Leadership Void or Vacuum?

If you want to get a cross-eyed look from an Acoli parliamentarian, or an Acoli elected official for that matter, mention the alleged Acoli leadership void or vacuum. However, before I get anybody bent out of shape, let us define what leadership is and pin-point what people really mean by “leadership vacuum.”

On-line Mariam Webster defines leadership as:

1 The position or office of a leader: ascended to the leadership of the party.
2. Capacity or ability to lead: showed strong leadership during her first term in office.
3. A group of leaders: met with the leadership of the nation's top unions.
4. Guidance; direction: The business prospered under the leadership of the new president

Then Wikipedia says that the word leadership can refer to:
1. The process of leading.
2. Those entities that perform one or more acts of leading.
3. The ability to affect human behavior so as to accomplish a mission designated by the leader

“The ability to affect human behavior so as to accomplish a mission designated by the leader” is most likely what people are referring to when they talk of “leadership vacuum” in Acoli. And that fits with definition #4 of Mariam Webster. That “ability” or lack thereof is largely determined by the environment or polity.

The 60s was a relative calm and prosperous period for Acoli— punctuated only by a few intriguing deaths of a few Acoli personalities of the time. If these deaths caused any murmurs, they were never taken by the power elites as anything to portend what was to come for Acoli. Parliamentarians and Ministers concentrated on Uganda and their place in it for themselves. No one stood up prominently to lead mass Acoli opposition to the one-party state promulgated by Obote as something not in the interest of Acoli. Instead many young bright Acoli were lured into the party of totalitarianism for personal glory and opportunism. Local Council officials administered what was left from the colonial days without any bold creative initiatives.

If you were looking at influence and ability to influence public policy and the course of events at this time, you would have found in the government Ministers Ojera and Lakidi. On account of them Acoli got trophy schools, hospital upgrades, Gulu-Kampala highway tarmacking and maybe some choice ambassadorships, or princes of parastatals. Move-to-the-Left and the Common Man’s Charter may have got nodes from Ojera and Lakidi by virtue of their ministerial positions. Did they do it because it would have been a boon to Acoli aspirations? We will never know. As Minister of Communications Ojera may have been the architect of very cynically oppressive press laws that likely worked against Acoli.

In the opposition Alija Latim and Obonyo, in concert with KY Daudi Oceng, worked to expose high-level corruptions. While many crossed to the government side they remained firm in the opposition even as their influence diminished with the advent of the one-party state.

Overall, I would give the Acoli leadership in the 60s a C+.

The seventies woke up Acoli to the butcher by the Amin regime. Some of those who lost their positions with Obote made a dash out of the country to regroup and make a comeback. Most attempts at coming back were tentative at best—and deadly—Ojera lost his life in the process.
This is the period when we begin to see the real vacuum in Acoli leadership. Those leaders who went with Obote or soon after did not make efforts or made only half-hearted efforts to rally Acoli to the reality of the deaths of many Acoli in the hands of the military regime in Kampala. Those who remained retreated to their farms and/or sat on their hands waiting for fate to rescue them.

Acoli leadership gets a D during this period in my book.

The seventies period ends with the rescue of Uganda by Tanzania with help from some Acoli who still largely fought to bring Obote back. Did they think bringing Obote back was beneficial to Acoli? Some may have thought so, but was there any clear Acoli-centric leadership as we go into the eighties? Yes, in terms of influence and ability to influence public policy and the course of events, culminating in the take-over of power from Obote. The wisdom and effectiveness of such leadership is another matter.

Acoli leadership gets a B-.

With the ascension of the NRA in power, any semblance of Acoli leadership was thrown into turmoil. As nature abhors a vacuum in came charlatans, a prophetess, someone called Joseph Kony, and deaths and deprivations rained on Acoli. This then began the era of Messianic, Clientele-subordinates and other In-betweens.

The Messianic group is represented by a hodge-podge of rebel outfits, which were later succeeded by Lakwena and Kony, whose members spread into the so-called Diaspora. These are people who saw that iron could only meet with iron to affect change. Too weak to effect any military victory, hence any policy change in Kampala, they resorted to coercion and terrorizing of the Acoli people who could not rise in popular support.

The Clientele-subordinate are represented by an assortment of NRM ministers, LC5s, MPs and presidential advisors. These are people who feel that the Messianic and other characters are being unreasonable and they claim to speak for the ordinary suffering Acoli. Generally, however, they are in it for their groceries, and have very little influence on any policy and events affecting Acoli.
The In-betweens are characters who, while giving semblance of opposition, nevertheless were co-opted into the so-called broad-based government. Vocal and articulate as they may be they never really caused any meaningful events or policy change.

Here then is a period when no Acoli is able to change the course of events or help forge policies despite the wails of Acoli in the displaced persons camps and the razing brutalities against Acoli by both the government armed forces and Kony’s LRA. Hence we have the notion of the leadership vacuum.

Acoli leadership gets an F.

Enter the multi-party politics. The Messianic never participated and no one openly advocated any association with their actions. The Clientele-subordinates lost big in the elections because the electorate saw them for what they really are. The In-betweens could be divided into two groups. Those tied to the old political parties. The other are coalition- incrementalists who by design or instinctively saw that in the Uganda of today Acoli can only play a meaningful and effective part by coalition with peoples of other regions.

How effective the Coalition-Incrementalists will be depends on when Uganda elections will become competitive or continue to be non-competitive. It is said that any election is non-competitive where the winner wins by 59% or more. What does this mean in the context of Acoli? This means that as long as Museveni is expected to garner 59% or more, the marginal votes of Acoli does not matter, and the less the NRM would take Acoli seriously for effective policy influence—hence, continued leadership vacuum. However, if Museveni’s chances dips lower, Acoli will be a hot campaign battle fields in which Coalition-Incrementalists will play a decisive roll and have potentials to influence events and major policies that will affect Acoli. Already we are seeing bold and courageous statements by some MPs that will have influence on land policy of the NRM government.

Note. The idea of Messianic, Clientele-Subordinate, and Coalition-Incremetalist is adopted from Richard A. Keiser’s Subordination or Empowerment?---.