Ugandans hate the truth

By expressing my sincere frustration with Uganda's loud-mouthed "anti-corruption crusaders" and "human rights defenders" who in reality are corruption orchestrators, promoters, perpetuators, and perpetrators and human rights offenders, I have received a barrage of personal attacks and insults.

I, however, did not see anyone punching holes in my arguments neither did anyone challenge my facts with cogent reasoning. That has made me surmise that Ugandans hate the truth; they hate to be exposed, they all enjoy flattery and almost all of them are either corrupt or are corrupted.

I will not capitulate in my struggle for social justice; I will not deceive myself that I will ever stop thanking the creator for giving me the intellect that I have. I will not feel envious of the people with intellect. I will always speak the truth and I will never shy away from informing the ignorant of their ignorance. The truth of the matter is that none can know everything and none can know nothing. Because we are human, we are all inadequate in one way or another.

Even when Jesus was both human and divine, I want to surmise that because of his human nature, he also had some human weaknesses. For instance, he called certain people hypocrites and sons of serpents. He for instance told off his mother at the Wedding of Canna, "dear woman, of what concern is that to me?"

When Jesus parents found Him in the temple among the spiritual leaders, His mother, Mary, asked Him, "Child, why have you done this to us? Why did you leave without saying a word? We have been so worried that we couldn't sleep. She reproached Him just like your parents would if you were not behaving well, or when they found you after you had been missing. Usually the mother has more to say. As His mother began to chide Him, Jesus seemed surprised at what she was saying. He thought His mother shouldn't question Him like that, so instead of answering her, He asked, "Why didn't you know that I would be here? You should have known that I would be in my Father's house! He meant the temple. He was amazed and asked His mother, "Did you not know that I would be in my Father's house? Mary and Joseph didn't know how to answer His questions. Perhaps they were not as enlightened as Jesus was.

I hope all of us including those who have chosen to crucify me for my beliefs will learn a thing or two. I wish all of you well in the fight for social justice.

Leadership and qualities of leaders

Vincent Nuwagaba

LEADERSHIP AND QUALITIES OF 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

LEADERSHIP AND QUALITIES OF LEADERS

Vincent Nuwagaba

Vincent Nuwagaba

LEADERSHIP AND QUALITIES OF 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 t

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 t

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

The UHRC response to my article is as laughable as it is ludicrous

“Don’t be afraid. Go on speaking, and don’t be silent, for I am with you. No one will attack and harm you, for I have many people in this city”. Acts 18:9-10
I received a response to my article on the Ugandans at Heart forum by the Uganda Human Rights Commission (UHRC) with a mixture of consternation and laughter. With consternation because the UHRC could debase itself by sinking so low and with hope that the article portrayed the type of people we have at the commission. If anyone doubted the commission’s mediocrity, the response to my article ostensibly authored by my sister Florence Munyirwa can really confirm that. I, however, must state that such media exchanges are healthy and they don’t only buttress freedom of expression which is a cardinal human right but also help to bolster democracy in our society. I will respond to the UHRC article in turn.

1. The Commission in its opening remarks states that it has observed me as “a self-acclaimed human rights defender” but adds that it’s concerned that I should get adequate mental health and counseling. I want to state from the outset that I appreciate that I need adequate mental health just like everyone including but not limited to all UHRC staff need mental health services. As to whether I am a self-acclaimed human rights defender, I refer the UHRC to United Nations Fact Sheet 29 for it is absurd that a whole National Human Rights Institution that has recently won an award from the African Commission on Human and People’s Rights (ACHPR) and holds an ‘A’ status given by the United Nation’s International Coordinating Committee for National Human Rights Institutions doesn’t know who a human rights defender is.
On the allegation that I have assaulted a Police Officer at CPS and another at the UHRC Head Office, I kindly beg that Ms Munyirwa the author of the derogatory response comes to court to give evidence. The UHRC is full of lawyers and they know quite well that whoever alleges proves. As I speak, I am out on cash bail and I will periodically report to court to answer to the charges that were politically-motivated by the UHRC. I wish to state that the UHRC is only a National Human Rights Institution in name but in practice it is a political institution aimed at doing public relations for Museveni’s NRM regime by whitewashing the regime’s depraved and nasty human rights record.

