In criminology there is something called the broken windows
theory, which suggests that by controlling urban environment – through
cleanliness, establishing order and fighting petty crime, it removes the
environment for much more serious crimes.
That to wait until the big crimes begin to get hard on crime
could be a case of shutting the door after the horse has bolted the barn.
In the last five years of the new KCCA this theory may have
been confirmed at least by Mercer, the world’s largest human resource
consulting firm.
In its annual Quality of living ranking released they put
Kampala ahead of Nairobi, Dar es Salaam and Kigali when measured in terms of
sense of personal safety, stability, crime and effectiveness of law
enforcement. Of course the result was tempered by the fact that Kampala was
ranked 169 out of the 230 cities that made up the survey.
These rankings are not only good for much needed back
patting by KCCA but are also important because they informs investor
perceptions. Investors – local and international, of course are the people who
create jobs, the insufficiency of which is one of the biggest challenges for
the city today.
Several observers have suggested that the President and the
NRM’s dreary showing in the last election was due to attempts to bring order to
Kampala which saw the vendors thrown off the street and the eviction of large
populations to make way of the Naguru estate project.
Museveni won about 31 percent of the Kampala vote while
opposition MPs swept all eight seats in the city.
"They say you cannot make an omelette without breaking eggs. We have lived in a state of anarchy in the capital for so long that interest groups have grown around maintaining that chaotic status quo. It was inevitable that there would be consequences...
It is a scandal that the beneficiaries of the old system
were enough that they have inadvertently voted against the progressive changes
happening in Kampala – it is inconceivable that somebody voted for dirty
streets, port holed roads and unlit streets intentionally.
In fact what it reflects is that Kampala was masking a lot
of disguised unemployment, people were getting by operating on the margins of
society and when order was established they found themselves without a
livelihood.
"To ally with this protest vote cannot be developmental. What is needed is real leadership by KCCA and the council, who while they can only promise that it will get worse before it gets better, have to stay the course knowing that in the medium to long term we the residents of Kampala and the nation as a whole will benefit from the qualitative improvements...
It is a thankless job, but that is what leadership is about,
recognising that what is popular is not always right and what is right is not
always popular.
There is still a lot to be done in Kampala including calling
commercial building owners to order, collecting property rates and improving
public transport all of which will have their political costs.
From a purely mathematical standpoint Kampala has always
been hostile to the NRM – the last district leader being Christopher Iga, so
there is little to no downside in continuing with planned projects.
It is imperative that the government does not waiver in its
support for KCCA and its programs but KCCA needs to recognise too that it has
to balance its technical role with cooperating with the political
establishment.
KCCA is already involved in some income generating projects
and job creation initiatives, in a bid to continue its good work KCCA may be
well advised to scale these up to benefit more youth and unemployed citizens.
