BURUNDI CHAOS THREATENS EAC CREDIBILITY

A meeting in Uganda at the end of 2015 to resolve the conflict in Burundi did little to bring hope to the violence ravaged East African nation, serving only to highlight the crisis as the region’s most pressing security issue in the coming year.

Last week on December 28 Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni opened the latest round of  Burundi peace talks to stop months of fighting triggered in April by president Pierre Nkurunziza’s plans to seek a third term in office.

Read more

THE TOP 10 OF SHILLINGS & CENTS 2015

It has been another year in our journey through time.

During that time Shillings & Cents has taken more than a passing interest in events affecting us. Sometimes with cheeky irreverence, often with head shaking incredulity but always with well meaning sincerity this blog has attempted to uncover the meaning behind and implications that will follow everyday events, which will determine our futures and the very course of history, and even there, I fear I understate the reality.

Below is a ranking by hits per story of the most read articles off this blog in 2015, from the fate of floundering generals to the shamelessness of grubby fingered officials to the geopolitical storms brewing in all around us and further afield to the brainless upbringing of future generations.

The list is by no means comprehensive. Stories of noteworthy importance that did not make the list, but which also enjoyed great popularity include Uganda's tourism gets a short in the arm, How the rich save, The scandal of NSSF's billions and The scent of roses and wealth , all deserving of mention just that there were better entries, but let me not spoil it for you....


10. LESSONS FROM THE UGANDA-KENYA SUGAR BURST UP

Kenyan authorities have been restricting sugar imports from Uganda. They argue that our factories are not producing sugar surplus to our requirements therefore we must be importing sugar for onward sale in Kenya.

Read More 


9. OBAMA WALKS TIGHT ROPE IN AFRICA VISIT

US President Barack Obama’s landmark visit to Kenya had him sticking to the script -- extolling democracy, hinting on human right concerns but all the while being careful not to upset key regional allies in the fight against terror.

At a press conference in Nairobi he chastised Kenya for not respecting Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) rights, a rejoinder by his counterpart Uhuru Kenyatta to the effect that it was a non-issue for him and his countrymen, put paid to that discussion.

Read more

T7. THE UNCOMFORTABLE TRUTH THE UGANDAN POLLS ARE THROWING UP

Over the last two weeks the New Vision has been running a poll that sampled people’s opinions on the Social, Political, Economic and Cultural issues in our society.

The poll, which randomly sampled more than 6,000 respondents from 43 districts around the country is bound to be a trigger for many other polls coming out in the lead up to the elections next year.

Read more

T7. UGANDA SUGAR STIRS UP KENYAN POLITICS

Perennial nearly-man of Kenyan politics, Raila Odinga is kicking up a storm in the sugar growing regions of western Kenya, mobilising the population to resist the importation of Ugandan sugar to bridge the shortage in the market.

Kenya’s sugar manufacturing industry, which is mostly controlled by the government has failed to keep up with the population’s demand for sugar. As a result their local industry only produces 500,000 tons of the 830,000 tons the region’s largest economy demands.

Read more

6. GENERAL SEJUSA’S TRAVAILS A STAGE IN UGANDA'S EVOLUTION

It started much earlier but let us use January 26^th 1986 as a reference point to chart events and place the events surrounding our most recent headline grabbers, Amama Mbabazi and General David Sejusa’s, in a bigger context.

When the rag-tag National Resistance Army overran Kampala, the city’s state of disrepair was emblematic of the general state of the nation. Electricity supply was intermittent or non-existent for most of the capital’s residents, roads were in such a sorry state as the normal traffic rules were suspended, bread, sugar, paraffin and even bar soap were a luxury.

Read more

5. THE UNWHOLESOME PRESSURE WE PUT ON OUR CHILDREN

Last week 23 year old Joan Abua, frustrated with her third O-levels failure, committed suicide by hanging herself from a tree behind the family home in Akongo village, Otuke district.

In letters she left behind for her family, she lamented, “This world is not easy, I tried my best in vain” and while thanking people for coming to her funeral, she promised to curse her relatives if the letters were not read out for the mourners.

Read more

4. SHILLING COLLAPSE IS OUR FAULT NOT THE DOLLAR’S

Last week the US dollar burst through historical highs against the shilling raising inflationary fears and more stress for local businessmen.

