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Why we left Museveni
I am often asked: ‘How is FDC different from the Movement?’ I often answer that NRM-O is a personality cult but FDC is about institution building. I have started breaking down the answer to give it more meaning and hopefully get more understanding for the reasons why followers left the flock to become opponents.
Some time after taking power in 1986, President Museveni diverted from the original Movement goal of building a democratic nation and embarked on a journey to entrench himself in power by manipulating legitimate authority and the abundant hope that the population had in him. Like the CEO who increases his own interest at the expense of stockholders, Museveni’s government became an affair of loyalists and their interests transcended those of serving the nation.
From there on, it was a matter of personal conviction and timing for ethical leaders to quit NRM upon realising that there was no room for undoing the damage from within the organisation. To this day, other leaders such as Bidandi Ssali still cling to the hope that they can wrestle Goliath from within rather than step back to use David’s sling from the other side of the political divide.
The turning point may have been different but the reasons given for leaving revolve around the same themes.
A common theme is that Museveni undermines legitimate authority in favour of parallel structures of loyalists. The usurpers who usually had no prior standing in law become so powerful that they render legitimate structures obsolete and non-consequential. SRPS (special revenue protection services) was closely aligned with Uganda Revenue Authority (URA); run by the military and no one knew exactly how SRPS recruited or to whom it was accountable. AGOA and the Uganda AIDS Commission are not associated with line ministries; instead they found their way to the President’s Office. Foreign policy is not evolved in Foreign Affairs; instead it is State House which influences positions on international trade, war in Iraq, and aligning all policies with U.S. interests.
Regional policy was implemented by the Chieftaincy of
Military Intelligence (CMI), External Se
curity
Organisation (ESO), and Ministry of Defence; after all, we were negotiating our way out of conflict rather than negotiating trade agreements. And military men – Col. Noble Mayombo, Maj. Gen. Kahinda Otafiire, and Amama Mbabazi (Defence minister) became the negotiators.
Legitimate authority was deliberately undermined and power centres devolved from professionals to loyalists.
Then the coercive machinery of government came to the fore; CMI was big, the Presidential Protection Unit was replaced by the Presidential Guard Brigade, Kakooza Mutale became a household name associated with election violence. All pretences at a democratic evolution were thrown out of the window.
While Museveni’s first decade was inclusive, broad-based, with a shared vision, now the country implements Museveni’s personal vision and he has remarked memorably that he is the only one with a vision to lead Uganda. The rhetoric is still visionary and alludes to grand ideals of transforming society but the means of achieving the ideals have become Machiavellian; principle has been thrown out of the window and in its place we see political expediency.
The epitome of all this manipulation and intrigue is embodied in the devious manner in which the executive is proceeding to amend Article 105(2) of the Constitution to remove presidential term limits. So, the over-simplified view that the quarrel between FDC and NRM-O is over Museveni’s desire for a 5th term is wrong. The amendment is simply the most defining of a malady that afflicts the NRM-O: A cultish style of leadership.
When he was a transformational leader, young university graduates followed Museveni into the bush to struggle against dictatorship. They were attracted by his visionary leadership and pushed by a brutal dictatorship. He inspired them, appealed to their values, self-esteem and to higher ideals for which many laid down their lives. Today he is a transactional leader who wins allegiance through a quid-pro-quo system of rewards. The gap between rich and poor has widened, corruption is rampant – because the only motivation that a public servant has to do their work is materialistic not idealistic.
Two decades later, Uganda is once again ripe for transformational leadership to harness the gains of Museveni’s first decade and to avoid the decay that would come with a third decade. The stability period, which had an efficiency orientation that brought unprecedented economic growth, has passed. It is time for Ugandans to align their self-interest with national interest and not Museveni’s interest; and that is what FDC is about.
The biggest hurdle for new leadership is in the weapons of influence that Museveni uses to cling to power, which we shall discuss next week.
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The author is FDC coordinator in the United States. | 