2. That I have been admitted to Butabika more than twice. I find the UHRC reasoning not only wanting but also unfortunate and absurd. The UHRC has engineered my being taken to Butabika on two occasions. They only do that after I have punched holes in what they do and shown them that they have to respect donors’ and taxpayers’ money. On both occasions, I have not been subjected to drugs because I have asserted myself. I want to request that the UHRC produces a medical report from Butabika if it is to continue using that pretext to gag me and dismiss me as an insane person. I must add, though, that I will proudly accept to be labeled insane if that’s what it takes to fight for justice in this country. I will however, not shy away from assuring those who label me insane that for them they are suffering from schizophrenia which is the highest form of mental illness. May I also assure the UHRC that stigma is antithetical to promotion of human rights?

3. Award for Best African National Human Rights Institution (NHRI)
I clearly stated in my article the reasons as to why the UHRC cannot be the best African NHRI. If the UHRC disagrees with what I stated, they should show how far they have gone in addressing the rights concerning the areas I raised. Fortunately, as I write this article, yesterday Friday, November 16, the Commission Chairperson Med S.K Kaggwa was at Makerere University School of Law on a function organized by the school’s Public Interest Legal Aid Clinic (PILAC) together with AIGP Andrew Felix Kaweesi and Prof John-Jean Barya addressing students, human rights and law practitioners. In his introductory remarks, Prof Christopher Mbazira remarked that the public had fears that with the appointment of Med Kaggwa as UHRC Chairperson the situation would worsen but it has improved. When time for discussion came, I told the audience and Mr. Kaggwa that I am fully convinced that the UHRC is promoting human rights in the breach and it never merited an award. Mr. Kaggwa couldn’t respond. In the morning hours yesterday, a day after responding to my article, the Commission locked both its gates to block my entrance. This was not the first time. They have done that several times whenever they behave in an uncouth manner towards me. Surprisingly, I had been to the Chairman’s office on November 9 and I had been given November 16 as the day when I would meet him. I am sure the locking of the commission gates had been ordered by Gordon Mwesigye or Florence Munyirwa who knew I would question her about her defamatory statement against me. It has taken me many years in school and out of school to build my name. I will not accept the UHRC, an institution mandated to protect and promote our rights cardinal of which is the right to human dignity which includes the right to one’s good name to destroy my name by a stroke of a pen. I will not accept that! Accordingly, I demand a written and published apology from the commission and if the commission can prove that I am defaming it like the statement claims, I should also be forced to apologise to it publicly. I know my observation about the UHRC is first justified and secondly, it is a fair comment. Justification and fair comment are two defences against defamation. If the UHRC through Ms Munyirwa can prove that their remarks are fair comments and/or justified, they should state so and re-echo their remarks. 

4. Slow resolution of disputes and failure to pay UHRC awards
I must state that I find the reasoning given by UHRC wanting and laughable. When the UHRC states that they have to take time to adhere to the principles of natural justice, I laugh out loud instead of mourning. It’s well-known to everyone who cares to know that it’s a principle of natural justice that “justice delayed is justice denied”. Put another way, it is a maxim of equity that “delay defeats equity”. So, Ms Munyirwa, what exactly do you mean when you evoke natural justice? I hope the UHRC knows the principles of natural justice? I know there’s a principle of law that requires the judges, the commission in this case to listen to both sides. This principle is called “Audi alteram partem”. Adhering to this principle doesn’t mean the matter should take ages before it’s resolved. Otherwise, how come the courts are faster yet ordinarily the tribunals should be faster than courts in dispensing justice? On the court awards, I wish to re-echo what the commission chairperson Mr. Med Kaggwa said at the above mentioned function at Makerere University. The chairperson stated that “the government owes Sh4.5 billion to human rights victims and it seems not interested to pay yet some of the victims need this money to treat themselves”. This augments my statement that the victims rarely get the awards. The question to be asked thus is, “What does it help to lodge one’s complaint with the UHRC when there will likely be no compensation even if one won the case?” Granted, the UHRC has no budget for awards. Is it not a toothless barking dog? Has it ever petitioned parliament to amend the UHRC Act to allow it the mandate to compensate victims? My considered view is that the UHRC is in place for propaganda purposes – i.e to show that the NRM is committed to fight human rights violations. During my Secondary School days we would say, “Tubamanyire” meaning we have known you. Surely, some of us have known the UHRC.
It is quite unfortunate for the UHRC to state that I have personal vendetta against any UHRC staff member. I share nothing else in common with those people apart from the fact that I am impassioned for human rights and justice which ironically they shamelessly abuse although their mandate is to promote, protect and defend them. I am told that a group of enraged young men (call them “patriots”) under the leadership of Yoweri Kaguta Museveni, Uganda’s current president picked fire arms on February 6, 1981 to fight a government that they had lost to in an election that had been held hardly two months before on December 10, 1980. That group of “patriots” walked on dead bodies to ascend to state power five years later. No state institution including the UHRC has ever labeled such “patriots” violent. Paradoxically, I, Vincent Nuwagaba who only uses my pen and my tongue am portrayed by the UHRC to be violent. What a contradiction? What an absurdity?

