Museveni Is Not Finished

The Mouthpiece — 01 October 2011

By Josepha Jabo

Vincent Nzaramba has published a book about President Museveni titled, ‘People Power—Battle the Mighty General.’ While the Police reportedly confiscated copies of Nzaramba’s book it is still available online, implying Nzaramba was not interested in making a hefty profit from sales and more interested in getting his views across than anything else.

While the young writer is entitled to his opinions, I question the wisdom of writing ‘He is finished’ as a subtitle on the book’s front page! Writing, ‘He is finished’ is a highly provocative statement because it is not for Nzaramba to decide whether President Museveni is finished or not!

Whether the author realizes it or not, the book’s 200-page seditious content does incite the public to violence hence those charges were preferred against the writer. Amongst other things, the book which is basically a ‘How-to-remove-Museveni-from-Power’ manual calls for President Museveni’s removal from power either by impeachment or his own resignation.

President Museveni just won the 2011 Presidential Elections with 68% of the vote—so why should he go? And if the Ugandan voters (the author likes to refer to people power) had decided Museveni had overstayed then they would have not voted for him. While on the subject of politics, one has to wonder whether if Nzaramba (who still insists he is a loyal NRM Party Cadre) had won the Kawempe South Parliamentary seat last year, in which he contested, would he have still gone ahead to publish this book?

Nzaramba’s publication (and others like it that might appear now that the way is clear) indicates the scrapping of the Law of Sedition by the Constitutional Court should have been revised rather than scrapped to bring it into context with today’s world in order to safeguard a peace-loving Ugandan society. Why? Because without this essential law every disgruntled, sour-grapping, poison-penned individual will have the liberty to write whatever he or she likes whenever he or she feels like it and in hindsight the consequences of slanted, seditious material in this country will be too late to reverse— then it will be too late for regrets.

On page 21 Nzaramba quotes retired Supreme Court judge, George Kanyeihamba saying, “Some Ugandans have said that if the Yoweri Museveni of 1986 were to meet the Museveni of today they would fight- they would shoot each other.’ This implies that President Museveni today, has either become his own worst enemy or is a man at war with himself or is a shadow of his former self. Is this not character assassination?

Nzaramba’s book is not only a personal attack on President Museveni encouraging disaffection towards him (a picture of a stern-looking Museveni in military uniform was deliberately chosen for the book’s front-page cover) but it is also a political attack on the Office of the President which is the Highest Office in the Land carrying the title ‘Fountain of Honour’ hence, the office deserves it’s due respect. What is more, If Nzaramba is so loyal to the NRM, as he claims, why does he refuse to recognize the authority of his Party Chairman? Even from a Christian point of view, Christians are called upon to pray for their leaders and respect authority because all authority comes from God.

Romans 13:1 says, ‘Everyone must submit to governing authorities. For all authority comes from God, and those in positions of authority have been placed there by God.’ Therefore, challenging President Museveni’s God-given authority or wondering why he is still in power is unchristian. It is also unpatriotic.

The Writer works for Uganda Media Centre