2005: Worst Year for Uganda’s President ?
by Timothy Kalyegira, The Monitor.
The announcement by the Global Fund on Wednesday that it is suspending its 200 million-dollar grants for the campaign against HIV/Aids in Uganda is the latest in a series of dramatic diplomatic setbacks and image problems for the government of President Yoweri Museveni, once highly regarded by the international community and within Africa.
A timeline of a year of Museveni’s rapidly declining international prestige and credibility:
Sept. 7, 2004 — The American public television broadcaster PBS in its documentary programme Frontline comments on the changing perception of President Yoweri Museveni: “Today, after arbitrary arrests, beatings, and harassment of the political opposition in the last presidential election in 2001, a new view is emerging of Museveni as a leader on the verge of becoming yet another African dictator.”
Feb. 2005 — In a “Risk Assessment” report on Uganda, Canada’s Carleton University predicts that should President Museveni get a third term in office, there will be uncertainty in Uganda “leading to increased dissention.”
March 10 — The veteran Irish rock star and debt relief campaigner Bob Geldof, at launch of Prime Minister Tony Blair’s Commission for Africa report in London, accuses President Museveni of “trying to be president for life.”
March 19 — A damaging article in the Daily Telegraph newspaper of London titled “Regime of tyranny and torture back to haunt Uganda” highlights unbelievable incidents under Museveni’s regime where “Suspected dissidents disappear after midnighta-oechilling screams can again be heard from Idi Amin’s infamous torture chambersa-oe[and] from the few that escape come tales of a-oemass executions.”
March 30 — The New York-based group Human Rights Watch says U.S.-funded “abstinence-only” programmes are jeopardizing Uganda’s successful fight against HIV/Aids, denying young people information on any method of HIV prevention other than sexual abstinence until marriage.
April 2 — Security guards at the Uchumi supermarket in Kampala catch red-handed the director of information of the ruling NRM, Zedekiah Ofwono Opondo, shoplifting a ballpoint pen and an underwear item in the year’s biggest scandal.
April 11 — The International Court of Justice at The Hague in the Netherlands begins hearing a case filed by the Democratic Republic of Congo against Uganda in which Congo accuses Uganda of invading its territory, committing human rights violations and massacring Congolese civilians.
April 15 — Former president Milton Obote says in an autobiographical series in the Daily Monitor newspaper that President Museveni as leader of the NRA rebels was the mastermind behind the killing of tens of thousands of civilians in Luwero Triangle during the 1980s. This particular edition of the newspaper proves extremely popular with the reading public.
April 22 — The International Herald Tribune in a comment says: “Many Ugandans, including members of Museveni’s cabinet, feel the country [should] emulate its neighbour, Tanzania, whose president has no doubts about stepping down this year after two terms in office.”
April 29 — The British government cancels $10m of funding to Uganda, over Uganda’s questionable transition to fair multi-party politics.
May 1 — An opinion article in the Boston Globe newspaper by former US ambassador to Uganda Johnnie Carson blasts Museveni, saying “we may be looking at another Mugabe and Zimbabwe in the making“.
May 13 – The Irish government suspends aid to Uganda over same concerns as Britain.
May 17 — In a 14-page briefing paper, Human Rights Watch and the Foundation for Human Rights Initiative list recent cases of torture by Ugandan security forces against political opponents, alleged rebels and criminal suspects.
A World Bank-commissioned study recommends aid cuts to Uganda over the next three years, warning that recent political developments have jeopardised Uganda’s development agenda.
May 21 — In an interview with the Daily Monitor, a frightened vice president Gilbert Bukenya reveals the existence of powerful mafia-like forces within the government that are persecuting him and says there is a secret investigation underway into his wealth.
June 29 — Two Italian members of parliament table a motion in the Italian parliament seeking an Italian government in aid cut to Uganda and a ban on President Museveni, his family, and some cabinet ministers from entering Italy.
June 30 — The Tanzanian newspaper Mwananchi criticises President Museveni in an editorial: “Allowing] Museveni to continue contesting the presidency means he is being entrenched to rule for life.”
