Uganda speaks with forked tongue…

Just how solid is Uganda's word and who speaks for the country?

This is a legitimate question after last week’s events that saw Kampala flip-flop between appeasing the International Criminal Court, which has issued arrest warrants against Sudan’s President Omar al Bashir, and sticking with the pack after the African Union passed a resolution against any efforts to arrest Bashir.

Somehow, Uganda’s political leadership expected to land on the right side of both camps.

Having got the ICC to issue warrants against the leaders of its own Lord’s Resistance Army, Uganda was expected to be a natural ally in any future search for fugitives from international justice.

This is what must have been on the mind of ICC chief prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo when he made a beeline for Kampala after learning that the indicted Bashir was scheduled to make an appearance at the Smart Partnership Dialogue that Uganda is hosting this week.

Kampala did not disappoint.

Junior Foreign Minister Henry Okello Oryem told a press conference that Uganda had an obligation to execute the ICC warrants and went on to suggest that Bashir would be arrested if he set foot in Kampala.

Hours later, a thoroughly embarrassed Kampala was scrambling to do damage control.

In the event, Bashir chose to delegate his deputy as President Yoweri Museveni avoided a potentially charged summit of the Non-Aligned Movement in Sham el Sheik, Egypt.

Uganda risks a crisis of credibility. Taking stands and then backtracking from them to suit different occasions, is hardly the way to earn respect.