Uganda’s South Sudan adventure

Why supporting Salva Kiir may turn out to be Museveni’s most ill-advised military intervention 

The Uganda People’s Defense Forces (UPDF) recent military adventure into South Sudan follows a pattern that has made our country a regional military hegemon and our president, one of Africa’s most influential presidents. Our armies (or their offshoots) now stand guard from the Gulf of Eden (Somalia) on the Indian Ocean to Kinshasa on the Atlantic Ocean. Museveni can now project power from Bor in South Sudan to Eastern DRC. With Rwandan troops (an off-shoot of UPDF) in Central Africa Republic and Joseph Kabila’s army (an off-shoot of Rwanda) in charge of all the Congo, President Yoweri Museveni has overtaken Julius Nyerere as Africa’s most militarily interventionist president.

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NRM at 28, a balanced scorecard

Museveni’s biggest problem has been to overpromise and under-deliver hence the recurrent frustrations of his utopian supporters

This week, President Yoweri Museveni and his National Resistance Movement (NRM) will be celebrating 28 years in government. In a moving inaugural speech in January 1986, he promised that “This is not a mere change of guard but a fundamental change in the politics of our country.”

Everything Museveni said on that day had been said by very many African leaders when coming to power – whether it was a nationalist politician receiving instruments of government from a departing colonial power, a politician who had defeated an incumbent government or a military officer who had staged a successful coup. Yet there was a tendency to present Museveni’s statements as new and original. A myth was created that he was exceptional.

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The link between sex and politics

Understanding the popularity of Museveni and Besigye through evolutionary science 
 

To understand the incentives that drive citizens who vote and the politicians who seek their votes, we may need to appreciate the lessons of evolutionary psychology especially in regard to male-female sexual relations. (I am sorry for gay couples as this theory may not apply to them). Men want sex from women so as to pass on their genes. Women want love from men in form of physical protection and material provision over a long period of time to ensure the growth and survival of their off springs.

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Making Mandela human again

Attempts to make Mandela a secular saint and set his actions apart from the general experience in Africa distort history

Two weeks ago, I committed “sacrilege” on my television show on NTV when I said that many of the things former South African president, Nelson Mandela, did and is being praised for have been done by other African leaders.

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Kamya fighting the wrong battle

Uganda needs social reform built around collectivities and not another constitution per se

The year 2014 is going to be the year that sets the tone for the 2016 elections. The politician with an argument for the future of Uganda is Beti Kamya. She has been arguing that the opposition in Uganda has been fighting the right battles the wrong way; that instead of the opposition focusing on removing President Yoweri Museveni from power; it should be pushing to remove power from him - and any other future president of Uganda.

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Can Besigye do a Mandela?

Why the opposition leader cannot dare seek a compromise with Museveni because he would be accused of selling out

Now that we have finished mourning and burying Nelson Mandela, we can celebrate his life by asking ourselves: can opposition leader Kizza Besigye act like him? If he tried, what would happen?
I use Besigye because he claims, like Mandela, to be fighting a corrupt and repressive government.

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