July 2 — The Rwanda government turns back a substantial number of unauthorised vehicles that were part of a large armed convoy taking President Museveni by road to the Rwandan capital Kigali for a summit. A diplomatic row follows.
The U.S. embassy in Kampala rejects an entry visa application by Jovia Akandwanaho, sister-in-law of President Museveni, stating that she is on a list of prominent Ugandans accused by the UN of looting minerals from Congo.
Tanzania’s Guardian newspaper writes that “Tanzania should not co-operate with an undemocratic country that wants to have a ‘president for life’.”
July 4 — The Associated Press news agency, in a report examining the changing fortunes of President Museveni, says “the reformist appears to be setting himself up as president-for-life.”
July 12 — The British Prime Minister’s wife Cherie Blair and U.S First Lady Laura Bush begin a joint week-long trip to Africa to raise public awareness over HIV/Aids. Conspicuously, they do not visit Uganda, once regarded as Africa’s most successful role model in the fight against Aids.
July 15 — Kenya’s Daily Nation newspaper in a scathing editorial on Museveni’s third term bid in office, writes: “Long viewed by the West as a model African state with progressive policies, Uganda is fast sliding down a dangerous road, where freedom and democracy are being supplanted by self-interest and a naked thirst for power.”
July 16 — The People newspaper of Kenya also in an editorial writes: “The goings on in Ugandaa-oeare likely to frustrate Africa’s chances of benefiting from the [western] initiative, whicha-oeties assistance toa-oegood governance and zero tolerance for corruption.”
July 17 — Former President Bill Clinton begins a six-nation African tour to boost Aids treatment programmes. Once again, his omission of Uganda from his schedule — whose president he once described as one of Africa’s “new breed” of leaders — is conspicuous.
July 19 — Norway cut aid to Uganda in protest at the slow pace and direction of democratic reforms, including a return to a multi-party political system.
July 28 — The Economist Intelligence Unit, a division of the highly regarded Economist magazine, in a forecast report on Uganda states: “As well as angering opposition politicians, the president’s desirea-oeto remain in power for a third term is also dividing the Movement, not least because Mr Museveni has not hesitated to remove senior members of the cabinet and the army who did not seem to be fully behind his attempts to secure another term.”
A referendum on returning Uganda to a multi-party system is largely boycotted by the public. International observers put the turnout at 18 percent, while the government says it was 47 percent. Western news outlets like Radio France, the BBC, Voice of America, Reuters, and the French news agency AFP all comment on the unusually low turnout.
July 30 — The former Sudanese rebel leader and current first vice president, John Garang and 16 other people die when the helicopter they are travelling in from western Uganda crashes in southern Sudan. Riots break out in Sudan, with southerners and several Internet websites saying the crash was an assassination, not an accident resulting from bad weather.
Aug. 5 — President Museveni, accompanied by a large armoured convoy, enters southern Sudan en route to the town of Yei to pay his last respects to Garang. As happened with his attempted entry into Rwanda through the Katuna border area with a similar armed convoy, this Yei incident caused concern with the Sudan government.
Aug. 11 — The Ugandan government shuts down the private FM radio station KFM and the following day the police charge a journalist, Andrew Mwenda, with sedition after he accused the government of causing the death of Garang “by omission or commission” in an apparent helicopter crash.
Aug. 12 — BBC World Service radio, in a news report, says relations between Uganda and Sudan have significantly worsened following the death of Garang.
Aug. 16 — The Sudanese newspaper Alwan quotes the commander of the Southern Sudan Defence Forces, Major-General Paulino Matip as accusing the Ugandan government of having a hand in the “assassination” of John Garang. Significantly, Matip is not rebuked for making that statement by either the Khartoum government or the main southern group, the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, reflecting the widespread view that this was an assassination.
Aug. 19 — The BBC World Service news reports on growing tensions between Uganda and Sudan following the death of Garang.
Aug. 24 — The United Nations-backed Global Fund on AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria suspends all five of its grants to Uganda, valued at $201 million, because of “serious mismanagement.”