hopelessly stretched down!

Native doctors reportedly took turns in the dire pursuit of appeasing the Gods and swaying them to save the land from the calamity of famine! Rujumba, the look in Peter Oduluse’s eyes eloquently spoke of government betrayal!

Even with the Ministry of Disaster, Preparedness and Relief in place, the response of the government was regrettable. It not only shocked and disturbed the nation but equally invited tears to freely flow from the eyes of those who not only sympathized with their suffering people but also questioned the motive of government.

Rujumba, when reports of massive deaths as a result of the famine flowed to Kampala, the honorable Minister of Disaster and Preparedness in a press conference he personally convened asked the messengers for proof of their allegation by show of graves! According to him, this hunger thing was a smear campaign to government orchestrated by disgruntled opposition hotheads whose major occupation is to sound doldrums even where it is not necessary.

That once more, the opposition legislators had seized the opportunity of a ‘mere food shortage’ to smear the good government. He then reminded the people that it was not the duty of government to feed its people and capped up his words with counsel to the famine stricken people to grow more mangoes, dry them in times of plenty and save the excess for tough times. He is a professor of sociology from Makerere University, East Africa’s premier tertiary institution.

When famine hit Kenya at the turn of last year, the Kibaki- led government, whatever its excesses, swiftly responded by declaring a state of emergency. Through negotiations with Kenyan partners abroad and with the blessing of the O.D.M, the major opposition party, pathways of relief were constructed in the Harambee nation.
But it remained that His Excellency Emilio Mwai Kibaki swallowed all his pride , declared a state of emergency and saved his countrymen who were bordering death.

Thus in Kenya there may be electoral theft and those other evils that plague African democracies but there no such a thing like the government forsaking its people in dire times. The government loves its own!

The world over, governments react swiftly to check any crises they are faced with or actually take significant strides in countering the after-effects of those crises that are beyond man’s contemplation. When Hurricane Katrina bore its claws on the American shores, the response was swift and admirable. When a powerful earthquake shook L’Aquila in Italy, Silvio Berlusconi’s government impressed and in fact, made it the venue of the G8 summit to tell of how his administration feels the plight of the its countrymen.

In the Peoples Republic of China, Hu Jintao’s government has repeatedly shown commitment to its people at the strike of the crises the latest being an Earthquake.
But in Uganda, Tinker man Yoweri Museveni and his segregationist junta cannot just stop tinkering with the lives of Ugandans. By show of their actions, they virtually feel nothing for the ordinary poor Ugandan.

That explains why ministers have the Liberty to post such despicable comments in such trying times. That is why Museveni’s henchmen can afford to live lavish lives fit only for Hollywood actors of fame and name as jiggers ravage the electorate.
That is why a ‘super’ minister can openly rob workers of shillings 11 billion and the government he is serving parcels out a paltry 10 billion shillings as a relief envelope to the people being overwhelmed by famine.

Rujumba, if the N.R.M administration goes on with such cosmetic responses to dire crises like the current famine that is running over the Northern and Eastern parts of the country, these brothers of ours shall not only feel segregated against and thus seek secession but will also doubt the motive of the government.

KYOMUHENDO- ATEENYI

www.kyomuhendoateenyi.blogspot.com