| Freedom fighters can die young and clean, or they can grow old and become monsters of corruption
There was the National Resistance Movement. Then it was rebaptised the Movement. Now it's been changed into a party called National Resistance Movement-Organisation (NRM-O).
Whoever thought of bringing back the word "Resistance" knew what he or she was doing. For we all clearly see that they are resisting further democratisation, and the sensible check of term limits that nearly all emerging economies and democracies in Africa, Asia, and Latin America have adopted. Instead, we have created a President-for-Life.
Thoughtful commentators say the political reversals in Uganda shouldn't have surprised us. It is what you might call the "curse of the freedom fighter" at work. No one has made this point better than the immensely enjoyable Mr Miles Kingston, columnist of The Independent of London.
Curse of freedom fighter
If it is any comfort, Uganda is not alone. Let's leave it to Kingston, who writes:
"One of the reasons why the sacking of Jakob Zuma, South Africa's deputy president, has been so uncomfortably received is that that [being entangled in corruption] is not how heroes are supposed to behave. Zuma, after all, was an old ANC champion who was in prison with Nelson Mandela. He was a principled underdog fighting for liberty against an oppressive regime.
"And it now seems that when he reached power, he fell from grace and was tempted by bribes and corruption
everyone is saying what a shame it is, though Mr Zuma is still very popular, and nobody can quite believe it.
"Well, it may be a shame, but to say it is a shock or a surprise would be ridiculous. One of the things you learn in life, or that you should learn in life, is that when the underdog becomes the top dog, he changes character as fast as a lottery winner.
"The
underdogs always get a good press. Freedom fighters are always heroes. The little guy oppressed by the big guy is always right. The Boers 100 years ago
the Vietcong
the Australian aboriginals
the people of East Timor
the indigenous North Americans [so-called Red Indians]
the Jews in Germany
all these in time have had the rose-tinted spectacle treatment. Quite right too
we assumed that they were noble and virtuous, and patient and long-suffering, and that when they were liberated , they would go on being noble and virtuous and all the rest of it, and work out their own future, and put all the past wrongs right.
"When the poor down-trodden victim finally attains power, he becomes as corrupt and vicious as anyone else, and often as incompetent. The Africans threw off the colonial yoke and put on an African yoke of despotism and corruption. The Jews, freed from the Nazi boot, created their own racist nation and yes, if the poor downtrodden Palestinians got their chance fo
r
self-government, they would do the same
The only tribe that gets a perpetually good press is the tribe that never gains its freedom.
"
The IRA were once admired from afar, especially from the USA, as freedom fighters. Now they are seen as corrupt, and drug-runners, and thugs, and murderers
And they haven't attained the power they were after! They have managed to go directly from being underdogs to being dirty without ever being top dogs.
"And that is why Nelson Mandela is regarded universally with awe. Freedom fighters normally have two courses of action. They can die young, unfulfilled, and untainted like Che Guevara, or they can become monsters of greed and corruption like Robert Mugabe.
To grow old, and powerful, and still stay good and untainted, as Nelson Mandela has done, is almost superhuman. To fall like Zuma, is sad. But how very human".
But, I would add, still so very unforgivable.
Monsters?
If Uganda's freedom fighters have become monsters, what do you say to those who argue that the majority in Parliament favour creating a President-for-Life; and to the real possibility that the majority might well elect President Museveni to the job?
To them, I would recommend the wisdom of the great writer, Mark Twain. Many of us, for better or worse, read his |Adventures of Huckleberry Finn when we were little. But there are those who think Twain is great not because of his books, but his speeches, and pithy remarks.
It was in his Notebook (1904) that he left us with one of the memorable political reflections of the 20th Century: "Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to reform - or pause and reflect".
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