Comment
Tunisians do Africa proud as 2011 starts with a bang
Posted Monday, January 31 2011 at 00:00
Egypt is the classic story of leaders who have clung to power for decades, insuring themselves by building a huge, loyal military guard.
Mubarak has done it; President Yoweri Museveni in Uganda has done it; Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi too; Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe took the same road, as has Angola’s Jose Eduardo dos Santos.
The problem is that they can never build armies that will overcome all uprisings. There will come a point where the protestors overwhelm the loyal guard.
In fact, the more soldiers a big man recruits to keep him safe, the more he increases the number of people who have relatives in his guard.
In countries like Uganda, if one-and-a-half million took to rioting, the army would just turn, because shooting them means you are most likely to kill your own relatives.
In Egypt, five million can send the huge army fleeing. And when that number comes out, there is another danger.
It will not just be Mubarak who loses power, but the whole ruling class. At such moments, the ruling class will rally and cut their losses by throwing Mubarak under the bus.
They have done Africa proud, those Tunisians.
Charles Onyango-Obbo is Nation Media Group’s executive editor for Africa & Digital Media. E-mail: cobbo@ke.nationmedia.com
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BUT CHARLES -- there would be no need for bodyguards and bull dogs inevitably followed by crisis management (street riots)if these leaders focused their energy and paranoia on the upgrading of their ordinary citizens.
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