The Prosperity-for-All Gimmick of President Museveni of Uganda

The man has been in power for twenty plus years, and yet his most loyal constituency—the teeming rural poor—are no better than they were in the sixties. He tried this and that—no can do.
The poor masses soak in the rain as Mr. Museveni blesses them for their stupidity and support

First there was the barter trade. Just after his most violent revolution, he went around the world begging to barter his coffee and bananas. There were no takers. The only way out was the IMF-World Bank. This was the Thatcher-Reagan era when unfettered free market was the in-thing. No Marxist has changed course at the blink of an eye than Museveni. Soon the bitter structural adjustments of the IMF-World Bank were the order of the day. All benefited the few—the powerful and those informed enough to take advantage of the anything-goes economy. We were told that the economy was growing at a rapid clip—evidenced by buildings and auto-vehicles that choked Kampala traffic—a taxi driver once affirmed to me when I asked him on the state of things. But then what about the roads, the hospitals and other infrastructures that make life tolerable? You have to see to believe.

The challenge for Museveni has been how to catapult the millions of peasants into the good life since structural adjustment doesn’t allow socialism and is slow to trickle down, if at all. The dilemma is that these millions are his most loyal voters. So, clever as he is, he from time to time comes up with slogans and gimmicks disguised as major policy overtures. There was a loan scheme, called Etandikwa, which died a natural death since the peasants took it for gifts for their votes. In the last election campaign he coined Prosperity-for-All—Bonna Bagaggawalle —his native language equivalent. Soon this became a public policy with a cabinet post for his brother and a hurriedly put up lending scheme. This will die another natural death, and he will blame somebody come 2011 when he goes to the voters again to extend his stay in the “sweet chair.”

There are true and tried ways of bringing up the lot of the poor. Gimmicks and slogans are not.