New York Times
May 12, 2011
By JOSH KRON
KAMPALA, Uganda – Ugandans frustrated with their government turned out in overwhelming numbers and boisterous celebration Thursday to welcome home the nation’s leading opposition figure, drowning out a lavish and dignitary-studded inauguration ceremony for President Yoweri Museveni.
Kizza Besigye, a three-time presidential candidate and ringleader of Uganda’s recent street protests over rising commodity prices, flew home Thursday from Kenya, where he had undergone medical treatment for wounds sustained during a recent arrest. Mr. Besigye, who had been barred from returning to Uganda on Wednesday, made it back early in the morning, then spent virtually the entire day driving from Uganda’s airport in Entebbe to the capital of Kampala – normally a 45-minute drive – while being thronged by dancing and singing supporters.
Witnesses driving with Mr. Besigye said that, at around mid-day, military police beat up and dispersed many of the supporters following Mr. Besigye and then surrounded the convoy, escorting it into the capital, an opposition stronghold, where thousands more cheering fans waited.
Ugandan police and military personnel have fired tear gas at major intersections along the road into Kampala, clashing with opposition supporters throwing stones and trying to disperse crowds that seemed determined to stay put.
“Celebration,” said Sarah Nabatanzi, 30, who awaited Mr. Besigye on a palm-leaf laden motorcycle. “We are celebrating now.”
“Museveni is treating us very bad,” Ms. Nabatanzi added. “Now you see they are beating us; nothing we have done, but they are spraying tear gas on us.”
The outpouring of support for Mr. Besigye’s return, which coincided and eclipsed the swearing-in ceremony for President Museveni’s fourth elected term in office (President Museveni has governed Uganda for the last quarter-century), was by far the largest demonstration by Ugandans protesting the government, and could mark a sea-change in the country’s political status-quo.
Many supporters held up old Besigye-campaign posters, others rode motorcycles while standing up and chanting opposition slogans as they drove towards the man they called “our president.”
“I cannot believe this,” said a motorcycle driver awaiting Mr. Besigye near the town of Kajjansi, along the route to the capital. “I can’t believe this day.”
For the last month, Mr. Besigye and other opposition leaders, many of whom lost handily to President Museveni in the February election, have staged twice-weekly street demonstrations to protest rising fuel and food prices, and what they call debilitating government corruption.
The protests themselves have mostly been tiny and timid, and were discarded by some as shallow political theater orchestrated by the losing candidates.
But in recent weeks, the protests’ narrative and political momentum has built as the government mounted a brutal and at times fatal response.
Mr. Besigye flew to Kenya last month seeking medical treatment after being arrested, attacked with a type of pepper spray by plain clothes police and being shot in the hand by a rubber bullet.
On Tuesday, the police used water cannons to disperse a group of six people, some of them political leaders, who were already huddled against the wall of a building. Another opposition leader was bundled into a police van and whisked away after standing in front a public park.
And what started as an almost-embarrassing political flop for Mr. Besigye last month – with roughly five followers during his first protest culminated Thursday in a dramatic procession celebrating Mr. Besigye’s return.
A deeper political row may be developing. In the last couple weeks, there has been a surge of criticism against the government and the use of force against the mostly peaceful protestors.
“Lots of this anger is being vented at Museveni as he is sworn in both because of wide-spread belief of fraud in the election and because of the way the government has handled Besigye,” said Dr. Elliot Green, a special on Uganda at the London School of Economics. “The next question is where things might go from here.”
Mr. Besigye, who came in a distant second to President Museveni in the elections, with roughly 20 percent of the vote, said that he would refuse to recognize the current government.
President Museveni has long been a close ally of the United States, and many voters gave him high marks for stabilizing the country and delivering economic growth after decades in which Uganda endured dictatorships and rebellion.
But Mr. Museveni has recently been riddled with allegations of corruption, facing questions on campaign financing, the purchase of Russian fighter jets and secretive oil contracts.
Furthermore, many security officials used by the government to counter the recent protests have been linked to a violent and shadowy branch of Uganda’s police force, known as the Rapid Response Unit, which was recently accused of widespread human-rights abuses.
No comments:
Post a Comment