A number of political analysts have hinted at the risk of a civil war or even genocide emanating from the kind of events that triggered off the recent riots in Uganda.
Although these assertions look far fetched, however, these situations are not desirable because no one really wins.
A civil war, or any war, for that matter, is not a picnic that anyone should think of precipitating for whatever reason. Experiences in Africa over the last 50 years show that both sides of the war, in the real sense, emerge as losers albeit in varying degrees.
The grave effects of the 1967 to 1970 civil war in Nigeria should have educative value to Ugandans. The civil war in Nigeria took the form of a war of secession. Three major factors were responsible for the civil war; colonial legacy, conflict between the north and east, and the bid for secession.
Colonialism grouped a number of formerly independent, proud and prosperous societies such as the Ibo, Fulani, Hausa, and Yoruba among others into one political entity.
These societies each had a glorious heritage and would wait for the first opportunity to quit the colonial creation, which put them together without their free consent.
The Nigeria civil war was, to a large extent, a result of nostalgia of previously highly developed African societies to turn the clock of history to the pre-colonial status quo.
It will be noted that the colonial policy of regional administration along ethnic boundaries also precipitated civil war because it had the effect of nurturing sub-nationalism based on regional and ethnic affinity.
The military coups that rocked Nigeria in January and June 1966 created a crack in the power of the Federal government which the secessionists and anarchists found tempting.
It is crucial in the case of Nigeria to recall that the Gowon coup, that involved the murder of president Ironsi while on a northern tour was a powder keg that pushed regional ethnic tension to ignition point.
While Ibo army officers like Ojukwu held the north responsible for the murder of Ironsi and several other Ibo army officers, the northerners put the blame of their actions on the Ibo. They claimed theirs was an act of revenge because Tafawa Balewa, a northerner, was killed in an Ibo led coup.
What by all accounts was a key cause of the civil war in Nigeria was the pogrom, a nasty effect of conflict between northern and eastern Nigeria ethnic groups. In may 1966 there occurred mass killings of Eastern Nigerians working in the north, most of them Ibo.
The killings were followed by a massive return to the east of refugees from the north in a state that alarmed the whole of eastern Nigeria. The sight of their kith and kin, maimed, starving and naked returning, struck a code of revenge from Ibo of all walks of life.
Another wave of killing and maiming of easterners mainly Ibo, in the aftermath of the June 1966 coup attracted swift reprisals against northern Nigerians in the east.
The pogrom, a situation which sought to drive Ibo out of the north and Hausa out of the east swept over several cities. It was estimated that between 10,000 to 30,000 people died as a result. Put yourself and your ethnic group in the Nigerian jigsaw puzzle. I bet no one can emerge as an out and out winner.
The Nigerian situation could have been extreme, but no one would wish to take even a smaller version of that.
Members of the ethnic groups we belong to are settled, working or running businesses in all corners of Uganda and beyond. Some ethnicities have been more out going and adventurous than others either as a result of an enterprising nature or natural compulsion. Who wants a pogrom here?
The path of dialogue and democracy, limited as it is, still stands out as the best alternative to the many questions that Uganda still has: be it the northern bogey man as Mao calls it, or the Buganda question, or any other of the several questions still lingering in our national conscience.
