Museveni doesn't need lectures from Samantha Power

By Don Wanyama

The United Nations Security Council on Monday 21, 2016 held an "open debate" on "prevention and resolution of conflict in the Great Lakes region" where Samantha Power, the US Permanent Representative to the UN, made some very unresearched and unfortunate comments about Uganda and President Museveni.

In her presentation, Power attacked Uganda, claiming last month's elections had raised real issues—among which are; security forces detaining opposition figures without legal justification, harassing their supporters and intimidating the media. She adds that President Museveni's actions "contravene the rule of law and jeopardise Uganda's democratic progress, threatening Uganda's future stability and prosperity".

Had Power been one of the usual talking heads in Washington or New York, one would have dismissed her comments as hearsay with no need for a response. However, this is America's topmost diplomat at the UN and to, therefore, let her wallow in ignorance would be a big disservice to her and her masters. She must be helped to appreciate what exactly is happening in Uganda.

To begin with, were the last month's elections unfair and undemocratic? There were eight presidential candidates and thousands more vying for parliamentary and local government seats. Power might also want to know that the just-concluded election had a record turn-out of over 10.3 million voters as opposed to just over seven million five years ago. A surge in number of voters is not surely a reflection of an atmosphere of fear and intimidation created by security forces.

For her own information, she might also want to know that Uganda employed a biometric identification system — championed by President Museveni — to help reduce the number of multiple voting — a malaise in previous elections. There was a time in this country when each party had its own ballot box and all that one had to do at the end of voting was assess the weight of the box and change the labelling depending on which party was rigging! That and many others are no more.

Throughout the campaign season, all presidential candidates went about their schedules unhindered. With the exception of isolated incidents of some candidates for example disagreeing with the Police on mundane things like which road to follow to a rally venue, we challenge Power to point out a single incident when a candidate was incarcerated or extensively denied their right to canvass for support. Supporters jubilantly escorted their candidates, with rallies being turned into carnivals of sorts.

However, if Power is talking about the preventive arrest of Dr Besigye after the election, then that is entirely a different matter. When a candidate fails to garner majority support largely because of his unappealing message and organisational weaknesses and instead chooses the path of anarchy (perhaps to offer accountability to the likes of Power), then it would be a terrible indictment on the state if it failed to rein in this individual.

And these actions are not without basis. Democracy is not practiced in a jungle. There must be rules to be followed. In 2011, after Dr Besigye lost the election (third loss then) he hoped to cause an overthrow of the legitimately-elected government through quasi-revolutionary unrest dubbed "walk-to-work". The resultant mayhem saw several lives lost and the economy took a knock, which has taken time to heal. It would be foolhardy for any government, with these lessons learnt, to let loose such an agent of anarchy, this time under a mantra labelled "defiance" and also when gathered intelligence points to plans of mischief. Those who prepared Power's talking points should have helped her interrogate this "defiance" notion further.

The bottom line is that over 10 million Ugandans turned up to make a choice. The majority, over 60%, voted for President Museveni and the NRM. To argue that the decision of these millions "jeopardises Uganda's future stability" is a total affront on Ugandans and their sovereignty. What Power is doing is akin to the outsider who weeps more than the bereaved. Power supposes she understands Ugandans' interests better than themselves. The whole world is watching in shock as Republicans in Power's backyard move to endorse Donald Trump as their presidential flag-bearer but we have not raised our fingers because we appreciate that is their democratic choice.

President Museveni, unlike what Power says, actually guarantees Uganda's future stability and prosperity. I don't want to drag Power into the nitty-gritty of what NRM hopes to do in the next five years but let her understand that it was actually that message of stability and prosperity, summed up in the phrase "Steady Progress" that got Ugandans to overwhelmingly vote President Museveni.

And it is just not Uganda's stability that Museveni guarantees, it is that of the entire Great Lakes region. When everyone was running out of Mogadishu and allowing Al-Shabaab to turn the city into its base, it is President Museveni who placed Ugandan boots on the ground and helped pacify that country.  Just the other day, South Sudan was on the brink of collapse had it not been for President Museveni's timely intervention. The success of Burundi's peace process has a lot to do with President Museveni's role.

We appreciate American support to Uganda but what Ugandans will not allow is a handshake going beyond the elbow. When Power talks of media intimidation, must we remind her that in 2013, her own government, for two months, illegally tapped Associated Press journalists' phones in pursuit of a leak that or how the Snowden debacle has exposed the emptiness of their open society talk? Or when she talks of security forces harassing citizens must we remind her that young black men are nine times more likely to be killed by American police than other Americans and that in 2015, these were actually 1,134 deaths?

No society is perfect, not even America. What matters is the will by the leadership of countries to keep working towards bettering their citizens' lives and President Museveni is doing exactly that. He does not need lectures from the Security Council.

The writer is a special media assistant in the Office of the NRM chairperson