Why it's right for us to celebrate Liberation Day

By Justus Muhanguzi

Thursday, January 26, 2017, is the National Resistance Movement (NRM) Liberation Day.

Liberation day has relative meanings to different categories of Ugandans. The various interpretations associated with this day depend on many factors and individual beliefs. Some Ugandans especially those who have been  lucky (or unlucky) to have lived before and after January 26, 1985  (when the rag-tag NRA officers and men matched on to Kampala) have a comparative advantage when it comes to this common debate on whether Liberation Day is worthy the name - let alone the celebrations.

At this time every year, Ugandans, young and old get involved (silently or publicly) in an acrimonious reflection and soul searching about the importance and relevance of this day. While others look back at that historical day (January 26, 1986) with nostalgia, others especially the youth and those who do not profess the NRM ideology always ask this intriguing question "liberated from what?"  There are of course many answers to this question and I want to give my personal view in regard to the above question.

 I belong to the group of Ugandans who have lived long enough to witness one or two political and military regimes before the military and current political establishment came on to the stage. This is 31 years ago today. At the time of Obote I ouster in 1971, I was a primary six lad and never fully comprehended both the political and military developments that were at play then. It was a few years later, during Amin's regime that I started following political events in the country. At the time of his overthrow in January 1979, Ugandans had lived, suffered or died under human rights violations.

When a combined force of armed liberators comprising of Museveni's FRONASA which was superintended over by the president of Tanzania, the late Julius Nyerere finally pushed out Idi Amin, Ugandans and the rest of the world breathed ‘a sigh of liberation'. But the excitement did not last. The liberation by the then Uganda National Liberation Forces (UNLF) and the Tanzania Peoples Defence Forces (TPDF) became short-lived because of the insecurity that engulfed Kampala. Many prominent people were killed in cold blood. Then there was the reported rigging of the 1980 general elections by Uganda Peoples' Congress Party which paved way for the subsequent assumption of power by Milton Obote, provoking a section of Ugandans led by Yoweri Museveni to protest by waging a war against what was seen as an illegitimate and unpopular regime.

It took Museveni and his combatants a grueling 5 years in the bush war to end what was and is still referred to by some pundits as an oppressive and sectarian regime. The day the rag-tag NRA matched onto Kampala has and continues being referred to as the "Liberation Day" which Ugandans celebrate every 26th day of January annually.   

I answer the question ‘what was Uganda liberated from' drawing from my own experience and observations. I want to refer to the early 80s where the common political jargon was "Twariire" (we have eaten) which was a common way of glorifying and institutionalizing corruption. I compare the general security in the country now with the period before 1986  when security of life and property of Ugandans was compromised into a culture whose lingua franca was either panda gaari (jump on the military truck for screening/detention) or gaana-gaana (hundred shilling identification fee) levied on every traveler  at  every military roadblock. I feel that most Ugandans have to a large extent every reason to celebrate being liberated from the gross human rights abuse and insecurity among others.

While some Ugandans have and continue to argue that ‘ordinary folks do not eat security', it is in my considered opinion that it is  worthwhile to sleep or ‘walk to work' on an empty stomach these days, contrary to what used to be in the 70's and 80s. Those who lived in Kampala in the 1980's recall how the city dwellers had adopted a self-imposed curfew and used to desert the streets by 3:30pm and would only deem it relatively safe to return to the city after 9:00am the next morning. Even then, walking or driving on the streets one had to be very cautious ready to ‘take cover' or make an abrupt U-turn and run for dear life at the sound of gunfire. Those were days of notorious panda gaari (military operations by state agents to rid the city of guerillas or bandits).

At that time Ugandans had become used to that type of life and it had become ‘very normal' to jump over a dead body on the street or market place during day time. Paradoxically Kampalans had become callous to the extent that one would find it unusual to walk along a street for 30minutes without witnessing a bloody scene. Similarly, it was very abnormal for a resident of Kampala to spend 30minutes during the night without hearing some sporadic gunfire followed by people crying and pleading.

