Gen. Muhoozi Kainerugaba (MK), President Museveni’s son, has lately been in the news, in fact for three years consecutively, and no sign of “kuzikiza- switching off” just yet. He continuously rebrands himself often coming up with new even more potent ideas.
Today he adorns in a tight-fitting suit and tomorrow you meet him dressed in a yellow shirt of his father’s NRM party. Then another day, almost like his father, you will see him putting on military attires complete with his General’s insignia. He is a Four-Star General, Uganda’s highest military rank.
The timing of MK’s Patriotic League of Uganda (PLU) pressure group or civic organization or even a political party, if you like, adds a layer of complexity to an already tumultuous political climate in Uganda.
As the nation grapples with a myriad of political challenges like President Museveni’s perpetual hold onto power; fading political opposition and an ageing political elite, then it is engulfed in insurmountable economic problems. These include widening economic inequality; an ongoing futile fight against the now institutionalized corruption and foreign indebtedness.
It is quite amazing that no one talks about the runaway national debt as if we have great plans in place to service it. We don’t have any sound plans and soon we shall be put out to dry.
And all the above myriads of problems are behind the backdrop of an indifferent population which does not respect laws let alone believe in them. Including but not limited to a group of western countries bent on destroying Uganda for daring to talk bad about homosexuality.
Now the emergence of this new MK group called PLU therefore threatens to further erode trust in political institutions, deepen division and eat away the meagre resources we have been trying to scrap together for a rainy day.
And yet, like always, “Muzeyi anapanga- Museveni has a plan” to take us all into a glorious future.
Friends, President Museveni is an unending enigma.
We just came out of a highly successful hosting of global leaders during the NAM and G77+China conferences and a visible refurbishment of Kampala City. It is noteworthy that it was during the two conferences that he made a speech (I talked about that speech here in an earlier article) which is still making reverberations in many Western capitals.
And now, through his son MK, he is already reminding us that Uganda is still a work in progress and he is in charge.
Don’t get twisted and think that PLU is a brainchild of MK or Frank Gashumba and Hon. Kabanda. It can’t even be an idea brought forward by Nuwagira Toyota Kaguta, Shedrac Nzeire Kaguta or Joseph Tamale Mirundi. None of those folks have the wherewithal to push such an idea.
The real architect of that ambitious plan seats in Rwakitura and at times Kisozi ranch to come up with such confusing and often ambiguous but highly successful ideas or plans.
Of course we have another cluster of NRM cadres uniting in an umbrella known as ‘Patriotism Clubs’ with a national secretariat headed by Seku Hellen. Then we have the NRM Secretariat seating at No. 10 Kyadondo led by Richard Twodong and the ONC (Office of National Chairman) presided over by Hajati Hadijah Namyalo an located at Kyambongo.
This is the famous Modus operandi of Yoweri Museveni. He creates many groups doing similar work therefore duplication. President Museveni is a great lover of this kind of work the result of which is to avoid so-called ‘special’ workers!
He creates groups to monitor his works then creates other monitors to monitor those and others to monitor those monitors until the ball returns to him once again as the chief monitor.
It has always been him ever since he mastermind the fall of Idi Amin Dada in 1979; chased Milton Obote in 1985 subsequently pushing the ‘Northern clique’ out of power for an undetermined period. He is the same architect who engineered the eventual death of political opposition in Uganda by creating a constitution which has no safeguards. Every opposition you see today making noise in Uganda be it DP, NUP, FDC, UPC, name others; it is because the Rwakitura General allows it.
Without beating around the bush therefore, PLU is a brainchild of President Yoweri Museveni. And a major objective of PLU is to attract the “yuti- youth” back to President Museveni’s revolution.
Headlines are screaming that “Museveni stops MK’s presidential ambitions,” and that “MK will come in as president in 2036!” The headlines are missing the point because President Museveni has never prepared MK to replace him as president except in the event of a tragic accident.
The president knows absolutely that his ageing cadre ship led by Moses Kigongo, Kahinda Otafiire, Salim Saleh, Rebecca Kadaga, Moses Ali, Mike Mukula, Ruth Nankabirwa, Sam Kutesa, Lydia Wanyoto, Kale Kayihura, Asuman Kiyingi, Sam Engola, Jim Muhwezi, Robinah Nabanja, name all the other NRM actors, have no energy or appeal left to help propel his cause forward.
