(this article first appeared in the New Vision of May 18th, 2018)
There are certain types of people, of whom the late Godfather of Soul, James Brown, said are fond of “…talking loud, but saying nothing.” These people (the British have a polite word for them – windbags) like drawing attention to themselves, it does not matter if they are making fools of themselves, but as long as they get some 15 minutes in the lights. This column is for all of you, gobermouths, fopdoodles and flibbertigibbets of this world.
Politicians in Uganda seemingly can do anything they want, and very often do, with the knowledge that they will most probably get away with it. Influence peddling, using their offices to commit all kinds unsavoury acts, down to outright murder – they have done it all. But very few of them get called upon to answer for their actions.
Uganda is beset with many problems, but one of the most painful is how public officials break the law or ignore it with impunity. I am willing to bet that almost every politician or government official, small or big, have used their offices to unfairly acquire land.
This is where the Land Inquiry Commission comes in; there have been complaints that the report that will be produced at the end might never see the light of day, as indeed many other commissions’ reports are lying somewhere gathering dust. The report may be shelved or, as some lawyers argued, there may be legal reasons why it will not be binding or acted upon. But what Justice Catherine Bamugemereire is doing is shedding light on what these gobermouths have been doing, away from the public eye.
It took the Commission, way before it has concluded its inquiries, to stop a reign of terror that the ever obnoxious Ronald Kibuule, State Minister for Water, had inflicted upon people of Buikwe. Not only had he used state machinery (including the police) to evict residents from land that did not belong to him, his agents had inflicted actual physical harm on the people. A case where one of the residents was killed is still in court.
Ronald Kibuule, State Minister for Water
But when the residents took their case to the Bamugemereire Commission, all the dirty underhand dealings were exposed. Eventually the land titles that Kibuule had fraudulently acquired were cancelled, and maybe the residents can now sleep comfortably without fear of being attacked in their homes.
Then came the Minister for Lands, Betty Amongi, under whose docket the Commission of Inquiry falls. It took the threat of a warrant of arrest to make her appear, and the theatre of the absurd ensued. She huffed and puffed and tried every each way to try and avoid accepting blame for a whole litany of wrong doings.
And that got Justice Bamugemereire hot under the collar, so much so that the good Justice even raised her voice in trying to get the Minister to give truthful answers. That did not go down well with some Ugandans, very typically so, especially lawyers.
Unsolicited opinions from so-called ‘learned friends’ made the rounds, expressing disappointment that the Justice had dared raise her voice to the ‘Honourable Minister’, and even referred to her as a ‘young lady’ at one time. They went on about legalities and matters of ‘procedure’ ad nauseum.
You really have to give it up to Ugandans to choose the petty over the very important, and it brought back memories of how members of the legal fraternity had attacked Lady Justice Ssebutinde’s Commission of Inquiry into the police. If Ssebutinde had been treated more seriously, maybe the police would not consistently rank as the most despised public institution in this country.
Like my colleague and BBC journalist Alan Kasujja put it: “…Until you’ve heard the stories of impunity, blatant abuse of power, dispossession of the poor and theft by government officials with no scruples that Justice Bamugemereire has heard, please sit down.”
So, y’all give Lady Justice Catherine Bamugemereire a break, and pray you’re not appearing before her next.
kalungikabuye 