Phew!
Have you caught your breath yet?
2025 is threatening to be the shortest 12 months we have ever had in a long time. Nearly every day brings with it an event whose impact will take years to unpack but we have to move on quickly because of what happens next. A quick rundown!
Besigye kidnap/arrest in Kenya
Dr. Kizza Besigye’s kidnap/arrest in Nairobi in November may have happened in 2024 but its real effects have been fully felt this year. In military detention with an aide Dr. Obed Lutale, Besigye seemingly turned the tables on his captors by launching a week long hunger strike protest.
The protest saw fears that Dr. Besigye, who is 68, may die in custody due to his age and circumstances of his incarceration.
Dr. Besigye’s continued detention quickly became a galvanising call to action for the usually fractured Ugandan opposition, to the government’s dismay. Rival politicians like National Unity Platform president Robert Kyagulanyi found themselves speaking from the same book with former allies like Mathias Mpuuga calling for Besigye’s arrest.
Interest in Besigye’s case quickly took on a regional tone as Kenyans outraged that he was kidnapped on their soil, joined in the chorus of voices calling for his release.
The nature of Besigye’s seizure in Nairobi led to new probing over the increasingly authoritarian stances displayed by the leaders of the main East African nations, prompting unforeseen headaches.
Apologists in Nairobi, Dodoma and Kigali are still working overtime to cleanse the tarnished image of their paymasters.
Meanwhile, Besigye remains in detention but his case has been transferred from a military court to a civilian one. He has also ended his hunger strike. Abduction of NUP supporters off the street in and around Uganda continues unabated.
The Supreme Court Ruling on General Court Martial
Chief Justice Alfonse Owiny-Dollo has long been considered one of the “best cadre judges” to the bench for the National Resistance Movement (NRM) government. It was under his tenure that the 2021 election petition contesting the outcome of the presidential election was dismissed.
He has remained largely silent as President Museveni demanded a revision of the terms on which suspects are granted bail. Museveni has argued that some suspects accused of crimes like treason, murder and repeat offenders should not be granted bail.
The surprise then was to see Owiny-Dollo (69), who is due to retire in 2026, preside over a judgment that ruled that the General Court Martial has no right to try civilians in January 2025. In the supreme court ruling, the justices went further and challenged legal standing of the army court declaring it was being run by persons not adequately trained.
That ruling so appalled the top army brass that not only did the army commander and first son General Muhoozi Kainerugaba come out tweets blazing against it insisting civilians could still be tried there, Museveni himself condemned it too.
In a chilling sentence in a letter to the “Bazzukulu”, Museveni declared that judges do not rule Uganda. Nonetheless, the ruling party has taken steps to “legalise” the existence of the army court in the near future. The country had been waiting for this ruling for four years though it was always postponed.
The media under attack politically, economically and culturally
Before I started this piece, the biggest media news in our part of the world was the regrettable annual tradition of firings at Next Media Services. Word on the grapevine indicating that the deputy CEO Joe Kigozi and Chief News Editor Dalton Kaweesa had been eased out.
A quiet decimation of newsrooms is underway in Uganda with The Daily Monitor, NTV Uganda and lesser-known outfits offloading experienced journalists due to economic constraints. The Ugandan economy has never really recovered from the body blows of the Covid-19 lockdown (2020-2022).
But with Uganda bracing for a dramatic 2026 general election many observers speculate maybe longtime Ugandan ruler Museveni’s last, pressure started to be exerted on the media from an unexpected and unpredictable quarter: President Museveni’s son and CDF Muhoozi Kainerugaba.
In a series of tweets on X (former Twitter) in February, Muhoozi indicated he had been asked by his father to conduct an audit of the media operating in Uganda.
All top media managers are supposed to subject themselves to “cadre training” under the CDF’s office. In fact a meeting is scheduled for February 27.
Reading between the lines suggests the media is expected to become more patriotic and less critical in just the time when its piercing scrutiny would be most needed by the country and its audience.
Meanwhile, on the global stage, X owner Elon Musk continues to gleefully try to emasculate the media by declaring to users of his platform that, “You are the media now,” not the traditional, professional practitioners of the craft. He is only parroting the sentiments of the most powerful man in the world: the current American president, Donald Trump.
The Trump presidency effect
Donald J. Trump maybe the most impactful American president on Uganda’s future. While Trump seems uninterested in Africa on the whole, his policy decisions are rearranging internal dynamics in many countries on the continent.
His 90-day suspension of aid through USAID (which he is determined to scrap) has thrown many health programmes in Uganda into jeopardy. Several health professionals have been forced to go on unpaid leave, “as we wait and see,” while others have been asked by the ministry of Health Permanent Secretary Dr. Diana Atwine to “work for free for now” in a show of patriotic zeal.
As this outlet reported last week, Trump officials are also working around the clock to undo sanctions issued against certain powerful Ugandan politicians like the Speaker Anita Annet Among.
If successful, this will be a grave setback for forces in the country who thought they had a sympathetic ear in the West and especially Washington DC. Trump, who once described third world nations as shithole countries, does not seem to have changed his mind about them.
He is content to let them go to hell in their own self woven, leaky handbasket.
Folks, we are just two months into 2025!
Tunamalaako?!
Medium: @davidjacktumusiime
X/Twitter: @davidtumusiime
Email: [email protected]
