Uganda-Against All Odds

 

UGANDA

Against All Odds

Ugandan presidential candidate Bob Wine, a reggae star-cum-opposition leader, recently accused the driver of a military police truck of deliberately running over and killing Wine’s security guard.

It wouldn’t be the first time Wine has been targeted since he decided to use his name recognition and anger to stand up to President Yoweri Museveni, who has held office for more than 30 years, in the East African country’s January 14 presidential election, Wine told CNN.

The Uganda-based Daily Monitor detailed the many times Wine encountered government crackdowns and oppression. Wine accused Museveni supporters of attempting to kill him twice. He claimed police killed 27 of his supporters.

In November, Quartz wrote, police arrested and held Wine for violating COVID-19 rules banning rallies. He was released on bail. Wine claimed the charges were trumped up, and he could be right. Experts at the United Nations said the government was abusing health restrictions to crack down on expression.

“We are gravely concerned by the election-related violence, the excessive use of force by security personnel, as well as the increasing crackdown on peaceful protesters, political and civil society leaders and human rights defenders,” said the experts in a statement.

In the same vein, Museveni shut down campaigning in the capital of Kampala and 10 other large regions, supposedly to stop the spread of the virus. Critics told Al Jazeera that the real reason for the suspension was that Wine was popular in those districts.

Wine speaks to the youth in a country where 80 percent of the population is 35 or younger. They don’t remember 1986, when Museveni assumed power after a five-year guerrilla war that sowed fear, division and insecurity throughout the country. They only knew Museveni’s stifling grip on power, his “unquestionable ‘order from above,’” argued Ugandan journalist Patience Akumu in the Guardian.

Deutsche Welle editor Daniel Gakuba didn’t envision Museveni going anywhere. Rather than publicly condemning his security force’s harsh techniques, Museveni has doubled down on violence, vowing to crush anyone who maligns him. With an iron grip on power, he has the resources to live up to his authoritarian aims, too.

In an interview in Time, University of Wisconsin political scientist Aili Mari Tripp agreed, describing Wine’s campaign as quixotic. Tripp viewed the contest as a test to see whether Wine’s populism could overcome Museveni’s entrenched dictatorship despite the president’s grip on the levers of the country’s electoral system.

Still, doors only open when they are pushed.