{UAH} Is Besigye fighting a lost cause?

I first met Dr Kizza Besigye in January 2001, twelve years ago. Then, I was a small boy, fresh from high school.

Now I am a responsible family man. Dr Besigye has opposed President Museveni for more than half the latter's nearly three decades of uninterrupted rule.

Since he first openly criticised the NRM in 1999, close to 15 years ago, Besigye has undergone at least four key phases. From 1999-2001, he made a case for "reform."

He believed, perhaps rather naively, in reforming the Movement system and redirecting the country back to the 1986 ideals.

If he initially set out to critique the system from within, before long, a confluence of factors pushed him into running for president in 2001. The campaign mayhem, including indiscriminate shootings in his home town of Rukungiri, the rigging, his forced exile, etc., made Besigye realise that reform was a dead-end.

Enter the second phase, in exile, between September 2001 and November 2005. Taking up arms against Museveni's misrule was construed as the viable option. It appears, though, that some influential confidants persuaded him to jettison armed rebellion, giving way to the third phase, 2005-2011.

Duringthe third phase, when he twice won the presidency of the Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) and contested the national presidency twice, Besigye was somewhat a full-time, professional politician. He concentrated on building his party and traversing the countryside.

But when the Supreme court, against overwhelming evidence, fell short of annulling the 2006 presidential election, Besigye immediately alluded to the next phase of his political career: he would never petition the Supreme court again. True to his word, come 2011, he lost the election and he didn't go to court. He also unexpectedly announced his wish to relinquish the FDC presidency.

Was he taking a political sabbatical or an FDC backseat? Neither! Instead, he was shifting gears to the fourth phase: civil disobedience mostly through street protests. His current phase coincides with a palpable cynicism against the NRM government and unprecedented widespread belief that President Museveni has run his course.

Once a revered statesman, the president is now frowned upon and despised stridently on the streets of Kampala, in small alleys at rural trading centres, and especially on social media and newspaper websites. Two comments from last week prompted me to reflect on Besigye's odyssey. First, local media reported him castigating the elite class for being selfish and not standing up against government's innumerable wrongs.

He was quoted as saying, "Anybody called a professor is a curse to this country" (Daily Monitor, July 22). Either he was misquoted or he meant something else because Besigye knows that among his unwavering allies include some university professors.

On the same day, former FDC envoy and political activist, Ms Anne Mugisha quipped on the social media website, twitter: "So, Kate's taking her time to produce an heir, Mugabe doesn't want an heir, and Besigye's getting in the way of an heir…?"

Anne's remark could mean many things but two are immediately plausible to me: that Besigye is refusing to hangup his boots and give way for his anointed successor and that Besigye is obstructing Maj Gen Mugisha Muntu who succeeded him as FDC president.

If this interpretation is accurate, Anne was reiterating what Besigye's many critics have said for along: that his is a personal war against Museveni. Yet, a close look at Besigye's relentless opposition does not square up to that assertion.

The current phase of Besigye's street-opposition is spiritedly embraced by many, especially the so-called "unwashed" of society, and loathed in equal measure mostly by the relatively more educated and well-off classes. Apparently, the latter dislikes Besigye's brand of opposition politics, and believes Muntu offers an alternative approach.

Quite disingenuously, sections of the elite now blame Muntu's invisibility on Besigye's activism, wondering why a man who quit the FDC party presidency is the one making news headlines, and not his successor. Muntu's election to the FDC leadership was generally well-received among the elite circles.

However, I think that rather than overshadowing his successor, Besigye withdrew from FDC activities. It appears that in the same way he gave up on the Supreme court, Besigye now believes party-politics is untenable under the current environment. This is both bad and good for FDC.

It is bad because Besigye's charisma and national appeal is invaluable to FDC's clout. Martin Wandera, former Workers' MP and a close aide to Muntu, once memorably remarked: "To the Besigyeists: "FDC can run without Kizza." But since last November the party hasn't run as well as it should without Besigye's role.

However, the good side of Besigye's departure is that it presented Muntu with an excellent chance to chart an alternative path, different from his predecessor's helm at the party and his current street-based opposition. It's too early to judge but some disquiet abounds.

I wouldn't back Dr Besigye if he stands in 2016 because he has made his contribution, leaving an indelible mark of a true nationalist. In fact, given chance I would advise against his candidature, not because he is unpopular but precisely because he is still, arguably, the most popular opposition figure.

Obviously it's his constitutional right to run again just as his street-based opposition against a government plunging our country further down the drain is both legal and legitimate.

moses.khisa@gmail.com This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

The author is a PhD candidate in Political Science at Northwestern University, Evanston/Chicago-USA.



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"War is nothing but a  continuation of political intercourse, with a mixture of other means. Man will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest." 

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