What would happen if an African opposition leader stood up in the middle of a meeting, started shouting back and pointing their finger at their president as seen here in the Trump White House recently (See picture attached). Surely it would be shocking in Uganda. If truth be told, many locals would see it as a sign of their opposition leader being "very powerful". For others, paranoïa would start settling in, and they would start advising the president's political opponent lady to flee the country for her own safety. Meanwhile it is actually the US president himself who released this picture of the lady shouting at him. To them, this picture is an indictment of the opposition leader. They are also calling it "her meltdown at the White House". Here in Africa, we would call it "Power", and crowds would start jubilating in her name all over the streets, (and possibly all over social media). That is fact about the difference in political maturity levels between two different societies. Obviously countries need such resolute opposition leaders, and democracy needs President's who see this simply as part of the natural political discourse and move on to the other more pressing important national issues (albeit after hitting back a little bit with a few words). No matter how bad I say Trump is, with some of us finding reason to call him a buffoon, clearly the US political culture itself is far ahead of what is in our own countries and our own "visionary leaders". This brings me to the Ugandan issue of another current confrontation: Museveni's "Bobi ban". The ban or prevention by the state of any citizen from engageing in any lawful activities is criminal in itself. Extrajudicial persecution of political opponents is when the state starts taking action against it's citizens based on purported crimes that do not even exist in the laws of this country. We should be asking if the young legislator has committed an offence and/or broken any law, why then isn't the matter before court? He is being accused and punished for being "An enemy of progress". Where is that crime in the law? The law determines all the punishable crimes in Uganda, and it is the law that also determines the punishment. And only a court can rule if their is any crime in the first place. What this kind of Musevenism behaviour leads to, is even more lawlessness by individuals serving in the organs of the state who would now follow in his footsteps and start taking extrajudicial action based on his assumed whims. In this case the police and security agencies who are now inclined to enforce bogus decisions and/or unlawful orders simply because their boss is angry against his/her political opponent on what might seem as patriotic grounds but is simply possible political persecution. Now if this is what is already happening today, I hate to imagine what awaits the young legislator and Museveni's other political opponents during the upcoming 2021 general elections. It's likely to be bloody, and as usual, many young people are going to loose their lives without even being remembered by anyone at the end of the exercise. Meanwhile, this Bobi ban seems to have other causes behind it. Including US Sanctions against some Museveni officials for their human rights abused. This includes visa restrictions where they cannot travel to the United States. Following Museveni's recent missing of the annual UN General Assembly in New York, there are concerned legal experts saying that he could himself be on the US sanctions list, but American law allows the White House the privilege to be quiet about certain sanctioned individuals in certain cases where it is in their national interest to do so. Remember that last year a US federal court also found a Chinese/Hong Kong businessman guilty of corruption after he gave Museveni a $1 million bribe in exchange for oil contracts. The corruption transaction was proved beyond any doubt, the telling email exchanges were presented as hard evidence, and therefore Mr. Yoweri Museveni is also legally a fugitive of the US Department of Justice as we speak. All this might have contributed to Mr. Museveni's rage and personal anger towards Honourable Bobi Wine who has been persistently lobbying against Museveni in the United States, including having meetings with Members of Congress and the House of Representatives. But getting back to the issue of political persecution, all actions of any government must be grounded strictly within the law. Not out of one person's hatred, vindictiveness and/or temper tantrums. And God knows that rightful leadership in a mature democracy has no room for such dangerous childishness against political opponents or against people like myself who pragmatically speak out about it in the public domain.
By Hussein Lumumba Amin Friday October 18th, 2019. Kampala, Uganda.
_______________________________________________ WestNileNet mailing list WestNileNet@kym.net http://orion.kym.net/mailman/listinfo/westnilenet WestNileNet is generously hosted by INFOCOM http://www.infocom.co.ug/ The above comments and data are owned by whoever posted them (including attachments if any). The List's Host is not responsible for them in any way. _______________________________________________
