Dossier

The Key to the Crisis

Nearly unnoticed by the Western world, Uganda has been heavily engaged in the fighting that has torn its neighbors in the Great Lakes region. And behind the ambitions of an ambitious African leader, a discerning eye can see the influence of Western powers.

By Richard Mugisha

It could it now be said with certainty that a new type of scramble for Africa is going on before our very eyes. To understand the agonies of the Great Lakes region, it is useful to consider the role played by a single key country: Uganda.

News of a Ugandan military cargo plane crushing over the Rwenzoori Mountains on the Zairian side of the border in February hit the European headlines just as the country's President Yoweri Museveni arrived in Paris. The plane--so the reports said--carried soldiers and weapons being deployed in the conflict that is now raging in Zaire. The survivors of the plane crush unfortunately landed into the hands of the Zairian security forces, who promptly arrested them. Back in Paris, French authorities had been preparing to ask their Ugandan guest why he had been unable to use his personal popularity to stop the conflicts in the region. Now, confronted with the evidence that Museveni's country was an active participant in the fighting, the diplomats faced a more complex problem.

At least as viewed through the prism of the international media, Uganda has been fairly free of conflict recently. The country has seen 11 years of relative peace under Museveni's National Resistance Movement (NRM); a new constitution has been drawn up, at least theoretically answering the demands of "the people;" presidential and parliamentary elections have been held in May and June 1995, without any significant complaints of force or fraud; and the nation's economy, fueled by the help of foreign investors, is growing at an admirable pace.

In a country where a family's security was once subject to the whims of Idi Amin, and where Milton Obote later unleashed terror among his people on an unprecedented scale--indeed, in an African region where today all social order seems to be crumbling--Uganda can be seen as a sort of African miracle. But that sort of view is held only by those who receive all their information from the Western mass media. Those who investigate a bit more carefully can find a bewildering tangle of dangerous plots, traps, and alliances. How many Western reporters, for instance, have explored the remarkable story that Christian "fundamentalists" in Uganda have made common cause with Muslim "fundamentalists" in the government of Sudan, in a bid to destablize Mureveni's regime?

In fact Uganda is a caldron of political instability. Some rebel groups demand a multi-party democracy, while others seek a federal system of government that would allow more autonomy for different regions. Militant Muslims push for the establishment of a strict rule of Shari'a law. President Museveni has not found a way to settle those conflicts democratically.

This frustration might provide one motive for Museveni's recent efforts to meddle in the affairs of nearby countries. He may be seeking to destroy the rebels who oppose his regime, many of whom are based in those countries. Or he may wish to support rebels in those countries, as a way to install new, friendly governments among his neighbors.

Or is it Museveni's goal to create a personal empire? Some of his opponents say that Museveni is of Tutsi origin (he has not discussed the question himself), and hint that he hopes to set up a new entity--a so-called Tutsiland. These critics see the Ugandan president as an ambitious man, a veritable Napoleon of Africa. Their theory might explain the widespread belief Museveni has carefully groomed the Tutsi soldiers within the ranks of his National Resistance Army (NRA). Without such military help, how could it have been possible for the Tutsis, ensconced for over 30 years in the refugee camps in Uganda and other East African countries, to have succeeded in routing President Habyarimana's army in the Rwanda war of 1990-1994? And is it any wonder (this argument continues) that the rebel army now fighting in Zaire--the first force to inflict any significant damage on Mobutu's dominion since that country's independence--had Tutsis (the Banyamulenge) at its core?

During the bloodshed of the early 1990s, the government of Rwanda accused Uganda of sponsoring the violence, arguing that Tutsi forces had crossed the border between the two countries. The Ugandan denial was not, and could not have been, convincing. In fact most of the rebels who entered Rwanda in 1990 were not only coming from Uganda, but were actually members of the Ugandan army; some of them, like Paul Kagame, were senior officers. Similarly, when the Banyamulenge rebellion began in October 1996, Zaire too accused Uganda of sponsoring the rebels--along with Rwanda and Burundi, countries which are both now ruled by the leaders who could loosely be said to be of Tutsi origin.

