On
February 12th, 2020 somewhere during the middle of the day, news broke
on social media about the passing of a great man, a hero of Uganda. General
Benon Biraaro had finally passed on to glory! I cannot explain the level of
sadness I felt at his passing as it was profound. I last met the General in
person a couple of weeks after the last Ugandan presidential elections. He was
taking his early morning walk at the Speke Resort Munyonyo. I remember as he
passed by where I was standing, I initiated greetings and a few pleasantries
passed between us. He thereafter continued with his morning walk. Already by then rumors had it that he was battling cancer. General Biraaro was an excellent
product of the National Resistance Army (NRA) and what it represented.
Many stories have been
told of the valiant actions of the NRA bush war heroes. In history it is one of the
shortest guerrilla wars ever fought from the beginning to its end, and that so rather
successfully. One of the hallmarks of the NRA was the uncompromising discipline
of its foot soldiers and all in rank and file of this outfit.
Growing up
in Uganda, I
watched as the Obote II government special forces wrecked
violence and intimidation on the population. I speak of the special forces because
I observed daily at their permanent station near my home how young men were
mistreated. It was common sight for these young men to be brutally beaten, and
that so at any hour you passed by the station, which incidentally was right by
the roadside. You got a feeling they did it for sport and the fun if it. I
remember feeling lucky that at the time that I looked like,
and was, an innocent, young lad
that they only saw passing by multiple times a day; they did not bother to stop
me nor ask me
for anything.
This is where I learned to walk with my Identity card! Yes, I said Identity
card; never mind that I was still in my single digit years. To date the habit
stuck with me. I carry all my key identification documents on my body wherever
I am, a weird habit some may say.
The men in green were not
any better. In fact, my recollection of soldiers in combat fatigues were
during the "Panda Gari" days; you woke up at 5 a.m on
any given day to chaos; the residential area would have been cordoned off by soldiers and no male above a certain age could
leave; it was almost a crime in those days to be youthful
and male. The
young men and the stronger older men were usually all herded off often
to the
nearest sports field where they were made to squat in
the sun, and made to do all sorts of demeaning exercises as they awaited a further filter.
Usually those unfortunate enough to make the filter never made it back. They
literally "disappeared" (we heard in those days that forests like Namanve “dissolved” their often-decapitated
bodies).
This "disappearing" thing one day became reality to me. There was this young single mother that had two boys in my class; She
seemed to be doing well. I think she was some sort of businesswoman. She
drove the latest Fiat Mirafiori at the time, cream in colour. I recall Andrew
and Alex coming to school one Monday morning, telling a horror story of how their
mother had been rounded up at home by armed men on the Sunday
afternoon,
bundled off onto a waiting truck and then taken to an unknown destination.
Later that week they seem to have found out where she was being kept and only so
as managed a glimpse of a hooded her
as she was being herded across the compound to a new location; that was the last they ever saw of
their mother: what an image to keep of someone that you loved, and
that loved you too! I hurt for them; yes, even as a child it still hurt so
badly. I kept
wondering what had happened to my friends' mum. Sadly, that
story's end hasn’t been told to date.
So, you can imagine the anxiety among us when a
new rag tag army, wearing bare threads on their back showed up. We had just been through one military coup the year before where the "Anyanya" militia were brought in; the country jumped from frying pan to the fire. Walking on the streets of Kampala then, if one met a soldier you made a beeline for the nearest cover you could find until the guy had safely passed by. Now in-spite of their misfit aura and despite the way they looked, instead there was a huge
discipline that the NRA guerrillas carried along with them. These guys treated the citizens
with much respect and exercised much restraint in their transactions. There was this one day when I witnessed a young soldier (he looked to be around 17 years of age) arresting a suspect that he had apparently witnessed killing off his entire family. The Boy soldier was clearly angry and if it were up to him, he would have "finished off" (read "dissolved") this guy on the spot. But that method belonged to the old guards, not to the new dispensation. He had to effect the arrest and carry this elderly criminal to the nearest detention center to begin his journey to justice, and that he did.
I remember when the guns fell silent in
Kampala on 26th January 1986, they really did fall silent. At first it felt weird
going through a night without a single gun shot being fired; months down the
road we got used to the new normal. Today, there is many kids that have never
heard a gunshot being fired. My first time to carry an automatic weapon was in
1986 when I was 13; this belonged to one of those rag-tag army soldiers. I
cannot forget that feeling.
So how did the NRA manage
to achieve this paradigm shift on discipline of armed forces? History was not
playing in their favor at all. In fact for over 15 years before 1986, the narrative of
violence dispensed by the Armed forces had been written and its script was clear and being followed to the letter.
How did the NRA manage to change that narrative wherever they went? Stories have
been told of the bush war, stories of how that same script attempted to
make its way into the NRA, and how it faced the brutal reality that the status
quo was not accepted there. Listening to these young soldiers I heard stories
of how undisciplined NRA combatants had been handled; the firing squad!