Besides President Museveni is now surrounded by ‘NRM’ cadres who don’t actually support the party
New luminaries of the party are not real NRM members like Nobert Mao (Minister of Justice); Haruna Kasolo (state minister of Finance); Betty Amongi Obote (Minister of Gender and Social Services); Anita Anet Among (Speaker of Parliament; Thomas Tayebwa (Deputy Speaker); Betty Kamya Turwomwe (IGG); Beatrice Anyar (state minister for water); Katumba Wamala and over five UPDF soldiers who are ministers, among others but all holding juicy posts in government.
President Museveni knows too that a young group of people brought him to power decades ago but now they have given birth to other young people who don’t see the continued relevancy of a Museveni presidency.
He was the least surprised therefore that Robert Kyagulanyi lovingly known as Bobi Wine would attract such a youth following. And if we are all talking about the same Museveni I know, then Bobi Wine’s honeymoon ended in 2021!
The year 2026 will surely be Yoweri Museveni’s last term because of age and having completed most of the things he set out to accomplish for both country and his family.
Because we are naturally unappreciative, the term running from 2026 to 2031 would have been a ‘free’ term for President Museveni. We would not carry out a presidential election in recognition of his service to Uganda. We don’t even want to talk about the money we can save if no presidential elections are carried out.
If as Ugandans we come up with such a proposal, the opposition and President Museveni (NRM) will vehemently oppose it . Both entities benefits from an election period.
Nonetheless, God did not give us that capacity to think further than our noses therefore many of us will oppose such an idea.
When Yoweri Museveni formed the plan to go to the bush after UPC and Milton Obote had rigged the 1980 elections, he told a few of his friends about this idea and many refused right away. They told him that they should nurture their political party, UFM, and win political power in the future.
“Which political power?” Was his last words before he disappeared from a Lungujja home owned by Kintu Musoke.
He never said another word and disappeared in the darkness of the night never to be seen again until five years later. Some of those people who had opposed his idea of a guerrilla war were the first ones to lobby for ministerial appointments in 1986.
Generally people are at first indifferent to new ideas. I recall in 1998 when Ugandans were abusing ‘automatic’ transmission vehicles calling them all sorts of names. Now none wants to drive a manual transmission vehicle!
Everytime President Yoweri Museveni introduces new ideas, we scream. They often work but faulting them at every turn.
Everyone is talking about Gen. MK a serving military person who is ‘breaking’ the law by participating in politics. But no one has been talking about serving military officers like Generals Aronda Nyakayirima, Edward Katumba Wamala, David Muhoozi, Kasiita Gowa and others when they are deployed as ministers!
The moment you let a person like Gen. Katumba Wamala to be a minister of government in a civilian/ political position, then you have no authority whatsoever to fight Gen. MK from doing the same.
Ugandans are good at playing deaf or hiding their heads in the sand like the proverbial ostrich. They will not complain when Jacob Oulanyah or Cecilia Ogwal are replaced by their siblings as legislators but make plenty of noise when President Museveni just talks about his son as being a good person!
If I am not mistaken, again, the central role of PLU will be to remind the yuti why they still need Yoweri Museveni to continue with the calibration of their country.
SILENCING THE OPPOSITION:
I often tell my friends that Gen. MK’s strategic and now tactical maneuvers have singlehandedly removed NUP (National Unity Platform) and Bobi Wine from the news headlines. NUP diehards are on social media (unreasonably abusing anyone and anything therefore not recruiting new members) while MK and his army of sycophantic supporters are slightly spreading like a wildfire all over Uganda.
Many Ugandans were at first fed on this picture of an incoherent son of the president, MK, until they were so convinced that this soldier- boy has nothing of his own to say.
When he started moving around the country, many naysayers were predicting a fall (embarrassment) of biblical proportions like that of Goliath. They were seeing the darling of the opposition, Robert Sentamu Kyagulanyi lovingly known as Bobi Wine, as the David who would soon defeat the colossus known as Goliath or Museveni disguised as MK!
