British High Commission owes us an apology

Mar 27, 2005

While reading the statement from the British High Commission, in response to the demonstration staged by Movement supporters, one expected to hear what the British’s stand was on Geldolf as well as their other officials who have made it a habit to make conclusive statements on Uganda’s internal

While reading the statement from the British High Commission, in response to the demonstration staged by Movement supporters, one expected to hear what the British’s stand was on Geldolf as well as their other officials who have made it a habit to make conclusive statements on Uganda’s internal politics.
As a student of Diplomacy, I expected an apology from the British High Commission for meddling in the internal political issues of a sovereign state, more over with constitutional means to resolve its matters or an explanation as to why Geldof and their own ministers chose to take positions on Uganda’s constitutional issues which are under debate, thus lending support to the contending sides. Surprisingly, the High Commission defiantly called for more demonstrations, trying to insinuate that the opposition should equally be allowed to demonstrate without limitations, as if hitherto that has been the norm. This confirms the prejudices the British hold against this government.
This town has witnessed much more anti-government demonstrations without any limitations, save for those violent ones which the Police have quelled because they defied the law and were a threat to public order. The British should have advised the other demonstrators to exhibit the kind of conduct the Movement supporters did. All that, however, is being diversionary. We should not debate how the demonstration took place, but rather why it did. The demonstrators deserve an explanation on the issues they petitioned.
The question of external forces meddling in other countries’ internal politics is not only a threat to democracy but to world order. The Geldofs of this era are not speaking as individuals but rather as champions of interests of competing ideologies in the world. Africa has always been a victim of such Proxy wars. The cold war ended but it continued to haunt Africa through ideological wars and the disintegration of comradeship that people like Nkrumah advocated. The Nkrumahs of the continent, now the Musevenis; are the targets of the Geldof propaganda, preaching symbolic democracy without prescribing anything to advance good governance. They are victims of the effects of blackmail being traded on the globe that Museveni is the only problem for Uganda, yet Uganda has had real enemies that they silently watched in approval. Ugandans know what is good for them. Geldof and others can only doctor media opinion polls but not the votes. March 2006 will prove them wrong, I bet!

The writer is the Special Presidential Assistant/Research and Information

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