----- Original Message ----- 
From: Elum Aniap Godfrey Ayoo 
To: [log in to unmask] 
Cc: Edward Mulindwa 
Sent: Monday, January 26, 2004 10:30 PM
Subject: Museveni now tells off donors



Having discounted the advice of donors, Museveni said Uganda's problems would be solved by home-grown solutions


Museveni now tells off donors
By Badru D. Mulumba & Emmanuel Mugarura
Jan 27, 2004


      KOLOLO - President Museveni was in a combative mood yesterday as he celebrated 18 years in power.

           
            President Museveni inspects an honour guard marking the 18th NRM Day at Kololo Airstrip yesterday (PPU photo). 
      Speaking during the national celebrations at Kololo Airstrip, Mr Museveni asked donors to keep off the internal affairs of the country. 

      "These fellows dispense and disperse opinion about everybody and everything in Africa," he said.

      "If foreign dominance and dependence could develop a country, then black Africa would be one of the most developed continents on earth," Museveni said.

      Several donor countries have publicly encouraged Museveni to leave office at the end of his term in 2006.

      In a recent television interview, the US government's acting Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, Mr Charles Snyder, said his government was talking to Museveni to persuade him to leave.

      Museveni is constitutionally ineligible for another term in office and has not publicly said he will seek one. 

      However, a Cabinet proposal to lift the two five-year term constitutional limit would allow him to stand again - and Museveni said yesterday that he would not listen to donor advice on electoral matters in Uganda.

      He said the National Resistance Movement revolution brought about the concept of "one person, one vote at a particular time. We know how to solve our issues."

      The President also said he is not happy with the public criticism or advice from the donors.

      "If there is an exchange of views, it should be done discreetly without any show of arrogance," he said, drawing applause from the VIP tent in which sat senior government officials as well as the vice president of Kenya, Mr Moody Awori, and that of North Korea, Mr Hyong Sob. 

      "We don't want that touristic expertise," he said. "Someone comes here and after two days he calls himself an expert on Ugandan affairs. We shall not accept it."

      No 3rd term crisis

      Despite public concern about his reluctance to state whether he will step down at the end of the current term, the President said there is no political crisis in the country.

      He said the 1995 Constitution says that any matter of national interest shall be resolved by the people. 

      "The people of Uganda should therefore [shun] those alarmists," he said.

      Having discounted the advice of donors, Museveni said Uganda's problems would be solved by home-grown solutions.

      He cited fighting Idi Amin and HIV/Aids, as well as the economic recovery as examples of locally driven success stories.

      "Some people immediately started working with Idi Amin. Nobody asked us to fight him but we went ahead against their will. Eventually we got rid of Idi Amin; where would we be if we had followed their advice?" he asked.

      The President also defended Uganda's military engagement in the DR Congo and said it had saved the region from chaos.

      "But the way we are maligned, 'that Uganda is in Congo because of diamonds'some of these foreigners don't realise that black people have a conscience, a vision, ideas; why? 

      "They think: why is Uganda in the Congo? They are there to steal.

      "How can you have a partnership with such arrogant and self egocentrism?"

      He advised donor countries to open up their markets to African products and stop "sermonising".

      Fighting corruption

      Museveni also rejected donor advice on fighting corruption.

      "I am given sermons on how to fight corruption," he said yesterday, "but I know how to fight corruption."

      He defended the practice of shooting poachers in the game parks and robbers elsewhere on the spot.

      "I don't hear these experts on corruption and community talking about that. I don't hear them," he said.

      The President said "small paymasters" are behind the corruption in the army and ruled out granting an amnesty to rebel leader Joseph Kony at the end of the current offer.

      "I don't want to hear of calls for a ceasefire until the bandits are located in one area," Museveni said. 

      Defending Mugabe

      Museveni also used his speech to defend Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe - and attack some donor countries for their double standards over the weapons of mass destruction.

      "Why don't all countries stop these weapons?" he posed, in reference to the WMDs, and "not to say, 'you, don't have them; I would have them'."

      Speaking of his Zimbabwean counterpart, Museveni said: "I disagreed with Mugabe on Congo. His army was fighting on the other side, ours on another. And sometimes Mr Mugabe made unfair accusations. He was calling us names."

      However, Museveni defended Mugabe against allegations of electoral malpractice and said regional countries should be left to address the matter.

      "The problem is that Mugabe didn't lose as some people would have wanted him to lose," Museveni said. 

      "If you don't lose as somebody wants you to lose, that is an offence." 

     



© 2004 The Monitor Publications


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