The dollar traded above sh3,000 on Tuesday and held there by the time of publication. This is the highest the dollar has been against the shilling.

Read more

3. UNRA’S FATE IS AN INDICTMENT ON OUR SOCIETY

This week the Uganda National Road Authority (UNRA) board took a chainsaw to its staff, sacking all of them to facilitate a complete overhaul of the organisation, which has become the poster boy for corruption and greed.

The almost 900 workers will be let go over the following weeks but have been given the option to reapply for their jobs when applications are called.

Read more

2. IS OUR SOCIETY IRREDEEMABLY CORRUPT?

This was yet another week in which corruption dominated our headlines.

Uganda National Road Authority (UNRA)’s Allen Kagina took a slasher to the organisation’s hierarchy, sacking some, encouraging others not to seek contract renewal and causing soul searching in the authority, which had become the byword for the worst excesses of corruption in this country’s history.

Read more


1. NOW WE ARE GOING INTO CAR MANUFACTURE?

Last week the Kiira Motors Company (KMC) unveiled their 25 year old business plan.

The company which started as some engineering undergraduates tinkering around resulted in the development of the Kiira EV prototype, a car that runs on electric power in 2011. According to the business the planned car assembly plant will employ up to 10,000 people, is projected to be profitable by 2023 and at full capacity in 2039 will be rolling out 60,000 units.

Read more

BURUNDI TRAGEDY HAPPENING AT THE WORST POSSIBLE TIME

A tragedy begins to unfold before our very eyes in Burundi.

Since last week about a hundred people have been killed following an attack on three military installations in the small east African nation.

Some observers say these were just the latest in an insidious campaign, which begun as a drive to snuff out opposition to a third term bid by President Pierre Nkurunziza, but which now threatens to spin out off control as the victims resort to retaliation as the state offers no redress.

The tension between the Hutu and Tutsi in that part of the world is always bubbling under the surface threatening to flare up at the slightest provocation. Fuelled by bad politics, dehumanising poverty and callous geopolitics a repeat of the 1994 Rwanda genocide is never discounted.

"The historical context is long but to summarise, when Belgium colonised Rwanda and Burundi they found dichotomous societies where the minority Tutsi ruled over the majority Hutu. The Belgians amplified this divide – as was the wont of all colonialists, by favouring the ruling Tutsi against the rest in terms of access to education, health and the general economic advancement.
They then upped and left, leaving the fissures and tribal animosities not only intact, but festering, presumably for us to sort ourselves. Well, we are doing that the best way we know...

Post-colonial governments since have been able to keep the lid on by sheer brute force. But these pressures are always looking for release and the more they are capped, the more likely they are to explode with devastating and unanticipated consequences.

Ideally what should have happened is that through stability and economic development, these ethnic divides would have been smoothed out, even eradicated. With stability as both sides become more and more economically dependent on each other for survival, and even to thrive, commercial interest would subsume tribal fidelities.

It did not happen, so the populations of that region find themselves in a perpetual death clinch where mutual distrust means there is always a sense of foreboding.

It has come at a bad time.

To begin with the general international posture seems to be, like it was for Rwanda in 1994, that it is happening in a small place in the center of Africa, there is little risk of a regional conflagration, so make some appropriate sounds, half-hearted threats and let it work itself out.

Secondly, there are regional rivalries that are staying local actors’ hands.

In the East Africa Community Burundi has aligned itself with Tanzania, while the action men of Rwanda, Uganda and Kenya have gone about fast tracking regional integration. While Rwanda, with most to lose by a flare up of those ancient animosities, very similar to the ones at home, would love to offer some leadership – especially military, in resolving the issue, it daren’t do so without a regional consensus, which maybe hard to come by now.

Uganda is leading an already existing mediation process, Kenya is not known for military adventurism and in Tanzania, the leadership is only just finding its feet.

But as if that is not enough the regional actors’ economies are reeling from a strengthening dollar and falling commodity prices. There is little room to manoeuvre in terms of playing a more active role in Burundi unilaterally or collectively.

It is a sobering reality.

I imagine the diplomatic cables are being employed over time, favours are being called in and less charitable words are being exchanged, to see this issue resolved as quickly as possible. Which is as it should be.

It however raises real questions for the East African Community.