Slowly and purposely, MK moved around the country ostensibly to celebrate his birthdays and no one suspected these maneuvers. The opposition was quick to point out that he was spending state resources on these tours just to meet ‘hired’ crowds. They even tried saying that a ‘serving’ military man was, by law and UPDF acts, not allowed to participate in bipartisan politics.
We all always forget the glaring reality before our eyes that the land title of Uganda has a proprietor called Yoweri Museveni. This has been the reality in the last 45 years or so (people tend to forget that Yoweri Museveni and his NRA were the de facto rulers of Luweero for five years!).
When Gen. MK met nearly 300 ruling NRM Parliamentarians in the East timing it with the house-warming party of the Speaker Anita Among Magogo, it was simply a question of time before the prince was announced.
Before MK, the name Bobi Wine had become synonymous with Uganda. After Idi Amin, no one was talked about inside and outside Uganda like Bobi Wine. The Magere gladiator had actually surpassed Yoweri Museveni with followers on all social media outlets.
The government, President Museveni if you like, had tried to clobber his supporters in order to silence him. Many were hounded out of Uganda and became refugees elsewhere but his popularity grew. He was directly clobbered himself and trumped-up charges preferred against him but this increased his popularity.
Bobi Wine was being presented as the leader of the current generation being 42 years old fighting to remove Yoweri Museveni who is 80 years old.
Even President Museveni was alarmed by this age difference and suspected as much that Ugandans have finally discovered his Achilles’s foot!
First he tried to rebrand himself by stopping to move with Maama Janet, his wife, switching to his young beautiful daughters. He even threw away his buggy suits made in Uganda by his tailors for fitting ones made in London at Savvy Street. Even wearing those white shirts it made him look smart la MADIBA Nelson Mandela.
All these failed including of course retracing the NRA war routes dubbed “Africa Kwetu” where he walked nearly 300km on foot. On this journey he had young and often energetic men and women who failed to cover the distance Muzeyi Museveni covered!
Until one night when seated all alone with his cows that an idea came to him. He knew right away that his answer was always Infront of him like a long nose. In his son Kainerugaba or avenger, he saw a saviour.
Gen. MK is 49 years old therefore diminishing completely the age talk. After his unveiling, President Museveni has no worry at all under the sun. His son has assisted him in defeating the opposition even before an election.
He has enlisted Kampala’s charlatans like Frank Gashumba and Tamale Mirundi. These fellows know how to play street politics and of course to ‘chop monie’ which the General seem to have in plentiful supply.
I have also observed another trend where President Museveni’s daughter, Natasha is leading the crusade to rebrand her parents on social media. She is showing us a soft side of her parents in the process winning over many Ugandans. She made those movies which glorified her revolutionary father now she makes her parents appear chick on TikTok!
I think for the first time, this TikTok idea did not come from President Museveni.
Slowly but surely MK is no longer a joking word but a political reality jutting out in the African sun like a sphinx. Everyone is running scared including NRM diehards who are facing a hard choice: stick with Museveni for a guaranteed present or support MK for a possible future! Whichever side these folks will choose, there are consequences.
BY WAY OF CONCLUSION:
Like I often tell you, President Museveni is wondering how easily Ugandan can be fooled. That is why he often prefers to be with his cows in Rwakitura which gives him assured loyalty and a better sense of humour. He knows like you should that Ugandans are a people who believes in anything. I mean anything however twisted or fake.
Should we talk about the rise of ‘fake’ pastors or talk about fake “sengas- aunts” or “kojjas- uncles” and their concoctions that prolong male genitals and gives female folks something something?
Apart from overstaying in power, which is a lesser evil, President Museveni guaranteed peace and security the only ingredients which were missing for Uganda to enter a take-off stage.
Surely we have enough resources and a clever population to boot. But insecurity was our Achilles’s feet until Museveni picked an AK- 47; collected a few young people, and dashed to the bush.
Of course things change and new dynamics crop in. Now Museveni needs to rebrand to stay relevant to a generation which has not known any war or even heard of the ear-splitting sound of an RPG rocket.
Noise and elections, as Dr. Kizza Besigye often reminds us, cannot and will never remove Mr. Museveni from power because he does his homework that well.
LAST WORD: “I will leave Uganda when every single person supports the NRM party” – Yoweri Museveni 2017.
Adam Kamulegeya
adamkam2003@gmail.com
0779 104 336
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