{UAH} Allan/Pojim/WBK: Letter to General David Sejusa
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11:26 AM |
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Letter to General David Sejusa
Greetings! It is regrettable that I am writing to you while you are in Luzira maximum-security prison. When you served General Museveni with maximum dedication and loyalty, there was no inkling that you would one day be dragged to jail on the orders of the same man.
In November 2005, it was Dr Kizza Besigye. And, of course, you recall that you had a very prominent role in getting him to spend Christmas day in that infamous prison from where he was nominated to contest the 2006 presidential elections. In your usual candour, you have courageously told the world that the 2006 presidential election was blatantly stolen by Museveni.
Prison is one of the most equalizing and humbling experiences. The only exception is a president – perhaps the key reason why our current ruler cannot contemplate leaving power, for he might well end up there once out of State House.
Comrade, I was meaning to write you a note on the email asking why you had gone silent lately. I was curious to know what you have been up to recently. As you know, I admire your courage of speaking truth to power, of telling the emperor explicitly that he is naked. I also consider you someone with a fine mind with a first-rate grasp of statecraft and social dynamics.
So, in the current political heat, as the wind gathers, and as we hear a litany of desperate statements aimed at sending chills down people's spines, I was eager to hear you weigh in. And just after you did, your long-awaited and widely-anticipated arrest finally came.
Strangely, you were arrested by the deputy chief of defence forces, who is a rank below yours. And you were arraigned before a court martial chaired by an officer two ranks below yours. I am sure these two irregular actions did not surprise you.
Many Ugandans remain sceptical of your genuineness in the struggle to end the autocratic rule of General Museveni. The scepticism is not without good reason.
Your dramatic capitulation after losing the court battle when you offered to resign from the military and your recent stealthy return from London greatly dented your credibility.
When you aptly denounced the Museveni regime in 2013, I wrote in this space arguing that you had too much baggage and had done way too many wrongs for Museveni to part ways with him. I kept hoping you would prove me wrong, and you did hold up quite well until that dramatic late-night arrival at Entebbe international airport in December 2014.
In all fairness, though, you have had a consistent resolve to stand up and be counted when a wrong is being committed. You did it while still in the bushes of Luweero and showed up again during the Constituent Assembly deliberations along with the late Sserwanga Lwanga and Kizza Besigye. Although you got silenced by the military hierarchy after pointing out the scheme of entrenching Museveni's rule, you had gone on record.
At this point, Ndugu, I should mention that this letter is to turn a little terse, but don't take offense. I am compelled to ask, how on earth could all you fine-minded folks have been duped by one man whose mission was to grab power, use it to personalize the country, and reduce all of us Ugandans to nothing?
Let's face it. Although you have at different times come out to oppose what you believed was wrong, you have also been at the forefront of working for the entrenchment of a fundamentally-autocratic regime, a regime where one man right from the start was handed the latitude to rule unchallenged.
The hallowed Mzee, our messiah, was left to rule with a free hand for the first ten years. You expressed your disquiet in the CA and offered to resign from the army in 1996. But how did you end up in the fold to do the bidding of General Museveni, including the reprehensible manipulation of the Constitution to delete term limits?
Incidentally, Ndugu, what was your role in the 2005 cardinal constitutional sin? One officer who spoke in silence and paid for it was Colonel Fred Bogere. How about you? The other officer who stood up and openly opposed the deceptive moves and machinations that led to a life president was then Brigadier Henry Tumukunde.
He, too, paid heavily; he ended up in the dock where you stood on Tuesday. By the way, did you ever participate in taking Tumukunde to the dock in Makindye or incarcerating him at what he said was a filthy senior officers' mess in Kololo?
The case of Tumukunde bears more than passing resemblance to your own track record. After years and countless appearances at the court martial, Tumukunde received two ranks at a go to retire as Lieutenant General.
He is now actively doing what he excelled at in 2001 and what you, Ndugu Sejusa, did with utmost zeal in 2006: working to secure the Sabalwanyi in power so he continues misruling us.
That said, I wish you good health in the utterly-unpleasant conditions of prison and hope to see you sometime soon…
moses.khisa@gmail.com
The author is a PhD candidate and teaching assistant at the department of Political Science, Northwestern University, USA.
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