"In the event of likely future episodes like this, with the rest of the world distracted or apathetic to  our plight, can we build the capacity to clean up our own mess?..

OBAMA WALKS TIGHT ROPE IN AFRICA VISIT

US President Barack Obama’s landmark visit to Kenya had him sticking to the script -- extolling democracy, hinting on human right concerns but all the while being careful not to upset key regional allies in the fight against terror.

At a press conference in Nairobi he chastised Kenya for not respecting Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) rights, a rejoinder by his counterpart Uhuru Kenyatta to the effect that it was a non-issue for him and his countrymen, put paid to that discussion.

In Addis Ababa, he wondered with a wry smile why Presidents would want to stay on forever, that he believed he could win a third term himself but not only can’t he run again as there is a two-term limit in the US, but also because he is really looking forward to shedding the trappings of power. But this was said to an audience that did not include any of the intended objects of his derision.

"The history of the US shows that where their national security issues are concerned they are not averse to overlooking the “puny” issues of democracy and human rights. Every US President’s foreign policy preoccupation is to diffuse or obliterate any threat to the country – as with all other presidents, the difference is that with the US they have the means to enforce their will around the world...

With the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the cold war, the US’ main security threat comes from unconventional armies that can pack a disproportionate punch to their size. Not since America’s interventions in central America in the 1970s and 80s — an attempt to prevent communism taking hold in their back yard, has the US thrown all caution to the wind like it has in its war against terror.

Which brings us around to Obama’s choice of countries to visit during this trip.

Kenya was an obvious choice. His father was Kenyan, Obama hadn’t visited since 1987 and it would be nice to visit as POTUS (President of the US). Romanticism aside, Kenya is at the frontline of the war against terror with its involvement against Al Shabaab in Somalia and their history of horrific terror attacks – in 1998 and again in 2013, as well as numerous other smaller but no less significant attacks, along the coast and on its north eastern frontier.

During the planning of the trip there might have been concerns about the sticky issue of Uhuru and his deputy William Ruto being before the International Criminal Court (ICC) for crimes against humanity during the post-election violence in 2007. The ICC dropping the case against Uhuru earlier this year must have caused a sigh of relief at the US State department.

We shouldn’t forget too that a senior US official had urged Kenyans not to vote Uhuru in 2012 because of the ICC case hanging over his head.

Ethiopia is also heavily committed in Somalia, but it also is the latest leading economic light on the continent. But they too are not perfect. Western human rights and environmental organisations incessant criticism of their treatment of dissenting views and journalists, as well as their disregard for environmental sensibilities in its huge infrastructural projects – the Gilgel Gibel III dam is a case in point, mean under other circumstances POTUS may have given Addis Ababa a wide berth.

For the same reasons that he visited Kenya and Ethiopia, he would have visited Uganda, Bururndi and even Rwanda, but then again maybe not.

"With Uganda the US may not have forgotten that we signed into law the anti-homosexuality bill against the White House’s best advice, even if the courts later overturned it on a technicality. Burundi’s just concluded election was held under a cloud, seen by many as an attempt by Pierre Nkurunziza to extend his tenure beyond the constitutional two term limit. And in Rwanda of course, moves are in advanced stages to lift the constitutional term limits.

Maybe for Obama these transgressions were a bit too much for him or for the constituencies he panders to back home and far outweighed the heavy lifting they are doing in the Horn of Africa and Darfur in Rwanda’s case.

Whichever way you look at it, Obama’s African trip was going to come  with a mine field of issues wherever Airforce one set down, but in the end sentimentality won over real politic to make the trip possible.

We are not complaining.

RWANDA, BURUNDI: A TEST CASE FOR DEMOCRACY

The killing of key opposition leader in Burundi served as an exclamation mark in an already turbulent situation in the small east African nation. Across the border however the opposition made a call for a lifting of presidential term limits in their own constitution.

With Pierre Nkurunzinza safely reinstalled in his seat after a failed coup attempt earlier this month, and the worst of the Burundi crisis seemingly behind them, despite continued protests in the street, opposition leader Zedi Feruzi was gunned on the street on the weekend.

No one has been arrested for the assassination but no one doubts that such an event further inflames affairs in Burundi. That Nkurunziza is determined to run for a controversial third term does not help matters.