To the North of Uganda, the Sudanese government has joined in the chorus of complaint, asserting that Museveni supports the rebels of the Sudanese Peoples Liberation Movement (SPLM). Since early 1996, rebel activity in that country was increased, and by the beginning of 1997 the intensity of rebel attacks on Sudan's major towns in the east and southeast of the country led to suspicions that neighboring countries--namely Uganda, Ethiopia, and Eritrea--were giving support to the rebels. Here there are no Tutsis for Museveni to support. What business then does Uganda have in Sudan?

It is upon examination of Uganda's involvement in Sudan that one realizes that the theories about Museveni's personal or ethnic ambitions are not adequate to explain his actions. His designs for the region, whatever they may be, are not entirely his own; they also fit into the plans of other more powerful countries. A Third World dictator like Museveni cannot survive without paying attention to the interests of major world powers. And it would be infantile to assume that the powers of the West--along with Japan and, to an increasing extent, China--are engaged with purely benevolent causes in Africa.

In the harsh reality of the politico-economic world there are "spheres of influence" to be acquired, natural resources to be developed, and consumer markets to be taken over (or protected) from competitors. At the international level, economic interests can lead to crude power politics. Just for example, the chances that John Major and the Conservative Party will remain in power in Britain after the forthcoming elections could be somewhat improved if the Anglo-American support for Zairian rebel leader Laurent Kabila results in a fresh flow of Zaire's gold and diamonds to British business interests.

A few centuries ago the European colonial powers competed in what has become known as the scramble for Africa. The current unrest on the continent reflects a new phenomenon, not yet widely recognized, which might be called the second scramble for Africa. At the heart of this scramble is the Great Lakes region, and the main players are seen the Anglo-American alliance on one hand and the French-Belgian alliance on the other. Thus far the latter are losing. The former Belgian territories of Rwanda and Burundi have, in the course of the last seven years, been taken over upon by forces more friendly to the British and the American alliance. Now the frontier of conquest has moved into Zaire. It is in this light that we should see the role of personalities like Museveni, and of countries like Uganda.

When he took power in Uganda, Museveni delivered that country to the side of the Anglo-American alliance. When he began his struggle for power fifteen years ago, the country was waking up to the reality that the Tanzanian war of "liberation" against Idi Amin was, rather than ushering in a new peace, culminating in a vicious civil war. Milton Obote--the president at the time, as well as the leader of the Uganda Peoples Congress (UPC)--had rigged general elections, and Museveni had run to the bush to fight the new regime. Other Ugandan politicians too had formed armed organizations some of which were quite radical. The turning point in the struggle came when the British journalist William Pike became the first Western journalist to visit Museveni's NRA in the bush, and upon his return to the Western world that Museveni was not, as had been widely suspected, a Communist. He therefore became an acceptable recipient of Western support.

In 1985 when Obote's regime fell at the hands of its own army, and it became apparent that this army was incapable of asserting any kind of control over the country, it was Tiny Rowland, the head of the British-based multinational corporation, Lonrho-- a man who was widely respected for his business and political ties with African leaders--who pointed out to the British establishment that Museveni was the man to deal with. From that time forward Museveni's rebels gained strength and in January 1986 they took power in Kampala.

These peasants in ragged military uniforms, headed by a peasant turned populist politician, had occupied an important political vacuum. On Uganda's political spectrum they stood apart from the other warring factions: the degenerate remnants of the former regimes of Amin and Obote; the zealots who used tribal and ethnic arguments as their ideological bases; and the extreme radicals who sought to lead Uganda into the Communist orbit. With the help he soon received from the West, Museveni neutralized all these forces, made Uganda safe for Western commerce and investment.

There are many different theories to explain the troubles of Africa. History is written by victors, and the Great Lakes region has an abundance of such "heroes": Kenyatta, Obote, Amin, Mobutu, Nyerere, Habyarimana, and now Museveni. (Museveni has actually made a point of writing his own biography now, while he is still in power, so that his place in history will be secured.) By the same token, such leaders have always been blamed for the crises that their respective African countries have undergone, and of course they are far from blameless. Idi Amin caused mayhem by murdering the elite and ruining the economy of Uganda. Mobutu has overstayed his time in power and now the ailing Zairian dictator does not even have an heir to the throne. After a political and social catastrophe such as the one that occurred in Rwanda in 1994, blame is laid at the feet of main players, such as Museveni, Habyarimana, or Paul Kagame.

