Guest Writer
Apr 13, 2005
I am not a UPC member neither am I a sympathiser. I am only related to the former president Apollo Milton Obote by nationality.<br>Like any other citizen of this country, I want to give credit where it is due.
Obote deserves better treatment
I am not a UPC member neither am I a sympathiser. I am only related to the former president Apollo Milton Obote by nationality.
Like any other citizen of this country, I want to give credit where it is due.
When those people who deserve to be counted as having fought for this nation are genuinely pointed out — without prejudice — I see Obote’s name on the list.
Those swearing and cursing the writer after reading this are amongst the few who have failed to see reason behind the much orchestrated state-fanned mudslinging of the ageing UPC head now exiled in Zambia.
Obote should be treated as a freedom fighter and accorded the status and privileges that go with the position of former president.
History talks for itself about this man and how he beat the British on their own turf, to be handed the instruments of Uganda’s independence at Kololo on October 9, 1962.
Obote, as a Legislative Council (LEGCO) member prior to independence, stood up to the British in a way that earned him a place amongst great East African statesmen like the late Kenyatta and the Nyerere. No wonder Nyerere had to accommodate him throughout his exile days of the 1970s.
He may have made mistakes, which of course, is human, but it is high time Ugandans learnt that throwing out the British was more important than the subsequent so-called liberations.
About the Luweero massacres, we need not apportion blame for it does not take a military brain to realise that in war, both sides share blame for the casualties.
When President Museveni himself lets the cat out of the bag on whatever plans the Government has for his historical archrival, Apollo Milton Obote, I get startled.
Speaking in Mityana at the wedding of MP Godfrey Kiwanda, the president repeated Nsaba Buturo’s words that Obote must answer for the Luweero killings, which ironically took place in an area where Buturo was a district commissioner.
We must also remember the much hyped Uganda Commission of Inquiry into Violation of Human Rights headed by Justice Oder, which pinned Obote over the atrocities and exonerated other players could have been more authentic if they had been handled by an impartial foreign team.
One only needs to compare the credible investigations by independent teams under the guidance of the UN in Liberia, Rwanda and former Yugoslavia to understand how questionable ours is. Even if Obote was involved in the massacres as a commander-in-chief, we have other commanders who have killed Ugandans but were pardoned for the sake of reconciliation.
With the Government giving amnesty to Kony’s men who have slain thousands of innocent Ugandans, it is interesting when Dr Obote is treated differently.
The writer is a journalist
I am not a UPC member neither am I a sympathiser. I am only related to the former president Apollo Milton Obote by nationality.
Like any other citizen of this country, I want to give credit where it is due.
When those people who deserve to be counted as having fought for this nation are genuinely pointed out — without prejudice — I see Obote’s name on the list.
Those swearing and cursing the writer after reading this are amongst the few who have failed to see reason behind the much orchestrated state-fanned mudslinging of the ageing UPC head now exiled in Zambia.
Obote should be treated as a freedom fighter and accorded the status and privileges that go with the position of former president.
History talks for itself about this man and how he beat the British on their own turf, to be handed the instruments of Uganda’s independence at Kololo on October 9, 1962.
Obote, as a Legislative Council (LEGCO) member prior to independence, stood up to the British in a way that earned him a place amongst great East African statesmen like the late Kenyatta and the Nyerere. No wonder Nyerere had to accommodate him throughout his exile days of the 1970s.
He may have made mistakes, which of course, is human, but it is high time Ugandans learnt that throwing out the British was more important than the subsequent so-called liberations.
About the Luweero massacres, we need not apportion blame for it does not take a military brain to realise that in war, both sides share blame for the casualties.
When President Museveni himself lets the cat out of the bag on whatever plans the Government has for his historical archrival, Apollo Milton Obote, I get startled.
Speaking in Mityana at the wedding of MP Godfrey Kiwanda, the president repeated Nsaba Buturo’s words that Obote must answer for the Luweero killings, which ironically took place in an area where Buturo was a district commissioner.
We must also remember the much hyped Uganda Commission of Inquiry into Violation of Human Rights headed by Justice Oder, which pinned Obote over the atrocities and exonerated other players could have been more authentic if they had been handled by an impartial foreign team.
One only needs to compare the credible investigations by independent teams under the guidance of the UN in Liberia, Rwanda and former Yugoslavia to understand how questionable ours is. Even if Obote was involved in the massacres as a commander-in-chief, we have other commanders who have killed Ugandans but were pardoned for the sake of reconciliation.
With the Government giving amnesty to Kony’s men who have slain thousands of innocent Ugandans, it is interesting when Dr Obote is treated differently.
The writer is a journalist