Is it Time for Another Fundamental Change?

When Museveni and his gang marched triumphantly into Kampala, it heralded a new era, to which, if I were in the country, I would have probably welcome had they not gone native in my home region up North. At the time Obote had already squandered his chance, and the stars were already misaligned against him—nothing was humanly possible to save his brand.

In modern democracies of whatever shape—that includes post-independent Uganda— new ideas brought by a charismatic leader lasts, at the most, twenty years, give or take. Usually the leader rides into town in a milieu of wide arrays of discontent. Soon he or she sets out to make his or her mark. Institutions are torn down, and new ones created by the acolytes of the new regime who may lash the country to the other side of the extreme, causing instabilities. Nature, however, gravitates towards balance, and any imbalance is eventually corrected to achieve a stable state.

Take the leading democracies of today—United States and Britain. In the eighties Reagan rode into town like a cowboy coming to save the country and the world from the bad guys. He could do no wrong. Big government, welfare queens, and the evil empire were marked for dismantling. He could destroy a little black country of Grenada, and he would be cheered for it. New Dealers with liberal outlook retreated into hiding, wondering what went wrong having saved the population from institutional injustice and extreme poverty in the midst of plenty.

The Reagan period has lasted for over twenty years. It came crashing this year in an economic debacle many call the worst since the Depression of the 1930s. In fact, Clinton, a Democrat, did not make an about-turn in Reaganomics. Following his first election, with his eye to the next election, he made sure he paid homage to Reagan at his ranch--a significant symbolic statement for those astute enough to read the tealeaf. He could not go to Nelson Mandela inauguration—even if it was the single most important event of the last fifty years—because of the same reason. Now, the stars are aligned for Obama to come to town and make his mark.

The same story can be said of Thatcher’s Britain. Even if her brand seemingly had a shorter self-life, it nevertheless influenced and spawned Blair's New Labor.

Museveni’s Uganda saw drastic changes in the faces and nature of power and economics. The Zeitgeist of the period is embodied by obscene wealth, extreme poverty and crumbling infrastructures. This imbalance is unsustainable because nature abhors it. It has to be corrected to achieve balance. Museveni can use all kinds of tricks to hold on to what is no longer his because the die is cast.