For many reasons, President Yoweri Museveni’s army is the key to Uganda’s first multiparty election in 25 years. Not surprisingly then, his people are trumpeting his National Resistance Movement as the only party that can control the army.
Museveni won elections in 1996 and 2001. As much as the president tries to cake on the democratic make-up, underneath he has never really evolved from being the man who seized power in a coup 20 years ago.
By changing the Constitution to allow him to run for another term, Museveni has shed some political support. But that is a price he is prepared to pay as long as the military continues to back him.
It would take a very brave number cruncher to predict the outcome of the presidential poll on February 23. Museveni is boldly predicting that he will claim 80% of the vote, even though his major rival Kizza Besigye of the Forum for Democratic Change was treated to a tumultuous reception last year on his return from a stint in exile in South Africa.
More prudent forecasters are, however, predicting that while the president is likely to be returned, it will be a close affair and doubt that he will even meet the 50% plus one mark in the first round of voting. Inevitably, he will have to draw on what’s referred to as the ”ghost vote” made up largely of the men in uniform. Museveni has relinquished his position as supreme military commander. But he has never stopped referring to the army as ”my boys”.
In recent months, according to a Human Rights Watch report published last week, Museveni has been moving high-ranking officers and former officers into top government positions. A general has even been put in charge of managing the national soccer team.
The real size of the military is not known. But Museveni’s detractors claim the numbers are bloated so that salaries of non-existent troops or ”ghost soldiers” are channelled into the ruling party’s coffers to keep it in power.
But the government says it has to maintain high troop levels to counter the Lord’s Resistance Army, which has paralysed the north of the country, where the death rate is understood to exceed that of Iraq and Afghanistan.
Human Rights Watch says next week’s elections will not be free and fair. Opposition parties have been intimidated by the security and have had their posters removed. Besigye has been enmeshed in the law, facing treason and rape charges; spending more time in the cells and court than on the campaign trail.
Museveni has resisted pressure from the donor community to play fair. Uganda’s major benefactors are already looking beyond this election and have been pressing Besigye to accept the inevitable and use his parliamentary seats to boost his chances for next time round. If he allows disappointment to turn to violence, they argue, he will play into the hands of the military and Museveni, who would ponder the wisdom of maintaining the multiparty system.