Things couldn’t be more different in Rwanda. Dr Vincent Biruta leader of the Parti Social 

Democratic (PSD) called for the lifting of term limits. Biruta is also the natural resource minister of Rwanda. When we were still trying to digest this brilliant political manoeuvre, hundreds of rural Rwandans streamed into the capital Kigali and presented their petition to parliament calling for a constitutional amendment to lift presidential term limits.

With two million petitions parliament will now debate the issue for the next two months before deciding on whether to upset the status quo or not.

"The speed of developments in Rwanda has got our heads reeling and has observers of the country impressed by the political sleight of hand there...

Rwandan President Paul Kagame has always said he will respect the constitution but has also added that the fate of Rwanda will be determined by its citizens.

The term limits were adopted in various countries two decades ago, promoted as an answer to bad governments and as a way to achieve civil transfers of power. The opposers of term limits have argued that they shackle good leaders, a hard argument to rebut when the affected leaders still have the popular vote on their side.

Both cases provide some cause for head scratching for the champions of democracy.

On the one hand in Burundi there are “mass” demonstrations against Nkurunziza’s attempt at a third term, but he courts have ruled that he is within his rights to contest the coming election. Do you pander to the mob and compromise the institution building process – never mind that you suspect that judges may have been leaned on to rule favourably for NKurunziza? And if there is enough opposition surely an election will put paid to NKurunziza’s third term bid.

On the other hand in Rwanda there is no ambivalence in the constitution about term limits but there seems to be a groundswell of support for a lifting of these limits. So do you tinker with the constitution to cater for the political circumstances of the time or ignore the voice of the people and maintain that the constitution is inviolable.

"How the next few weeks play out will provide useful fodder for political thinkers...

It could very well be that Nkurunziza goes to the polls and his flattened to reflect the opposition crowds we saw on TV. Or that after two months of deliberation the Rwanda parliament dominated by the ruling Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF) comes to the conclusion that term limits should be upheald and begin a process to replace President Paul Kagame.

Of course both outcomes seem unlikely but whatever the outcome precedents will be set that will inform the democratic process going forward.

It will not be the end of the world either way.

BURUNDI: SAD BUT INEVITABLE

In events in Burundi of the last few weeks have seemed for onlookers like watching a train crash in progress.

President Pierre Nkurunziza was nominated by his party to run for what was essentially a third term in government. He and his supporters argued that the constitution said two elections by adult sufferage would demarcate the terms, but that his first term in office was made possible by a vote in the national assembly, so it did not count.

His detractors have argued though that a third term would not be in the spirit of the constitution which limits president to only two five year terms.

The constitutional court in Bujumbura agreed with Nkurunziza’s interpretation but this did not pacify the mobs in the street, who have been fighting running battles with the security agencies for at least a fortnight now.

The army eventually stepped in on Wednesday while Nkurunzinza was in Dar es Salaam attending a regional effort to resolve the fracas.

"It is sad what is happening in Burundi – more than 20 people have been killed and scores injured during the unrest, but these are the birthing pains of democracy...

Europe and North America the forerunners of democracy, have histories scarred with bitter war,  bloody revolutions and genocide to show for their journey to democracy.

England as an example did not become a full democracy until 1918. Before then only 60 percent of the men could vote. Women were not allowed to vote until after the Representation of the People Act in 1918 was passed.

To get to that point, the people had first to wrestle power from the monarchs, which incidentally was facilitated by a conquest of England by the Normans who set up the first parliament in 1066.

But as the people tried to wrestle more power from the monarchy and gentry there were coups, parliament even ordered the beheading of Charles I (His crime? Dissolving parliament, causing civil war and raising taxes), a trial abolition of the monarchy only to discover the new leader Oliver Cromwell was a worse tyrant than those who had gone before, a return to a much weakened monarchy, whose executive powers were transferred to parliament before we came to 1918.

These changes happened over a millennium, never in a straight line and not as neatly as narrated above.

There was bloodshed at every turn as the monarchs sort to hang on to their privilege and the people tried to wrestle more say over the management of their society for themselves. And every so often their elected leaders forgot themselves, crossed the line into tyranny before society called them to order and put a hold to their pretensions.

The French have a bloodier history as did the Germans and even the US.

