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Time, they say, is the best healer of them all.
If, twenty years ago, when memories of the great man�s genocidal
exploits were still fresh, rumours had filtered through that Idi
Amin Dada was comatose;
That for all practical purposes, he was dead, save
for intercession of modern technology via life-support systems, I
am sure most Ugandans would have sought out the fatted calf from
among their herds for a celebratory sacrifice.
Like the modern plague, Aids, the president had
turned the country into a killing field whose harvest, estimated
to range anywhere between 500,000 and 800,000 souls, must have
touched just about every homestead.
With modern-day pestilence, at least you know what
happened to your departed; you can do your duty by their remains,
and attain a sense of closure.
But what do you do with the spirits of loved ones
whose manner of (or reason for) death you do not know and whose
skeletons could be lying anywhere. They could be in Lake Victoria,
Bwerenga swamp, Namanve forest reserve (or what is left of it),
Matumbwe river on Bugerere road, Bujagali rapids, or the entire
length of both the Victoria and the Albert Niles, to name but a
few.
Quite obviously the president could not have
possibly killed the entire half million (plus) Ugandans -
personally.
And I doubt whether all the orders to cause people
to be stuffed into the boots of cars and made to �disappear�
emanated from him all the time.
But he is guilty of each and every execution since
his public espousal of brutality and cruelty gave a license to big
time war-lords such as Brig. Hussein Malera (Military Police,
Makindye), Ali Towilli (Public Safety Unit, Naguru), and Lt. Col.
Farouk Minawa (State Research Bureau, Nakasero), to butcher
Ugandans without let or hindrance.
The small fry, armed and charged with the defence
of the revolution, and the legions of refugees from countries, I
am not going to name, who had nothing to lose, were just as
lethal.
Orders or no orders, I insist, as US President
Harry S. Truman used to do, that the buck stopped in the Chief
Executive�s Office.
On the strength of the excesses outlined above �
which constitute only the tip of the proverbial iceberg � Ugandans
of two or so decades ago must have found their president so
revolting that in their secret thoughts, they must have said �your
excellency, even a hyena will vomit after eating you.�
This is a peculiar and telling Ateso insult. If a
hyena, which is not exactly renowned for moderation in its
appetite or refined �table manners�, should puke in disgust after
eating you, then you must be exceptionally odious.
Yet, almost a quarter of a century after Amin�s
last dance as Uganda�s absolute �monarch�, the hyena that would
have the misfortune of dining on him would not throw up.
The air is thick with talk of �forgiveness and
reconciliation�, �amnesty and pardon�, �magnanimity and mercy�.
Death has, of course, remained an institution
regarded by most Ugandans with awe, despite years of brutalisation
and trauma.
It is not unusual to see a total stranger who
chances upon a group of mourners, interrupting his errand briefly
to join them, shed a few tears perhaps, and part with a little
condolence money before taking a most respectful leave.
Quite a bit of this is clearly at play here. Only
a heartless ruffian would want to mock an eighty-year-old,
terminally ill man.
But I think there is a larger spectrum here, laced
with a considerable dose of cynicism spawned by our recent
history. There have been several Idi Amins in various guises who
have killed and humiliated Ugandans in ways not terribly different
from those used by the self-styled Conqueror of the British
Empire.
So the buffoon slaughtered an estimated half a
million people. Haven�t many of his successors who also used
violence to come to power replicated the Field Marshal�s acts of
carnage?
The skulls of Luwero had the good fortune of being
collected into a few sacred shrines.
But has anybody cared to count how many fell in
West Nile after 1980? Has anybody cared to count the skulls in
Lango in the aftermath of Milton Obote�s second ouster in 1985?
For a long time the Iteso were second to the
Baganda in numerical strength. Why did the population census of
the early 1990s see them relegated to fifth or even sixth
position?
What happened to the others or to the Iteso�s
powers of procreation? How many skulls adorn the grasslands of
Acholi?
With so many other despots at large or sleeping
peacefully in their graves, it is surely futile to rave at a dying
tyrant whose extradition we should have effected a million years
ago but didn�t.
Then again Amin, for all his ruthlessness, made
a few people deliriously rich and happy.
His Economic War, which began with the expulsion
of foreigners, mostly of Asian extraction but also including
Israelis, British and Americans, culminated into Operation Mafuta
Mingi. The latter involved donating prosperous department stores,
shops, sophisticated businesses, tea plantations and ultra-modern
factories, free of charge to bicycle mechanics, mandazi sellers,
and other empty-headed bunglers.
Their only qualification for the business
enterprise in question was their tribe, the language they spoke,
their religion, or the ruthlessness with which they executed
perceived opponents of the regime. You cannot ever hope to
persuade these Cinderella businessmen that Amin was anything but
an angel.
Those who couldn�t benefit directly form Operation
Mafuta Mingi had magendo or speculation trade to fall back on.
For the well connected, magendo could (and did
indeed) became more lucrative than owning big shops selling
merchandise that people could not afford. Here is how it
worked.
Because of mismanagement and serious shortages of
foreign exchange for replenishing stocks or buying spares for the
factories, almost all the necessities of life disappeared from the
stores and shop shelves.
Whatever stock still existed in the country was
safely tucked away to be accessed only by the chosen few who could
produce an allocation chit from a powerful government
functionary.
People who were not in the least bit interested in
business but knew influential general managers, bureaucrats or
ministers would walk into the good man�s office without a shilling
in their pockets and ask to be allocated a lorryful of beer, soda,
textiles or sugar as the case might be.
The beneficiary would sell that silly (but
valuable) piece of paper to any one from the myriad of business
people who always thronged the minister�s/general manager�s outer
office.
The chit would go to the highest bidder, who had
the ability to pay for it in millions. But, knowing of course,
that he had the freedom to raise the price of the commodity
sky-high in order to recoup his money and also make a handsome
profit.
Tell me how a man who becomes a millionaire in the
twinkling of an eye without any investment or sweat can hate the
person who instituted the system.
Didn�t the man accomplish anything positive
whether by design or by accident? Of course, he did.
Nobody rules continually for eight years without
blundering onto something good. Yes, he put an end to kondoism or
armed robbery.
Yes, he put the fear of God into the Karimojong by
threatening to cut off their penises, thus banishing cattle
rustling for the duration of his rule.
And yes, he pushed through to the end the
completion of some projects planned for or started by the Obote I
government.
He completed the construction of the Nile Hotel
and the International Conference Centre. He pursed the idea of
colour television (for what it was worth) until it was realised.
He built Uganda�s mission to the United Nations in
New York. Okay? He also completed Radio Uganda�s short-lived
External Broadcasting Services transmitters at Dakabela,
Soroti.
The hyena which eats Ssalongo Al-Haji Field
Marshal Dr. Idi Amin Dada, V.C., D.S.O., M.C., Conqueror of the
British Empire, President of the Republic of Uganda and Chairman
of the O.A.U., will not indeed vomit.
But I shudder to think that a genocidal tyrant can
purchase his immunity from prosecution by living to a ripe old age
in exile and gorging himself to death. This is not acceptable
completely and also.
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