Why Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya find every tree branch oiled and slippery

Riot police try to detain an opposition party supporter during protests against the electoral commission. PHOTO FILE | NATION 

In Summary

• Not much has changed since that immediate postcolonial period, although the remedy for this state of affairs at that time, the military takeover, came to be replaced by a new type of conspiratorial engagement represented by cabals based on ethnic identities and religious affiliations.

By JENERALI ULIMWENGU
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The quality of politics in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda seems to have taken a nosedive in the past couple of years, marking a new low in the conduct of those in power as well as that of those who want to replace them.

That is indeed the very nature of competitive politics wherein each political formation mounts a campaign of seduction, showcasing itself as the best there is in doing this, that or the other in the service of the polity.

But, seeing the way that’s being done in these countries, a little more decorum could be employed by the actors.

Leave Burundi and Rwanda out of the discussion because they come from a slightly different place historically and their evolution has taken a remarkably different trajectory.

The other three have a common colonial heritage, and at Independence, they inherited certain constitutional attributes bequeathed by their erstwhile colonial master, Great Britain.

Even so, the three original members of the East African Community have followed divergent paths in their political development, and something from those differences often comes back to temper the conversations they are having today.

1960s siblings

Soon after Independence, all the three adopted multiparty politics, much like the Westminster parliamentary model.

However, this model was purely a formalistic arrangement lacking in substance because it was not underpinned by any corresponding cultural or historical heritage.

This is hardly surprising, since the departing colonialists had done nothing during their stay to nurture any serious democratic practice.

Across Africa, these were dizzy days during which the new African leaders burst onto the scene buoyed by boundless optimism and pregnant with promise for rapid economic and social development.

But this soon faded as the new governments, inexperienced, inept and corrupt, failed to deliver on their promises and resorted to authoritarianism to keep their governments in power at any cost.

This is captured in Martin Meredith’s book, The State of Africa: “Once in power, African leaders became preoccupied with staying in power, employing whatever means (as) were necessary.

Much depended on their ability to operate matrimonial systems that kept key supporters loyal to them. Political activity was reduced to palace politics, an arena for ruling elites to maneuver for their own interests. Rival factions competed for ascendancy. Conspiracies and plots proliferated.”

Not much has changed since that immediate postcolonial period, although the remedy for this state of affairs at that time, the military takeover, came to be replaced by a new type of conspiratorial engagement represented by cabals based on ethnic identities and religious affiliations.

Uganda’s gambit

During the period characterised as the era of the ‘Cold War’ a lot of what was going on in Africa was viewed by the rest of the world in terms of what relevance any particular country had in the equation of the gigantic rivalry between Washington and Moscow.

The developed nations were willing to turn a blind eye to some of the abuses in many African countries because they saw them as allies in the ideological divide.

For instance, even Idi Amin Dada, whose army overthrew Milton Obote in 1971 and ruled Uganda for eight bloody years, killing thousands of his citizens, was treated as some necessary oddity by different powers when they thought they could use him to further their self-interest.

After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, signalling the end of the Cold War, the West became less tolerant of the dictatorial regimes in Africa and set governance standards to be adhered to if our countries hoped to receive economic assistance.

Many African countries fell in line over the new governance imperatives set by the West, not because they were converts to a new faith, but because they understood that aid just grew a dog chain and collar, and that aid was predicated on their exhibiting good behaviour.

The three countries had drifted apart since the collapse of the EAC in the mid-1970s, meaning that the political vibes in the period of democratisation were felt differently in each of the countries.

In Uganda, the defeat of the Amin regime and the subsequent arrival in Kampala of Yoweri Museveni’s triumphant army (1986) meant that a military regime had been replaced by another military machine, albeit one which was given to borrowing justificatory progressive rhetoric.

The tendency to military dictatorship was only thinly veiled, and sometimes blatantly stated, as when Museveni himself has said, more than once, that he was not prepared to surrender ‘my army’ to anyone.

Or, when he made it clear that since he had taken power coming from the bush, whoever wanted to take over from him better be prepared to do the same.

Tanzania’s path

The military syndrome in the ‘civilian’ running of the country has always been present in Tanzania as well.

During the rule by the founding father, Julius Nyerere, the top cadres of the ruling party were sent for military induction, and many came out to occupy civilian functions wearing military ranks of ‘captain’, or ‘lieutenant’.

