Late for Bowling

During our ministry retreat in Kampala, we had the opportunity to take our staff out for a night of bowling. Most of my staff had no idea what bowling was, so it was quite the treat. Too much fun, I tell you!! We piled into vehicles (approximately 100 of us) and were headed into town, when we encountered THE jam. "Oh man, we're going to be late for bowling" ... "stupid riot" ... "let's drive through and see what's really going on." ... were our sentiments, which I assure you the latter we did not act upon. We ended up arriving safely at the bowling alley and safely back to our retreat center - even safely back to all of our field sites. We are praising God for his protection and provisions for all of us.

Sadly and more seriously, here are Uganda's latest headlines. Please pray for this nation.

Riots in Uganda In whose interest?
Sep 17th 2009 KAMPALA From The Economist print edition

Museveni, Qaddafi and the mysterious protests

"RIOTS rocked Kampala in support of the king of the Baganda, the country’s largest ethnic group. Shops in the capital were looted, cars burned. Uganda’s president, Yoweri Museveni, who hails from the much smaller Ankole group, ordered police and soldiers onto the streets. At least 24 people were killed in and around the city; most were shot. The government says the rioters themselves had guns. In fact, it seems likely that the armed forces fired into the crowds. The main Bagandan radio station was closed. Some journalists were arrested and charged with sedition.

Events would have spun further out of control had the Bagandan king, or kabaka, Ronald Mutebi, not cancelled a planned trip to the north of the city. Mr Museveni’s aides told the kabaka he would be held responsible for further bloodshed. So he was kept in his palace. Many of his people were enraged by this apparent humiliation.

Buganda is the largest of Uganda’s five ancient kingdoms banned under the presidencies of Milton Obote and Idi Amin but revived by Mr Museveni. The Baganda make up 17% of Ugandans. They are not generally averse to Mr Museveni and his political party, the National Resistance Movement (NRM). A majority of them voted for him in the last election, in 2006. The vice-president and numerous ministers and MPs are Baganda, along with many civil servants doing the NRM’s bidding. So why are Mr Museveni and the Baganda now at loggerheads, especially as the president is seeking re-election in 2011?

Mr Museveni thinks the Baganda have been getting uppity. Though their kingdom is the largest and was once the most powerful, it is now a ghostly fiction, with no sovereignty and little wealth. Mr Museveni is especially weary of persistent Bagandan demands for a return of a swathe of claimed ancestral lands that were long ago distributed to pastoralists or pilfered by officials—and are most unlikely ever to be given back. Besides, generosity to Buganda would aggravate the other kingdoms, particularly neighbouring Bunyoro, whose land includes Uganda’s new-found oilfields.

Mr Museveni may calculate that he can treat the Baganda harshly now, but retain their votes by granting them concessions nearer the election. He has been adept at dividing and conquering the electorate, using carrots and sticks. He dishes out jobs to loyalists but harasses businessmen suspected of helping the fractured opposition. He says he will limit the kabaka’s power and chastises “meddlers” harming Uganda’s prospects.

Mr Museveni’s people say they have identified another villain of the piece: Libya’s president, Muammar Qaddafi, whom they accuse of giving cash to the Baganda. For several years Mr Qaddafi has subsidised Uganda’s kings and their cultural institutions as part of an exotic plan to unify Africa in a web of chiefs and kings. But his latest dollops of cash, say Mr Museveni’s friends, were meant to stir up trouble, because Mr Qaddafi has fallen out with Mr Museveni, despite helping him to win a bush war that brought him to power two decades ago.

Mr Museveni has ridiculed Mr Qaddafi’s swaggering “king of kings” approach, preferring to build up Africa with regional trade blocs such as the East African Community. Still, it is odd that Mr Qaddafi should want to poke Mr Museveni in the eye by funding riots, since the recent oil discoveries in Uganda should make its president more attractive as a friend. Libya, for instance, hopes to tender for a big oil refinery that Mr Museveni wants to build. "