Impermanence is the Great Equalizer

The tulips are sprouting. In the last weeks of winter some evergreens are blooming with flowers. Tiny leaves are emerging. Change is afoot. That is the nature of life—nothing is permanent. We are born, we grow old, we die—no matter who or what we are—kings, queens, presidents, war heroes, poor people, rich people—no exceptions. Change is the only constant--the common denominator.

When we accept and embrace the phenomenon of impermanence, we relax and are loving and compassionate. The problem with most of us is we try to fight time and we attempt to freeze it to satisfy our egocentric desires.

At a crazy time in my insignificant life I was one of the last to leave a party. Then, I and my kinds headed to after-parties till daybreak! Subconsciously I didn’t want the ecstasy to end. I was freezing the time of the delectable sensory pleasure. At that time it was very real and, like all delusions, no one could have convinced me otherwise.

Mugabe has frozen time, but all will come crushing down sooner than later. When another despot says that at 65, after more than twenty years at the helm of power, he would still go to war if his presidential seat is threatened, we know he is deluded. He is freezing time, but time marches on and his presidency will end like all the rest of them. That is the incontrovertible Truth that one can take to the bank.

Is the Lion Becoming a Softie?

Amin ruled him for only two days. He single-handedly chased Big Daddy out of town—followed by Obote and Okello Lutwa. Then Sese Seko Nkuku Ngbendu wa Za Banga had to abandon his vast resource-rich fiefdom when the Lion marched in to assist Elder Kabila, whom he later turned his guns against. Bashir to the North quickly saw the wisdom of peace when the Lion charged in to help buddy Garang. Impressive resume' –only marred by tiny Rwanda rubbing his nose in the fertile jungle dirt of Kisangani.

We can write pages on the bravado and the insults. Anything that fails, is other people’s faults. Every success is his alone and the NRM—as if there is any difference! That is the real manhood we are familiar with, but only betrayed by quirky Jungian Anima, which is manifested as second-rate female archetype, characterized by unconscious show of moodiness, betrayals, jealousy, irritability, vainness, etc. Does anyone remember the The Tonya Harding - Nancy Kerrigan Saga? Tonya Harding is the quintessential second-rate female who arranged to club a comepititor’s knee so that she could win in the Olympics! Any similarity to high-stake presidential rivalry in Uganda?

Now, in the twi-light of his long rule, which he doesn’t fail to remind us of, he has pulled a rabbit out of his gallon of a hat. It is about love—of country, of self and of East Africa—patriotism a la Museveni.

Macho revolutionaries can see a vertigo if they were to talk about sissie love. What is going on here? Should this love thing not have been the primary sentiment before front-loading the government with his tribesmen, purchase of an expensive presidential jet, creating a batallion for personal protection, fire-sales of state corporations and the likes? Is this about creating a legacy—a lasting imprint on the country? Whatever it is, love is good. It is the antithesis of hate, greed and ignorance. And we are all the happier if it will emanate from the top down, latterraly all around, and whichever way.

Much Ado About Delusions in Garamba

If cute code names were the Midas touch of successful military campaigns, Kony would have been killed many times by now. Now, as Operation Lightning Thunder winds down, and Uganda’s vaunted “professional” army is on its way out of Congo territory, courtesy of young Kabila’s naïve government, it leaves sans the prize.

What was the core mission of the exercise all about? Was it rescuing the LRA captives? If 80% of the LRA forces have been demobilized, as claimed, it also implies that 80% of the captives were killed since the bulk of Kony’s forces were captives who had no clue what this madness is all about. So, we can surmise that rescue was not the primary motivation—honorable and heart-warming as it might be as we see some being paraded for PR.

Was the mission about capturing or killing Kony? If so, it has failed hands down. The man is somewhere calculating his next move, and some lazy minds will say with the connivance of the Diaspora, the perennial scapegoat of convenience.

Some say the mission was about a right of passage—a bar mitzvah of some sorts—for OB Muhoozi. Probably, if the thunder had struck on target, Mr. Muhoozi would have been front page holding Kony’s head for a trophy. Instead, we see a soldier debasing himself with Kony’s wig on his head.