Nyerere’s justification for this ‘soft’ militarisation of political and government spaces was that young men and women in the service of their country needed to be trained in its defence and sufficiently disciplined for that task as well as lead the economic development.

Recently, President John Magufuli, who took over from Col (rtd) Jakaya Kikwete in 2015 showed the same preference for the men and women in uniform, appointing many of them to administrative positions, such as permanent secretaries of ministries, which are traditionally manned by trained civil administrators.

This may be something to worry about, especially when it is viewed against the shrinking political space allowed by the Magufuli presidency.

Political parties have been ordered not to hold rallies except under certain constrained circumstances. The political opposition leaders are constantly arrested and kept in custody without charge.

Double standards is hardly sufficient to describe President Magufuli’s clampdown on opposition political activity while he is carrying out his party’s political work at state functions.

Recently he used a Defence Forces occasion to receive opposition politicians defecting from their parties to join the ruling party.

Assassination attempt on Tundu Lissu

The recent assassination attempt on Tundu Lissu, a vocal critic of the president, has raised the ante in the political discourse as Lissu’s shooting represents something Tanzanians are not used to.

Since that shooting, more strident calls have come out demanding a new constitution.

The demands have received short shrift from President Magufuli, who seems to think that determined action by himself to tackle issues of corruption should suffice.

In the meantime, the media is getting a hammering, with new draconian laws seeking to constrict what may or may not be published or broadcast.

A number of publications have been shut down on the decision of a government bureaucrat. Journalists have been called to police stations to justify their stories, which are routinely dubbed seditious.

Misfiring Kenya

It is not always true that constitutions will necessarily ensure that rights will be respected and that there will be no abuse. We have seen how South Africa, with one of the most enlightened constitutions in the world, has fallen prey to state capture and rogue government. But a good, people-written constitution, with complementary laws designed to effect proper implementation, is always a good place to start.
President Magufuli’s supporters are wont to point at the difficulties faced by Kenya in the implementation of the truly iconic 2010 Constitution. This is, in my view, an excuse for doing nothing. That constitution was delivered at the cost of great suffering and commitment to the ideals shared by young Kenyans who braved police batons and jailhouse stints. Its implementation is bound to be difficult because there is a conversation still going on, and not everyone involved in that conversation is partisan to the letter and spirit of the Constitution.

What is obtaining in Kenya, therefore, is the opening up of a new level of struggle, new trenches for the actualisation of what the Kenyan patriots who thronged the Bomas of Kenya delivered in 2010 but which is resisted by those in power.

Prof Yash Pal Ghai, one of the architects of that process, once said something to the effect that good constitutions, written by the people, are harder to implement than bad ones written by the rulers.

Uganda, too, had its constitutional review process, which culminated in the 1995 Constitution, but as we have already seen above, it is clear that the president of that country is in no way prepared to let go of power.

At Museveni’s behest, term limits were removed, and currently he is involved in a blatant effort to end age limits, which will make him life president. Much like Idi Amin before him.

Empty rhetoric

It may be that democratic governance is beating a retreat in East Africa. A number of existing resolutions in the EAC commit the partner states to good governance, democracy and the respect for human rights.

But these will remain empty rhetoric devoid of practical meaning as long as the member states are unwilling to put their money where their mouths are, and to walk the talk of good governance.

The collapse of the old EAC in 1976 was put down to the fact that the Community had become a trade union for leaders and was oblivious to the real needs of their constitutive peoples.

Among these rank the need for governance structures and processes that are more transparent and accountable to the peoples of these countries and serve the purpose of expanding people’s freedoms in all spheres of national endeavour.

The EAC should encourage its members to live by these ideals. These countries would have been pushed and nudged by the donor countries in the West who used to point out human rights abuses to make African governments aware that they were being watched.

Now, even that has gone missing.

Europe has its own preoccupations, such as the pressure of refugees from Africa, the Middle East and the drift to the right in some polities.

The Donald Trump-headed US administration will not be bothered with Africa as it concentrates on its own immediate yearning to “make America great again”.

In short, East Africans, and Africans in general, are on their own. Which is great, because it will strengthen the ‘progressive’ forces by making them realise that only their struggle will deliver democracy, and not the handouts that are dished out by some Stiftung or other.

Jenerali Ulimwengu is an advocate of the High Court in Dar es Salaam.