Uganda

F

Return of Obote

A 20-month period of transition followed, with the goal of preparing for elections. However, factional intrigue stemming from Uganda’s complex ethnic and religious divisions resulted in three short-lived provisional governments during this period, led by Yusufu Lule, Godfrey Binaisa, and Paulo Muwanga. The 1980 election revived the competition between the UPC and the DP. The DP appeared to win, but Muwanga, a UPC stalwart, seized personal control over the vote count and declared a UPC victory. Museveni’s newly formed party, the Uganda Patriotic Movement (UPM), ran a poor third.

Obote took power for a second time, but with an even narrower base of support than before. In addition, Museveni rejected the UPC victory and started a multiethnic guerrilla movement, the National Resistance Army (NRA), in rural Buganda in 1981. The UPC government responded with a savage campaign against the Ganda in the region to deprive the NRA of supplies. Corruption, torture, and deprivation of human rights by UPC and government officials exceeded the worst years of the Amin regime. In 1985 Acholi officers, complaining that Acholi soldiers had to fight on the front lines while Langi officers and men from Obote’s area stayed safely behind, staged a coup. Again, Obote was forced to flee to exile, this time in Zambia. Acholi army officer Tito Okello declared himself head of state in July 1985, but he had the support of only a fraction of the army, and was unable to establish control over the country. After inconclusive negotiations in Kenya between the combatants, the NRA marched victoriously into Kampala in early 1986.

G

Museveni’s Uganda

The National Resistance Movement (NRM), the political wing of the NRA, immediately created a broad-based government by inviting members of other parties, particularly the DP, but also the UPC, to join the government at all levels, including the cabinet. However, it insisted on its own version of popular democracy. Museveni argued that because the NRM was a “movement” open to all Ugandans, it alone could contest elections. The old parties, he insisted, competed on the basis of religion and ethnicity, not on issues of development. Museveni established a system of local government whereby the smallest villages were indirectly represented in the province-level administrative bodies. He also oversaw the diversification of the Ugandan economy and adopted market-oriented economic development programs, to which he adhered strictly.

G

1

Foreign Policy

Under Museveni, Uganda practiced an aggressive foreign policy. The country was intermittently engaged in hostilities with Kenya during the late 1980s due to Kenyan support of antigovernment Ugandan rebels. Uganda’s support of southern Sudanese rebels elicited sporadic attacks by the Sudanese military.

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In 1990 the Ugandan government allowed considerable numbers of Rwandans in the Ugandan army to create an invasion force to attack and eventually defeat the Rwandan government. In 1996 Uganda allegedly helped the Congolese and Rwandan forces who crossed into the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and overthrew President Mobutu Sese Seko. In 1998 Ugandan military units helped the Congolese rebels battling the forces of Laurent-Désiré Kabila, who was then DRC president.

G

2

Domestic Issues

In domestic politics during the 1990s, the government took a number of bold steps. It supported a lengthy constitutional review that involved much public dialogue. The new constitution, adopted in 1995, permitted the return of traditional monarchs as cultural but not political figures. Several areas, including Buganda, promptly coronated kings. In 1996 Uganda held national elections for parliament and the presidency. All Ugandans, regardless of their party affiliation under previous governments, could contest the elections, but the government prohibited party activity and all candidates ran on a nonparty basis. International observers declared these elections free and fair. Ugandan voters chose to retain the country’s nonparty system of government in a 2000 referendum, but voted to switch to a multiparty system in 2005. Museveni was reelected in 2001 and 2006.

Since the late 1980s the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), a fundamentalist Christian guerrilla group, has opposed Museveni’s administration in the Acholi areas of the north. The LRA, originally funded by the Sudanese government, has caused much damage and loss of life, leading to popular discontent with Museveni in the north.

Under Museveni, Uganda made remarkable strides toward reclaiming its international reputation since the bloody Amin and second Obote periods. Museveni and the NRM accomplished three remarkable goals: an army that respects the rights of civilians in peaceful areas, disciplined economic management, and democratic elections. Nevertheless, in the early 21st century, Uganda had eradicated neither the LRA nor corruption in government, and its aggressive foreign policy periodically raised the ire of its neighbors.

Museveni became embroiled in more controversy as he prepared for reelection in February 2006. He caused international concern when he facilitated changes in the constitution in 2005 that allowed him to run for a third term. In addition, his leading opponent, Kizza Besigye, claimed that the government sought to derail his campaign by charging him with rape and treason in the run-up to the balloting. Besigye was cleared of the rape charges but had to appear in court repeatedly during the campaign to defend himself. Besigye filed suit charging that the February polling had been rigged. In April 2006 Uganda's Supreme Court validated Museveni's election victory. The court declared in a split decision that despite irregularities in the election, the evidence presented would not have reversed the results. Museveni was sworn into office for a third term in May 2006.

G

3

Ceasefire with Rebel Group

In August 2006 the Ugandan government signed a truce with the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). Under the truce the rebels would leave Uganda and come under the protection of the southern Sudanese regional government (see Sudan). The ceasefire was to be followed by peace negotiations. Still unresolved was the issue of war crimes charges brought against leaders of the LRA by the International Criminal Court (ICC). The Ugandan government offered amnesty to the LRA leaders, but ICC officials said they were still seeking the top LRA leaders, including its founder, Joseph Kony. The ICC has brought charges against them of murder, rape, using young girls as sex slaves, and forcibly conscripting children into the rebel army. In October the LRA said it would refuse to sign a peace treaty unless the ICC’s arrest warrants were dropped. There were signs that the truce was beginning to unravel, as some LRA units were leaving their designated assembly points in Sudan.

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