On the whole the mission was about Museveni’s penchant for violence. He was itching for battle all along, and the delay and snag in the peace process gave him the excuse. Now, hundreds are dead. Does he and his countrymen even feel an iota of guilt or remorse? Nature has its way of rewarding all our deeds—good or bad. If we ever wonder why things never seem to go right in the so-called Pearl of Africa—Uganda—, let us look at what the leaders have done with the tacit consent of sections of the population. We will see that the past is not pretty; the present is murky; and the future is dark for we reap what we sow. If you sowed mustard seeds (no pun intended), you can't reap juicy mango fruits. But, in our perverted ignorance, we behave as if we could. That is the epitome of delusion.

Robert Thurman on Mahatma Gandhi

Mahatma Gandhi, who synthesized the teachings of Buddha, Jesus, Thoreau and Toltstoy.....argued that there three responses to evil:

1. The lowest and least recommended response is to submit to evil, to surrender and do its bidding in abject docility.
2. The second response is to fight evil with evil, to oppose irt violently.
3. The best response to evil is nonviolent resistance, to fight against evil without adopting evil tactics. It takes the greatest courage of all, combined with unwavering intelligence and compassion, to stand up against evil without fighting it violently.

For people to resist the Nazis, they would have had to have stood en masse in the streets in front of the tanks and firing squads, letting themselves be killed rather obeying any order.

Gandhi's experience in South Africa and India had taught him that this action would eventually force the German soldiers to come to terms with the fact that they were not fighting an enemy but were commiting attrocities against all reason and all nature. Their evil command structure would then crumble, and their war would end.
Gandhi admitted that this high road of nonviolence would result in many casaulties before the killers relented, but he pointed out that violent resistance also would cause high numbers of casaulties; in fact, it destroyed the whole of Europe and the flower of entire generations.
Robert Thurman in Inner Revolutions (Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Real Happiness)

In Uganda there have been and continue to be a lot of evils done by the powerful. How the evils are dealt with creates the results we have today and continue to have.

The Folly of Wrong Thinking

Wrong thinking creates misunderstanding and misunderstanding creates suspicion and non-trust, and these create a lot of social conflict, not only within communities but also among nations—Samdhog Rinpoche

We are in a public hot tub/jacuzzi. For some reason this retiree African-American opened up to me for the first time. Hearing my accent, he asked where I was from.

AA: Is that where Amin is from?, he queried.

I am familiar and used to this kind of question.

Me: Yes, I said.

AA: Is he still alive?, he went on.

Me: No. The dude is gone to the other side, I replied with a hint of losing my temper.

Now I can see he looked animated.

AA: Is Uganda near Rwanda where all the killings are going on?

Me: Yes, Uganda sits on top of Rwanda .

I then gave him History 101 of Tutsi-Hutu chasm.

AA: There is a lot of trouble in Africa .

Me: There is trouble everywhere, and Africa has its unique versions.

AA: It is a custom in Africa for men to pour acid on the faces of women who disappoint them, isn’t it?

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I had to control myself.

Me: My friend that is wrong thinking. Hate and anger shows up in macabre ways all over the world. There are manifestations of hate and anger everyday in your country.

AA: But in Africa that is the custom of those people. They don’t have laws.

The dude was already getting to my nerves. I had to pull my arsenal in a controlled way.

Me: Tell me Willie, was what O. J. Simpson did to his wife and her friend the custom in America? Are hanging you guys on trees the American custom?

It was getting hot, and Willie decided to leave the hot tub to cool off in the swimming pool.

AA: Okay, okay.
He muttered as he climbed out.

This is the nature of wrong thinking. We begin to utter and do things that are stupid—causing divisions, bad blood, if not deaths. Unfortunately in Uganda wrong thinking is pervasive, and that maybe the root causes of all the problems that the country has faced since it was artificially cobbled together by the British.

Related to wrong thinking we will in the future tackle the issue of “guilt by association,” a phenomenon we may see it play out again and again if leaders and the led are not careful.