Another factor which has featured prominently in the modern history of the Great Lakes region is tribalism. Western analysts describe the continent as "the heart of darkness," tribal rivalries and ethnic strife. Blame for the continent's political and social afflictions is heaped on the numerous competing tribes and ethnic groups. According to this formula, the social explosion which shook Rwanda to its very foundation was the sinister work of the majority Hutus against the minority Tutsis. In Uganda the same theory posits that the Northerners who have refused to accept the rule of the Southerners. Now that there is civil war in Zaire, the Banyamulenge take the blame for starting it all.

This type of historiography, however, is inaccurate and misleading if it is taken as a complete explanation, apart from any consideration of the role played by the world's great powers. Admittedly there are numerous tribes in Africa but why should we blame them for the past and current crises when actually since colonial rule these people were deprived of any political power? The phrase "the ruling Hutus" is a gross mystification because it underplays the fact that even these Hutus had no power during the rule of a man like Habyarimana. When they were forced into exile they had only their bundles of firewood and personal belongings--all of which had insignificant monetary value in a modern sense.

To blame any individual leader or any tribe for the disaster faced by an African country is to assume that such a country is fully independent. But since gaining their independence, the African countries have become colonies of a different type. They are ruled by an African elite, largely detached from their tribal origins. But the major commerce of these countries, and thus their political decisions, are still dominated by the Western powers. The fabric that holds an African nation-state together cannot be properly understood without dealing with the reality of the former colonial and the new imperial powers which created and continue to determine the existence of these nation-states.

But now this system is failing. The fact that genocide has become a means of resolving conflicts is in itself an indicator of the failure of the African elite, and the collapse of the African nation-state. If the phenomenon of foreign control in Africa was never understood in the years after independence it is not surprising that the phenomenon of the second scramble for Africa cannot be grasped; nor can this collapse of the nation-state.

The peoples of the Great Lakes region are now suffering the horrible human consequences of this collapse of the political system. For the faithful Catholics of Uganda, the last 30 years have required a walk on a tightrope. Church leaders have been caught between respect for state authority (however brutal) on one hand and advocacy for oppressed people on the other. At times their response has been admirable; Cardinal Manuel Nsubuga publicly defied Idi Amin, and Cardinal Emmanuel Wamalla of Kampala has raised a lonely voice of protest against Mureveni's manipulation of the most recent elections. But the Catholics of Uganda, like all the people of the Great Lakes region, will need all the support they can get from the West in coming years. Their problems, it seems, are only beginning.

Richard Mugisha is editor of the Eastern Africa Review in London.

The Second Scourge

The bloodshed in the Great Lakes region has drawn Western attention away from the frightening spread of AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa. A Ugandan native--himself an AIDS victim, writing under condition of anonymity--describes how the epidemic spread, and how the people responded.

For nearly a year Bua suffered without arousing the compassion of anyone but his grandfather, until finally he breathed his last.

HIV infections and AIDS diseases became known in Uganda during the middle of 1985. The news arrived at a time when the country was going through a serious political upheaval: a democratic government had just been overthrown by a military junta, after the army itself had staged a bloody coup. During the ensuing confusion, amidst a time of total insecurity in the country, I met a Ugandan journalist who had recently returned from a trip abroad; he had accompanied the country's new president on a state visit to Burma.

"How was your trip?" I asked Nume, my journalist friend.

"Oh, it was wonderful," he replied. "Except for the AIDS scare: we were seriously warned not to mess about with any woman. My friend, the thing is spreading in that part of the world like brush fire."

I could not understand what Nume was talking about, although at the same time I did not want him to know that I was ignorant of AIDS. It was the first time I had heard about AIDS in that context. I kept wondering what it could be, knowing very well that he was referring to something completely different from what I knew as the meaning of the word "aids" in English.

