The recent string of by-election losses by the NRM while barely
scratching the ruling party’s numerical strength in parliament, has given the
opposition a sliver of hope for the future.
The loss by NRM flag bearer Alintuma Nsambu to DP secretary
general Mathias Nsubuga in the hotly contested Bukoto South constituency a
fortnight ago made it five out of six losses for the ruling party in the last
year.
A record, which must count as the ruling party’s worst
showing ever in by-elections since the return to multiparty politics in 2006.
Observers have put down the opposition’s runaway success to
two factors.
The first is the general economic decline over the last 12
months, so the NRM losses count as a protest against the way the economy is
being run.
Secondly and probably more importantly, is the way the
opposition parties have been able to concentrate their forces in the contested
constituencies, neutralizing the NRM’s presence. In general elections the
opposition find themselves spread out to thin and unable to match the NRM’s
nationwide presence.
In addition something has to be said for internal rivalries
and wrangling within the NRM, with its succession undertones, which has made it
near impossible to present a unified force to the electorate.
In the case of Bukoto South some NRM big wigs privately and
in the open defied party instructions to throw their weight behind Nsambu. Some
arguing that he was not a native son, an unknown quantity, while others citing
his comments against Buganda kingdom that made him a hard sell in central
Uganda constituency.
With Nsambu’s loss the ruling party ceded five of the 263
seats it came into the ninth parliament with, but this still leaves it eons
ahead of its nearest rival the FDC which holds 43 seats.
But more importantly the NRM still has more than two thirds
of the seats in the house. Despite the recent internal bickering and the discomfort
of a few of its rank and file’s eargerness to tow lines independent of the
party, the ruling party still has a comfortable majority that would allow it to
have its way in parliament on any given day.
The losses are regrettable but unlikely to change the
mathematical balance in the house.
But NRM planners will know more than anyone that, in
politics when the facts come up against perception, perception wins all the
time, and they will be forgiven for tearing out their hair and suffering
sleepless nights in trying to work out how to stem the hemorrhage.
The recency factor – the tendency to give more prominence to
recent events, is not helped by these events.
It doesn’t help too that with the presidential and parliamentary elections out of the way last
year, the NRM looked every day like a house divided against itself.
The opposition can smell blood, the question is do they have
the organizational capacity to take advantage of the NRM at its moment of historical
weakness?
A government in waiting’s best bet of increasing or
maintaining visibility is through its member’s in house – debating eloquently
against government positions, harassing the front bench and generally towing a
populist line against the government’s pragmatic one.
This would improve their stock in the public eye, make them
look like credible alternatives to the seating government.
For lack of numbers this is a difficult agenda to push in
Uganda. In fact the ferocity of the NRM “rebels” in recent months is such that
they look like the de facto opposition.
Your next option would be to take to the streets, tap into
any discontent and magnify it. The walk-to-work protests last year were an attempt
at this. But even with this strategy superior grassroot organization is
required, you don’t just start a fire and expect the public to jump in and
stoke it for you, no matter how much they sympathise with your cause.
Before the polls last year opposition candidates admitted
privately that no opposition party had a nationwide network to match the NRM’s,
and that whereas they made the necessary noises as a group it was really a case
of everyone for themselves and God for us all.
A mass uprising of the kind the opposition wished for, is
predicated on a good organizational structure.
The images we saw on the TV of the Arab spring were the finished product
backed up with solid organisational capability the like of which our opposition
are yet to marshall.
This is not to say that the series of recent opposition
victories should be overlooked, even landslides start with the movement of one
pebble, but it means that the opposition has to a lot more work to loosen the
NRM’s stranglehold on the country’s politics.
For the NRM it will serve as a wakeup call, a sign that it
can no longer be business as usual.
