Leadership and Qualities of good leaders.

We don't have leaders. We have rulers. Tetulina abakulembezze, tulina abafuzi. Titwiine abebembezi, twiine abategyeki. And that's the problem. For Museveni to delude himself that he can rule me, he must forget. No man must rule another man. No woman or man must rule another woman or man. This is because we are equal. Leadership doesn't mean going ahead of us but going side by side with us, walking hand in hand with us, consulting us, doing nothing for us without us.

Followership doesn't mean walking behind a leader but walking with him or her. Discussing with him or her, advising him or her where he or she is inadequate. We cannot know everything that there's under heaven. I cannot claim to know everything and nobody can say I know nothing. The more you know, the more you discover that you don't know hence the continuous search for knowledge. Limitation in knowledge cannot make you a bad leader because what is important in leadership is not knowledge but wisdom or insight.

Wisdom or insight denote the ability to judge and distinguish between good and bad. Knowing and distinguishing between bad and good in itself is not enough.

What is enough is after distinguishing between good and bad what do you do? Good leaders stick to what is good no matter how unpopular it may be. Good leaders stick to the truth no matter how risky and dangerous it is. Good leaders appeal to their conscience and never betray their conscience whatsoever. Good leaders place emphasis on the common good.

Good leaders never value material possessions over the common good. Good leaders uphold the truth, embrace the truth, disseminate the truth and indeed, where necessary die for the truth.
We have many examples of good leaders starting with MY LORD AND SAVIOUR JESUS CHRIST. Uganda martyrs were also very good leaders even in death. And this drives me to another attribute of good leaders namely that; good leaders are immortal. Even after physical death, good leaders continue leading and indeed they lead better and more efficiently and efficaciously after their bodily death.

Uganda martyrs continue to lead the entire world of Christian believers very many years after their demise. To prove that go to Namugongo Catholic and Protestant shrines on 3rd June.

Good leaders are selfless. Good leaders are not those who are flawless but those who easily recognise their flaws after they have been advised. Indeed, good leaders are those who have the humility to recognise that as human beings they are inadequate.

Good leaders don't have to have so many positive traits. They may have only one trait but very essential. So essential that without it you cannot have social transformation.

I will continue to add to the traits of good leaders as and when I am inspired for I am not reading these traits from any book and you better take them serious.

I want to state here that Norbert Mao and Asuman Basalirwa are good leaders that we must use if we are to have our society transformed. Incidentally, they share key traits in common. Both of them are Democrats at least at heart. Asuman Basalirwa was made politically by the Democratic Party as he cherished and still cherishes the principles for which the party stands. I don't claim to be his spokesperson but what I know is that he left DP because he didn't anticipate political growth on the basis of merit given his ethnic and tribal background.

Norbert Mao had at one time toyed with the idea of forming a party together with Aggrey Awori. Keen readers must remember his article titled "Whose party is the Democratic Party?". I must tell you Norbert Mao is a genius.

Why we need geniuses is not because they are good implementers but because they are good thinkers. That takes me to another attribute of good leaders. Good leaders are not those who necessarily do whatever they say but those who have the ability to think and say what is transformational.

Indeed, good leaders are transformational not transactional. Good leaders do the thinking and the rest including the mediocre implement to the letter ideas that the good leaders generate. I have been with Norbert Mao since 2001, I have never found him wanting when it comes to generation of brilliant ideas.

For good leaders to lead well and not be frustrated, there must be team work. This is another attribute of good leaders. Good leaders must be team players, must be consensus builders.

Leadership is like business and family management. In leadership, each person is talented differently in their own ways. Because human beings are talented differently, there must necessarily be DIVISION OF LABOUR. Each person must do what they are best at.

Leadership like politics entails the four Cs. These are conflict, cooperation, consensus and compromise. All of must compromise but only for the common good. If you see someone brutally refusing to compromise, you don't accuse them of being full of themselves, of being pompous, of wanting things done their own way. While compromise is a sine qua non, there should never be compromise about the truth.

Someone may say truth is relative. No. Truth cannot and will never be relative. Truth is eternal. Truth is scientific. The truth must be visible even to the blind. The truth must be comprehensible even to the daft. The truth is scientific. The truth does not belong to what some ignorant people call arts. The truth is immortal. Look, hundreds of years ago, someone said the earth rotates around the sun. For stating what he knew to be the truth, he was killed. What is the truth later years after his death?

This takes me to another attribute of leadership. Good leaders are not those who are holy. As human beings, all of us are sinners. All of us are terrible sinners who only benefit from God's grace, God's generosity, God's forgiving heart.

Accordingly, good leaders must be forgiving, must be merciful, must not be vengeful. The Bible says, vengeance belongs to the creator.
Good leaders must be God fearing. I cannot fathom having an atheist as my leader. Such a person can burn churches and mosques because he doesn't believe in the existence of God.
Good leaders must constantly and consistently pray. Pray for God's guidance in whatever they do.

Good leaders are not those devoid of emotions but those whose emotions don't degenerate into permanent anger and ultimate hatred.

Good leaders never hold any grudge against anybody including those who are enemies to them.
Good leaders cannot be enemies to anybody no matter how much someone openly becomes an enemy to them. Good leaders are above trivia.
Humility: Good leaders are humble. They humble themselves to the point of eating in kikumi kikumi, roadside food vendors, buy from the local shops, live local life style, walk on foot, live a very humble life style. The bible says blessed are the meek.

Read some other qualities of good leaders in the beatitudes, Matthew chapter 5. Read Sirach, I will later give you the chapter. Read the entire bible but put emphasis on books such as Wisdom, Sirach, Job, Ecclesiastes, Proverbs, Psalms. In the New testament, read the gospels but lay emphasis on the letter of St James and letters of Saint Peter. The discussion is to continue and I will turn it into a book