Kampala.
The transition in the Democratic Party from Paul Kawanga Ssemogerere to Ssebaana Kizito and that of Miria Obote to Olara Otunnu in the Uganda Peoples Congress left both traditional political parties fractured and vulnerable.
Even the Conservative Party, with its handful of members, always manages to find enough people to hold rival delegates’ conferences in the political equivalent of two bald men fighting for a comb.
The NRM party appears to have ring-fenced that top position to its founder and visionary, President Museveni; the ruling party reserves most of its dirty fighting for the position of secretary general, which appears, for now at least, to be the glass ceiling for its ambitious members.
The NRM party appears to have ring-fenced that top position to its founder and visionary, President Museveni; the ruling party reserves most of its dirty fighting for the position of secretary general, which appears, for now at least, to be the glass ceiling for its ambitious members.
FDC has already tested the waters in the previous contest between Dr Besigye and Gen. Mugisha Muntu, which had none of the bruising personal attacks that the contests in the other parties always appear to inspire.
FDC’s problem, however, is bigger. Whatever his faults, Besigye remains the most popular politician in the party and casts a larger-than-life shadow over it. At least two reasons help explain why.
First is the matter of history. Besigye’s opposition to the Museveni government started as a one-man effort in the 2001 election, supplemented by the spontaneous, individual efforts that came together in the Elect Besigye Task Force. Those efforts later coalesced into the Reform Agenda and, later, into FDC but in the chicken-and-egg question of what came first, Besigye came before the party.
First is the matter of history. Besigye’s opposition to the Museveni government started as a one-man effort in the 2001 election, supplemented by the spontaneous, individual efforts that came together in the Elect Besigye Task Force. Those efforts later coalesced into the Reform Agenda and, later, into FDC but in the chicken-and-egg question of what came first, Besigye came before the party.
The second reason revolves around Besigye’s personality and initiative and the manner in which he almost single-handedly took on the Museveni regime he had helped to install and challenged its democratic credentials.
Older officials in the DP and UPC privately grumble about their own contribution to challenging authoritarianism and the one-party/no-party system that the Movement imposed on the country.
They have some legitimate grounds. Ssemogerere (or Kibirige Mayanja, for that matter) stood no chance of winning the 1996 election but they helped keep the candle alive for political pluralism until conditions emerged to make it inevitable.
They have some legitimate grounds. Ssemogerere (or Kibirige Mayanja, for that matter) stood no chance of winning the 1996 election but they helped keep the candle alive for political pluralism until conditions emerged to make it inevitable.
But few politicians have paid a higher personal price than Besigye in attempting to challenge the status quo and the cult of personality. He has been physically assaulted, forced into exile, arrested, jailed, humiliated through courts on trumped-up charges and turned into a prisoner in his own home. The regime did not simply throw the kitchen sink at Besigye; they ripped out the plumbing and tried to drown him in the septic tank.
The election to replace Besigye gives FDC a chance to manage a transition of the top leadership and of the party itself and its appeal. If the opposition needed a strong, militant candidate in 2001 and 2006, the 2011 election showed that the politics of elections had swung fundamentally. Critics say that President Museveni, who directed over Shs600 billion of public funds to be spent around election time on vote-rich causes, simply bought the election.That criticism is not far-fetched. The advantages of incumbency and access to public resources – including about Shs18 billion in presidential ‘donations’ that the President dished out in brown envelopes along the campaign trail influenced a significant chunk of the election in his favour.
But that does not tell the whole story. The NRM, to its credit, ran a clever campaign. First, they did away with the brutality of 2001 and 2006 and replaced the terror gangs with money-carrying mobilisers. Bullets leave scars but bribes leave smiles, appeared to be the guiding lesson.
There was simply no room for the opposition to appear militant or talk tough.
Another rap?
But that does not tell the whole story. The NRM, to its credit, ran a clever campaign. First, they did away with the brutality of 2001 and 2006 and replaced the terror gangs with money-carrying mobilisers. Bullets leave scars but bribes leave smiles, appeared to be the guiding lesson.
There was simply no room for the opposition to appear militant or talk tough.
Another rap?
The ruling party also appears to have understood the demographic dynamic better, and ran a campaign that resonated with many young voters and many female voters.
The FDC does not get enough credit for running a campaign that was fairly well structured and drawn on a useful and reasonable manifesto. But in a peasant environment where the President’s rapping antics and auto telephone calls caused most excitement, the election was never going to be about macro-economic and governance issues. Besigye is right to give the party a chance to renew itself but the FDC has, thus far, been less than inspiring in its attempts to do so, almost wanting to hold onto a leader whose best race might well be done.
The irony of it all is that where President Museveni risks weakening his party by seeking to control its every move, Besigye now risks weakening his party by allowing it space to outgrow him.
Three candidates have thrown their hats into the ring: Nandala Mafabi, who is the leader of the opposition in Parliament; Muntu, who is the party’s secretary for mobilisation, and Geoffrey Ekanya, who is the party’s shadow minister for finance and MP for Tororo.
Three candidates have thrown their hats into the ring: Nandala Mafabi, who is the leader of the opposition in Parliament; Muntu, who is the party’s secretary for mobilisation, and Geoffrey Ekanya, who is the party’s shadow minister for finance and MP for Tororo.
Mafabi and Muntu go into the race as the best-available favourites. Both officials had chances to make the job theirs and both didn’t take them. As secretary for mobilisation Muntu had a chance to build grassroots support across the country but party officials say he was reluctant to do so, partly out of respect for Besigye who was still the party leader.
Mafabi hogged the populist limelight as chairman of the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament and he earned his spurs in winning a bruising re-election battle in 2011 but his stint as Leader of the Opposition in Parliament has shown that it is easier to break up and interrogate, as he did in Pac, than it is to build and reconcile.
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