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No Red Weddings: We need to revive political marriages for peace in Africa

Tuesday August 14 2018
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Ugandans marvelled at the many political foes coming to share the Mbabazis’ and Ramaphosas’ happy moments. ILLUSTRATION | JOHN NYAGAH | NMG

By JOACHIM BUWEMBO

For the last quarter of 2015 and first quarter of 2016, Plot 10 Nyonyi Gardens, on Kololo hill of Kampala was the most surveilled residence in Uganda.

The country’s best equipped and trained security agents were closely monitoring and anticipating every move in the home of ex-prime minister John Patrick Amama Mbabazi.

Mbabazi had decided to challenge his former friend of 41 years, President Yoweri Museveni, for leadership of the ruling NRM party and the country’s top job.

Political and security operatives were working round the clock to derail Mbabazi’s campaign and humiliate him beyond acceptability to the voters.

Even after the February 2016 elections, Mbabazi petitioned the Supreme Court to nullify Museveni’s victory and though unsuccessful, got the court to recommend significant reforms in the electoral system.

Mbabazi got 1.5 per cent of the votes but the NRM propagandists were telling the masses in vernacular that the man got “one and a half votes.”

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Last month and this month, national security has evinced equal if not more interest in Plot 10 Nyonyi Gardens. This is because South African President Cyril Ramaphosa came to this house in a delegation to ask for the hand of Mbabazi’s niece Bridget Birungi, for his son Andile Ramaphosa.

If you had acted suspiciously around Nyonyi Gardens or done anything to upset brother Mbabazi in the past few weeks, you would have found out what metal the Ugandan defence forces are made of.

I think this development provides the recipe for peace within and between African countries. In the circumstances, Uganda and South Africa cannot go to war even if they shared borders. Remember the silly rock called Migingo over which Kenya and Uganda are wont to flex their muscles from time to time?

Anyway, suppose every African president gave a son or daughter to an opposition leader’s child in another country, two things would happen simultaneously. First, the opposition leader would start enjoying dignified treatment from the state.

If Kizza Besigye’s son were to wed the daughter of a former president, it is unlikely that he would be sprayed like a cockroach and tossed in the back of a pickup like a sack of potatoes.

Second, Besigye would in the first place possibly not go to the street to confront a heavily armed, jittery police barehanded, for the Ugandan president would have called his counterpart, Besigye’s son’s father-in-law, to restrain his ever angry opponent.

And oh, these weddings can really unite political camps. Last Saturday afternoon, all Ugandans with a smartphone were glued to the proceedings at 10 Nyonyi Gardens.

Besides the cultural fusion of what the South Africans brought to Kampala with that of Mbabazi’s Bakiga from southwestern Uganda, Ugandans marvelled at the many political foes coming to share the Mbabazis’ and Ramaphosas’ happy moments.

We ordinary mortals also had a chance to see pictures of the inside of a residence of one of the mighty – the glitter seemed to put what we saw at the UK royal wedding to shame. And yes, General Museveni and the First lady were there, as were many former big people who fell out with NRM.

The country has not seen such a spectacle in a long time, and is unlikely to do so for the foreseeable future.

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