So, what
in NRA amounted to indiscipline? How could an army of angry, hungry and ill-dressed
young men and women garner so much discipline and order to follow instructions
without wavering to the left or to the right? We are told that you did not
steal anything as a member of the NRA; you asked politely for it, and if given, you took it back to the bigger team and shared it together. If you asked and you were not given,
you graciously accepted the negative response and moved on. You did not steal
even when your life depended on it nor did you revenge. You never raided locals’ gardens to
uproot tubers or food to eat it. You did not take what never belonged to you. You did not terrorize the locals. All offences to this rule were met by swift judgment by a counsel and then often ended with the offender facing the firing
squad. Even non-consensual sex was punishable by
death. So, this army learned to govern their appetites and slowly by slowly a brutally
disciplined force was born.
More than anything else, it is this discipline of
the NRA that brought people close to them. People gave their lives literally
for them, rather than give them away. To date, when General Yoweri
Kaguta Museveni visits those villages, he is treated with much respect by the
still surviving locals from those days. They love him to the core and would possibly
still die for him.
Lately, I see a lot of
self entitled members of the armed forces. I wonder what happened to the NRA discipline!
It is a rather worrying trend when one sees the "Wanainci" being treated as
second rate citizens by the ones who should be fighting for their rights. It is a
scary situation.
About 5 years ago I was
involved in a rather unfortunate incident where a very senior member of the
armed forces, notorious for his indiscipline and bully tendencies, unilaterally ordered for a tractor to
graze over one meter into our family property.
This boundary run for about 50 meters in a rather expensive part of
town (count the impact on cost); never mind that his directly adjacent property was saved and untouched as he had fenced it off all the way into the existing demarcated access road. I was swiftly constrained by the villagers not
to even attempt reaching out to him otherwise I will be met with a barrage of
physical abuse from both him and his guards (he had recently clobbered a boda
boda guy that had approached him over unruly driving). I eventually advised my
self out of the action simply because he had widened the road which we
all were using anyway.
On another day recently last year 2019,
men in uniform walked onto a private property and wrecked havoc in broad day
light. The issue had to do with a land matter that was before competent
decision makers for review and realignment. Apparently (not validated) they had
instructions to walk onto this property and terrorize whosoever they found;
never mind that the property was an established place of residence and work.
They beat, they threatened more violence, they kidnapped (for lack of a better
word, given that no warrant of arrest had been issued), they destroyed
property. Effect of this trespass was that life for these people took a downturn
as they could not manage a meaningful existence in such a work environment.
It is not uncommon lately to see some gun wielding guy bully a citizen out of their way with impunity. And by the way its no longer the senior guys; the juniors and privates have learned very well from their senior colleagues that have led by example. This is when you know that the "cancer" is at Stage 4. This, in the day of the NRA, was totally unthinkable. The culprits would have
received swift and decisive justice which would as well be meted
out to them in the very community they violated. These individuals however still walk around freely,
looking for another weak "mwanainchi" to devour. One wonders what people now think about men in Uniform. What an abuse of this uniform painted in the valor of those who went before them in the NRA; what an abuse meted out on the sacrifice of the
gallant men and women that have gone before them in this very uniform.
In
recent time, there has been some gruesome stories of the actions of errant men
and women of uniform. Some of the stories are so hard to believe, and yet these
are true. There is not enough space for me to repeat these stories here, but
the results of such abuse of uniform have been told over and over globally, and
they are always the same. Nicolae Ceausescu is a great example to
follow for anyone given the responsibility of the uniform; pay very close
attention to the lessons from that Romanian Revolution. The uniform requires
that one frequently retreats and reviews the actions and responsibility that
comes with that uniform, and ensure to recommit to those responsibilities with a new vigor.
I remember stories being
told (truth not validated) of the late Paulo Muwanga, possibly the most
powerful Vice President Uganda has ever seen. He was such a power center and
his directives never went unheeded. Deep in one Masaka village where he hailed
from, apparently the villagers were staunch DP party supporters (the most powerful
opposition part of the time); he on the other hand was a UPC stalwart. He could
not hear of anything else other than just what had UPC emblazoned on it.
However, in the case of his village, he made a wild exception. Apparently, he
never took it lying down if indiscipline happened in his village or to his
villagers (he was Minister of Defence). In addition, he ensured that that he often gifted the villagers with things
that were in the green and white colors, the official colors of DP. He understood
his people, he loved his people, and he knew no matter how high and mighty he
was, these were his people; and they loved him so! Not one evil word has ever
issued from that village about the late Paulo Muwanga, inspire of the many
cries from else where. The key lesson to learn is that East or West, home is
best; so, before long one will soon find them selves back home, and how lonely
that home will be if all you have done is agitate the people around you.
There is a way in which
evil practices easily and quickly get perpetrated into society. It is almost as
if they are simply waiting for someone to just give them a tag and they will
run themselves into whatever they can. Good, on the other hand, takes time; it
takes time to build anything good but just a moment to ruin it. A lot was
invested into Uganda's security, and the price paid for it was blood, the blood
of both citizenry and of our gallant men and women in Uniform. What I see in
cases like those above is a bunch of bad mannered "boys and girls"
that have totally lost their way, and now impose themselves onto the very
people they should so carefully be protecting from these very evils. This habit
quickly catches on and the cost to take it back is staggeringly high.
My word of advice to the
leaders and commandants of the men and women in Uniform, lets protect the
honor of that Uniform. Let us protect the legacy of the gallant men and women
of these armed forces that have laid down their lives in the process of fighting to
protect the liberties of their fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, friends and countrymen. Let us
remember these sacrifices and let us cut off that cancer before it takes the
entire body down with it.
