Presidential Tours: Is NRM’s Museveni involved in early campaigns?

Being in political the Opposition is a daunting task when space is so skewed in favour of the incumbent both in popularity and the resource envelope at his disposal.

Politics is about subduing the adversary through well-crafted artifices intended to bring out the hideous side of the opponent while emphasizing your strong brawn.

In Uganda, where the opposition has been struggling to wrestle power from colossus Museveni, it may require a lot of soul-searching that may entail telling half-truth or outright fib. The president like any other elected personality has to fulfil the pledges he made to the electorate.

Members of parliament (MPs), local council members at all levels, mayors, district leaders etc, all struggle to see that their manifestos are achieved. So, to troll, the president for doing exactly what earned him votes is shooting wide the mark.

The country-wide tour has been delineated as early campaigns, but the very MPs are always busy in their constituencies meeting people and evaluating their performance. The very reason they are given constituency development fund and mileage twice a month is to ensure their visibility on the ground, in fact, those who are not regular in their constituencies are spurned at the next ballot.

The president in his manifesto emphasized wealth creation, his tour is part of evaluation so that corrective measures could be undertaken where hitches are identified. The cheques that are given to Saccos and farmers’ groups are part of the NAADS project.

It may be symbolic to issue them publically but these funds are budgeted for under Operation Wealth Creation. It should be noted the president remains so till the next president is sworn in. Even during general elections, the president remains with all the adornments of the presidency. Whereas it is true that the president is also the chairman of the ruling party, NRM, there is a thin line that separates the two.

The opposition has been fervent in portraying this as a candidate on the campaign trail disguised as a working tour, insisting that the yellow colour is dominant and visible wherever he goes, but it should be noted that NRM as a party has structures up to the village level. This makes its visibility inevitable. The ebullient crowds are a show of support for their party and any attempt to truncate their enthusiasm may dampen their zeal.

The accusation that the president uses state funds in these ‘veiled’ campaigns, sets the stage for debate as to whether the president has to use party money to do government work. He is doing these tours as president of the country and not as chairman of NRM, nowhere has he been quoted as talking about 2021 elections.

So, it wouldn’t be proper to demand that he uses his personal or party funds while spreading the gospel of wealth creation. It could be argued that since wealth creation was part of his manifesto that he sold to the electorate during the 2016 general elections, it was partly on this basis that he was elected as president. The work of the president is not only in State House, on many occasions, visiting dignitaries have met him and discussed important issues upcountry, sometimes under tree shades or tents, when he is on these tours.

All those opposed to his countrywide tour know it perfectly that his visibility and interaction with the rural folks endears him to the masses, yet most opposition parties are Kampala based and their street politics only appeals to urban redundant youths. Most of these parties don’t have structures in rural areas and only show up during elections.

It is common knowledge that upcountry especially the rural heartland forms a large support base for the president, yet they abhor the recursive confrontational politics of defiance. 

Therefore, Mr Museveni’s presence in his support base directly affects the fortunes of political opposition. The politics of rural areas is that of visibility, not rhetoric as it is the case of Kampala. When politicians show that nothing has been done by the president because both the audience and themselves have not been upcountry, the president talks to the rural folks while pointing at an ongoing project like roads, dams, schools, factories which they can see physically themselves.

Whereas you are busy preaching the politics of deceit, the rural folk is standing in the compound of a nearly commissioned, school, hospital, community centre or district headquarters listening to the speech of the president enumerating the different achievements in the country including the new tarmac road next to the venue or the new hospital in front of them that is about to be commissioned.

These kinds of scenarios render opposition politicians consummate liars in the eyes of locals, actually if you want to see what rural transformation means, visit upcountry, not Kampala. Most of the areas that were inaccessible are bustling with business because of good or motorable roads, the emergence of trading centres because of electricity and activities that emerge as a result.

So, the more the president moves upcountry, the more it hurts opposition that is basically Kampala based and full of negative rhetoric. The negative voice will be loud and deafening intended to paint the president as extravagant, ill-intentioned and engaging in early campaigns, though the reality is that the opposition is running scared of his standing in the upcountry. The prize on the wall is the 2021 trophy.