"The point is that one cannot write democratic practice into existence. Assuming that democracy, described as the right of every one to have say in the management of their affairs, is the ideal, no two countries can tread the same path nor can the end product of what democracy means to them be identical....

The peculiarities of Burundi’s history have led it up to this point, as can be said about the individual paths of the other East African Community countries.

Violence and bloodletting are not desirable in any context but unfortunately when the aspirations of the leaders and the people diverge, when compromise is forgone for strong arm tactics, something has to give.

Burundi like Kenya more recently and Rwanda before it are going to have to go back to the drawing board, learn from this experience, forge a new compromise and get back on the democratic path.

Whether that takes a week or a month or a year it will happen.

BURUNDI’S TURN FOR THIRD TERM ACTION

Last week Burundi took off where South Africa left off with street protests against plans by incumbent President Pierre Nkurunziza to run for another term in office.

The protestors insist his running would a breach of the constitution, which provides for a two-term presidential limit. But Nkurunziza’s supporters say the constitution was enacted during his first term, he has run for one general election since and is therefore entitled to run at least one more time.

The opposition know this.

"They in effect, are trying to deprive Nkurunziza the element of surprise if he is to attempt to amend the constitution to allow for a third term, they are trying to create a public momentum against such plans and make it a campaign issue for Nkurunziza to pronounce on during the campaigns. The presidential elections are for June 26.

Why all this hoolah balooh about term limits?

Presidential term limits as we know them have their origins in the US. In writing their constitution in the 18^th century the issue came up and the advocates for term limits argued that the notion of a republic would not stand if the president’s term limits were not predetermined.

However they did not write it into the constitution immediately, but an informal two term limit was established when the first US president George Washington stepped down after he had served two terms.

Term limits were finally written into the constitution in 1951 after Franklin D Roosevelt became the longest serving incumbent, dying during in his fourth term.

In Africa our motives for writing the presidential term limits, beyond wanting to ape the US, comes from our post-colonial history, which shows that once a leader was in place you would have to throw everything including the kitchen sink to dislodge him.

"Caught up in the dynamic of hanging on to power, governments tend to forsake a long term national vision for short term pragmatism aimed at holding on to power, which really shouldn’t come as a surprise...

Politics is about vying for power and once obtained, it’s a bout retaining power. Power, the ability to influence things, starts out not as an end in itself but as an instrument in the service of the people. Somewhere along the way the seduction of power is too much and it becomes an end in itself.

This is not unique to the African situation.

In 1972 agents broke into the Watergate office complex in Washington. This was the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee headquarters. Various sources have it that proof of a deal made by Richard Nixon to stall the Vietnam negotiations, which if successful would have seen Lyndon Johnson back in the White House were supposed to be in that building.

Nixon or his cronies scared the Democrats would hold this over their heads through his first term and also at the next election were keen to get their hands on the nefarious dossier.

But they went too far and the exposure of the plot and the Nixon’s denial it was involved in the break in eventually cost him his presidency.

"Term limits are a mechanical solution to the threat of a return to monarchies...

What Africa really needs is institutions that can hold everybody to accountable, unfortunately for us impatient Africans these cannot reach full maturity in a day or a decade or even a century.

The question is how do you go about building such institutions?

Writing them into law is useful but not sufficient to make them credible and effective. For us who are always lamenting Gavumenti etuyambe. I am sorry to say it starts with us.

My fellow columnist Simon Kaheru last week reported that he went to a place where lining up happens. But beyond the physical presence of a line there is the intuitive, habitual even spiritual sense that there is a line --- even if it is not physically visible.

The institutions we yearn from start at the spiritual level, at the level of our individual consciousness. How can we demand that our leaders be held accountable for their public behaviour, for monies going missing under the watch and for the careless utterances they make that make us reduce our estimation as a nation in the eyes of the world when we in pour personal fiefdoms – be they at home or in the office, behave as if we are above the law?

So back to Burundi. Nkurunzinza should stand despite misplaced call for him to disqualify himself. 

He should stand if only to ingrain the tradition of voting into the people’s psyches. People who say in the context of our countries it is useless to vote because our leaders are prone to steal the polls anyway, are the real enemies of democracy.

In fact if the anti-Nkurunzinza people are convinced he is overstepping his mandate, sue him! Exercise the judiciary!