{UAH} Pojim/WBK: Hit the road, Jack: Kagina sacks 900 at UNRA, but is it merely a - Comment
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Hit the road, Jack: Kagina sacks 900 at UNRA, but is it merely a
Three unrelated events that happened in Kampala in the past week or so could have a bearing on the future management of Uganda's public affairs.
First, the Supreme Court decided to uphold the conviction and 25-year jail sentence of an ex-Member of Parliament, Godi Akbar, for the brutal murder of his teenage wife five years ago.
Godi was convicted by the High Court but he appealed; the appeal court rejected his appeal so finally he went to the Supreme Court, which also upheld the rulings.
Second, we had the mass sacking of all the staff of the Uganda National Roads Authority (UNRA) — some nine hundred of them — as new executive director Allen Kagina set about reorganising a parastatal that receives the biggest chunk of the national budget.
There is an ongoing commission of inquiry into UNRA that is busy unearthing the many billions of shillings stolen by the former staff while the country's road network was rotting away.
Third, the court ruled that the so-called special interest seats in our parliament are illegally occupied. Besides MPs representing real, geographical constituencies on the ground, in Uganda, we also have several MPs for the youth, some for workers, some for disabled people, others for the elderly, and a whopping 10 members for the military.
So, in the bloated House, a youthful soldier with an injury has an MP for the disabled, MPs for the army, an MP for his home area, an MP for the youth, the woman MP for his district and so on.
There is always pressure from groups petitioning for special seats. Prisoners have demanded a seat, teachers want a seat, prostitutes want a seat, taxi drivers want a seat and bald headed men have also demanded a seat.
What is the link between an ex-MP convicted for murder, a court declaring special parliamentary seats illegally occupied and Allen Kagina sacking all the staff she recently inherited at UNRA?
Ever since Godi lost the case of murdering his young wife and during subsequent appeals, he has blamed his jailing on two people; opposition supremo Kizza Besigye for not hiring good lawyers for him and President Yoweri Museveni who, he says, influenced successive judges to jail him.
Godi does not blame himself at all for going to prison for murdering his wife. Nor do thieving and incompetent employees blame themselves when they get sacked. (Of course there are some good people among the sacked UNRA staff whose only sin was to keep quiet as their colleagues looted.)
They will cry foul, blame tribalism, sex harassment and anything but themselves. And even as everybody wants to have a few extra MPs to represent them, the court can soberly look at the bloated parliament and kick out irregularly elected members.
It means that Uganda is not a hopeless case. The judges can firmly keep a guilty criminal in prison however many appeals he makes regardless of the thousands of voters who may support him.
It means that a sane and focused director can evict any number of non-performing workers regardless of their origin and godfathers in order to serve the public better. It also means that the courts can undo some of the follies created by greedy or unfocused legislators.
So we don't need to write off Uganda as a nation of genetically corrupt, unserious people — not just yet. There are a few brave and upright players who if given all our support can put the country back on the rails.
Joachim Buwembo is a Knight International Fellow for development journalism. E-mail:buwembo@gmail.com
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