It did not take more than a month before I knew that AIDS is a medical term, an abbreviation for Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, a fatal disease with no cure which is mainly sexually transmitted; and that it is caused by human immunodeficiency virus, abbreviated HIV. But for some time that remained the extent of my knowledge about HIV and AIDS, and indeed most Ugandans had progressed no further than me in their knowledge of the disease as of 1985.

But soon AIDS was the topic of conversation everywhere in the country. Different sorts of speculation began to arise about the killer disease. All those who were physically lean were suspected of being carriers of HIV. "Slim" became a very poplar slang expression for AIDS all over Uganda, simply because the syndrome was known to make people become slim. Since the suspected victims were said to be suffering from "slim," thus the rumors that someone "has slim" circulated daily.

There was only one laboratory in the whole country where the blood test for HIV antibodies could be done; consequently just a tiny fraction of the population could have access to blood test. Therefore anyone who was suffering from any tropical illness--such as typhoid fever, malaria, dysentery, pneumonia, or tuberculosis--was labeled an AIDS victim; he would become an outcast in the community.

No one would want to touch or mix with any suspected victim: it was believed that even by merely shaking hands with a victim, one could become infected with HIV. To inhale near an infected person was also thought to be a means of contracting the disease, because it was believed that the air would be contaminated with the virus. Mosquito bites figured prominently among other misconceived theories of how the infection was passed along. Such was the superstition surrounding AIDS in Uganda up until the late 1980s, especially in the rural areas.

In a remote village of northern Uganda, Bua was one of the first suspected victims. He was nearly forty years old, had grown up as an orphan, and was married but without a child. In his case, it could be true that he was in fact suffering from AIDS: he had a combination of symptoms and was really quite unwell. Different illnesses thinned him down terribly, until there was almost no flesh between his skin and bones. But his health deteriorated mainly because most medical personnel did not want to treat him, for fear that he could infect them with AIDS. His condition grew worse and worse, but a local hospital refused to admit him for intensive treatment. Back at home his wife, all his relatives, and his friends deserted him, except for his grandfather.

Nobody dared reach anywhere near the poor man. He was always kept in a small hut, and cared for only by his grandfather. The old man had to cook for him, feed him, clean him--do everything for his condemned grandchild. Once in a while he would take Bua as an out-patient to the hospital. But that trek would require transporting the younger man on a bicycle for some 12 miles; his grandfather would place him on the carrier of the bicycle and roll the bike for that distance. Along the way, there would be whispers spread ahead of them, warning others that the infectious man was coming; the road would be clear right up to the hospital, except for those who bumped onto them unaware, in which cases they would tear off like rabid dogs to avoid infections.

At the clinic, the old man and his grandchild would be completely isolated, with only one or two expatriate doctors ready to examine the patient and prescribe his medication, before telling the old man to take him back home. For nearly a year Bua suffered without arousing the compassion of anyone but his grandfather, until finally he breathed his last. His burial was attended by the grandfather alone. That one brave man had to dig his grave single-handed.

Slowly but surely, through government health-education programs subsidized by international support, Ugandans came to know the facts about HIV and AIDS. Religious groups, especially the Roman Catholic Church, did a commendable service in educating the society. Among many missionary workers one stood out: Father Egedio Tocalli, a physician as well as a priest, spared no effort in teaching different audiences, moving from place to place and writing articles to promote public awareness of HIV and AIDS in Uganda; he also did his best to provide proper counseling and adequate medical treatments for his many patients who tested HIV-positive or were diagnosed as AIDS sufferers.

Thanks to the work of people like Father Tocalli, those affected by the deadly infection began to benefit from the compassion of others. Within about five years, native Ugandan doctors and nurses had changed their attitudes toward the suspected AIDS victims. So the qualities of life improved a great deal for people who were seriously unhealthy. Testing facilities for HIV antibodies became much more widely available and inexpensive, making it easier to have an accurate diagnosis.

Today it is common practices for those who are healthy to hug and kiss their neighbors who are dying of AIDS, the incurable disease which Ugandans still normally prefer to call "slim." But no one can forget how thousands of Ugandans suffered and died, alone and neglected.