Uganda’s internet access has been shut down, police have been firing tear gas and rubber bullets – and the leader of the opposition has, for the umpteenth time, been arrested. Witnessing this chaos first-hand is South Africa’s President Jacob Zuma who arrived in Kampala last night.
Zuma (74) is in Uganda for today’s inauguration of Uganda’s 71 year old President Yoweri Museveni who, officially at least, has been re-elected for a sixth term. He has held the office since engineering a military coup three decades ago. Critics say Museveni has for years been rigging polls and using state funds to prop up his political party.
The saddest part of the story, though, is how the successor to the deranged Idi Amin and corrupt Milton Obote had promised so much. During his Presidential swearing-in address in January 1986, Museveni proclaimed the first point in his programme was “….the restoration of democracy……The people of Africa – the people of Uganda – are entitled to democratic government.”
Thirty years later, those words are cruelly hollow. Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.