I did experience one such bizarre incident one night in Nsambya Railways Quarters where I was staying during an official visit to Kampala from Bushenyi district where I was working as an information officer. It was 1982 during the height of the notorious military operations against Museveni's bandits (the then common reference to the NRA fighters). During that time, government troops used to carry out night raids on people's homes every night to terrorize and wreck havoc to the populace, all in the name of looking for Museveni's bandits. During that fateful night as I slept alone in one of those Railways two-bed roomed houses located  along the Nsyambya Road, the ‘unusual' happened. I realized that there were no gunshots that used to ignite the Kampala sky neither were there normal human noises that used to reverberate from the city centre or the neighbouring areas of Katwe, Kibuli and Nsambya.

After waiting for situation to ‘normalise' in vain, I sat on the bed until I felt I could not take it anymore as fear took its toll on me.  My plight was further complicated when I failed to find my identity card and graduated tax tickets - a mitigating factor in case the security men suddenly banged  the door and shouted fungua mulango (open the door) for the routine checkups. It was at that moment that I decided it was ‘safer' to abandon the house and lock myself in the dogs' kernel outside.

Nothing happened that night apart from the frightening silence that engulfed the city and its suburbs. The next morning at around 9:00am as I walked through panya across the railway to Ministry of Information Headquarters in Nakasero (current Hilton Hotel)to get my documents replaced  I decided pass by my friends place at Lumumba Avenue where  I spent the better part of  the previous day. To my relief, I realized that I had dropped and left my purse which contained my identification documents there.

When I shared my previous nights' ordeal with him, he also told me how he had spent a sleepless night because of the abnormally quiet and graveyard silence that had engulfed Kampala the previous night. I have never known what caused that Sunday's insecurity in Kampala and surrounding areas since the following night, it was business as usual. That night, I enjoyed a sound sleep because of the routine gunshots and the noise. I also had the confidence since I had my identity card and graduated tax tickets.

The day that followed turned eventful when I survived the wrath of the ‘fortune hunting' UNLA soldiers at the notorious Nsimbe Estates military roadblock where the gaana-gaana (identification fee levied on every traveler) was another magic of arresting bandits in transit. After parting with all the money I had on me to buy my bus fare ticket for the Kampala-Bushenyi return journey, I found myself in a very tricky and dangerous situation when our bus pulled up at the notorious Nsimbe roadblock. I did not have the money (gaana-gaana) to ‘dress' my identities which was enough proof for being a bandit for detention.

When the soldier who was picking the notes from every passenger's documents picked my ‘dry' identities, I had to act fast as the survival instinct went into an overdrive. The miracle stint I pulled was to go native and secretarian by greeting him in his native language, an act that disarmed him and softened him from shoving me aside to join the line of "suspected bandits'. Wearing a forced smile, he answered back and allowed me on the bus again. As the bus finally pulled off leaving behind the unfortunate passengers, I breathed a sigh of relief and thanked God for my colour and facial looks which have always made me pass for member of a certain Ugandan tribe different from mine.

Be as it may, many Ugandans suffered while others died due to sectarianism that characterized our society before the NRA/M took charge of this country. It is a fact that in the early 80's many people of Rwandan origin lost their lives and properties after the then Mbarara local government backed by the then powerful central government ministers passed a resolution to send them parking. When the current establishment took over power on January 26th 1985 efforts were made to outlaw sectarianism. There was even an incident in which someone was reprimanded after he reported some tribal sentiments against a fellow reveler during a drinking spree in a Kampala kafunda (beer joint).

In another related incident, an NRA senior commander who also doubled as a minister and NRM ideologue had to resign after pulling a pistol against a woman who reportedly provoked his wrath with some sectarian insults. On the other hand, The Oder Commission which was established in 1986 to investigate human rights abuses did a commendable job when it propagated the recommendation for the establishment of a permanent government human rights institution- the Uganda Human Rights Commission (UHRC). Given the above, I think Ugandans were indeed liberated and have a reason to celebrate the Liberation Day.

The writer is a former journalist