A Ugandan View of ‘KONY 2012′

A Ugandan View of ‘KONY 2012′: War Criminal by Franchise

By: Paulo Wangoola 

As I viewed the video my mind wondered and settled far away from Joseph Kony.  Kony is a mere case of the numerous questionable leaders, past and contemporary, who have emerged in Afrika, and have actively prosecuted horrendous war on the people, particularly women and children; for example Botha, De Clerk, Mobutu, Savimbi, Kabila, Kagame, Amin, Obote, Museveni, Ben Ali, Hosni Mubaraka, Bokassa, etc, etc.  How come all these leaders have gained, consolidated and entrenched their power with the active support of the Coordinate White Republic of Europe and North America?  Why is it that as a rule, the Coordinate White Republic is the last to abandon Afrika’s dictators, although even then, only after they have groomed a new and better dictator; that is when they can confidently announce the dictator is dead; long live dictatorship?

In the case of Uganda since 1981, that is for more than thirty years, the people have borne the brunt of war on them by Government and rebel armies; the people have been the grass over which these two generic elephants have fought and made love.  Between 1981 and 1986, particularly in the Luwero Triangle, the Government army was commanded by Milton Obote, while the rebel army, NRA, was commanded by Yoweri Museveni.  The latter enlisted numerous children in his rebel force.  In 1986 Museveni shot himself into power, and the hitherto rebel army, the NRA, became the official Government army, still commanded by Museveni.  Numerous rebel armies emerged and waged war on Museveni’s Government.  In time the rebel forces collapsed into the Lord’s Resistance Army, LRA, commanded by Joseph Kony.  Kony took a leaf from Museveni’s successful rebellion and, by any means necessary, enlisted numerous children into the LRA, reported to have constituted the majority of the rebel force under Kony’s command.  In the case of Northern Uganda therefore, war crimes are the shared responsibility between two armies, one commanded by Museveni, and the other one by Kony.  Moreover, Government military victory over a rebel army the majority of whom were abducted children meant the death of hundreds of them on the battle front at the hands of a sitting government.

War crimes by whatever force, the NRA, LRA or Government troops, remain war crimes.  For that reason therefore, justice will only be done when the commanders of the two armies, Museveni and Kony, are held to account.

The Kony 2012 video generates a long list of leaders who are alleged to have committed war crimes, and who should be brought to book.  Not a single name of a leader from the Coordinate White Republic of Europe and North America appears, except Hitler.  Yet it is common knowledge that during the last seventy years there have been numerous wars prosecuted and or fanned and financed by the biggest, most brutal, meanest and most treacherous military machine in human history; that is NATO.  All along it has been a case of the mightiest bringing disproportionate force and technology to bear on the weak and the meek; for example in Viet Nam, Granada, Panama, South Afrika, Zimbabwe, Congo, Angola, Somalia, Libya, Palestine, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Falklands, Tunisia, etc.  How can these lands locally generate war criminals without their counterparts in NATO, the Coordinate White Republic of Europe and North America?  In fact, the war criminals of the White Republic are the principal, and the ones in the Third World are war criminals by franchise; they are allowed to practice for as long as it is in the overall interest of the big powers.  The apparent decision to withdraw Kony’s franchise but maintain Museveni’s must be viewed in this context.

Otherwise the real problem the world faces is to be lumbered with the Eurocentric worldview, its counterpart Arab-centric worldview in its wings, by which white people, under ethnic Anglo-Saxon leadership, believe that the rest of the world owes white gluttony all their own natural resources and other assets, their sweat, blood and whole life; the notion that Western interest supersedes all other interest everywhere,  at all times, and that whenever and wherever other people’s interest conflict with the gluttonous interest of the West, the interest of the West shall prevail, by any means necessary.  Sounds like fiction; but it is not, in fact it is a case of truth being stranger than fiction!  The mind of the white establishment has the spiritual disposition, mind-set and moral high-ground of sorts from which they have developed, acquired and amassed to the level of monopoly, massive means de-voicing, disempowering, dispossessing and disinheriting the peoples of the world.  The pursuit of such undemocratic agenda is an act of perpetual war everywhere in its differentiated forms and levels, overt and covert, whose trail of success is a trail of war crimes.  For NATO at last to step forward and pretend to save Uganda from Kony can be compared to an arsonist who, having set a house ablaze, leads the people who come running in answer to a fire alarm, works hard in an ineffectual effort to put out the fire, and then turns round and demands or expects a reward, even as he plans other acts of arson.

Paulo Wangoola is the founder and nabyama (president) of Mpambo Afrikan Multiversity, Uganda, an institution that is dedicated to the advancement of indigenous knowledge for community renewal and enrichment. He is also special adviser to the Clans Council of the Busoga Kingdom, Uganda; secretary general of Heritage Trails Uganda; and a member of the Steering Committee of the Uganda History and Reconciliation Committee. Professor Wangoola was convenor of the 2004 Afrikan World Encounter on Building New Futures, Jinja, Uganda. He is the former secretary general of the Afrikan Association for Literacy and Adult Education, Nairobi, Kenya. Professor Wangoola has authored and co-authored several articles and books on a variety of themes, including the political economy of education, community development and progress, African indigenous knowledge systems and spirituality, participatory development, and North/South and South/South development co-operation. He was educated at Makerere University, Kampala, and the University of Southampton, United Kingdom.