5. The Commission fights human rights defenders
I want to re-echo what I stated that the Commission fights human rights defenders who are critical of the government’s sordid human rights record. I am a human rights defender and I don’t have to labour to prove that. My record can speak for me. I believe if nobody is willing to speak your story, your story should speak about you. When I was a students’ leader at Makerere University since 2001-2004, I consistently decried the inhuman and degrading treatment the government subjected to the government-sponsored students. I wrote several letters in the Daily Monitor and anybody including but not limited to the UHRC can check the Monitor archives to ascertain my claim. I wasn’t paid by anybody but was driven by my passion for justice and human dignity. I strenuously opposed the repeal of Article 105(2) in our Constitution both on air and in print. I have rescued so many people detained illegally in the police cells. Just recently, I helped all the inmates of Murchison Bay Prison make phone calls to their people free of charge. Before my incarceration there the Welfare Officer Nurru Kateregga used to demand for money before making any phone call for anybody yet the welfare office is funded by our very organization the Foundation for Human Rights Initiative (FHRI) under the Para Legal Advisory Services project. I continue to be a fearless voice of the voiceless and what frustrates me is the fact that we don’t have a fully independent press. Otherwise, I would be exposing the most glaring human rights cases that you cannot believe. In all I do, I get no salary; I get no funding from donors or taxpayers’ money. So what is the UHRC claim to fame vis-à-vis poor Vincent Nuwagaba?

6. I want to thank the UHRC for putting a very big smile on my face. I am sure the UHRC is caught between a devil and a deep blue sea. This reminds me of a story that my grandma Susanna Kirakwende (RIP) used to tell me when I was young. The story is about a hyena which  swallowed meat fats that were glued onto a stone that had been overly heated. When the hyena swallowed the meat, it found it extremely hot. Therefore, the hyena started asking itself, “Ncwere, ncwere obunuzi, miire, miire omuriro”, meaning “if I spit, I will spit the delicacy; if I swallow, I will swallow fire”. The hyena stayed in its indecision until it died of the hot meat fat glued on a stone that was as hot as a furnace. Likewise, in its myopic folly of portraying me an insane man and at the same time prosecuting me, the UHRC will ultimately sooner than later meet its demise. As a matter of fact, the UHRC has since February 8, this year subjected me to inhuman and degrading treatment but also instigated pharmacological torture against me. I am part of the civil society group that developed the Prevention and Prohibition of Torture Bill which was enacted into law and assented to by the President on July 12, 2012. I also did a media campaign for this law by publishing articles in newspapers. I am sure the UHRC knows very well that among the forms of torture highlighted by the Act is pharmacological torture. Can the UHRC claim it has not tortured me or can Mr. Gordon Mwesigye claim he hasn’t tortured me?
As a matter of fact, I have no problem with the police at the UHRC. I know they are just used as attack dogs. One of them has on one occasion asked me, “how come you don’t quarrel with anybody but when Mwesigye sees you he becomes hysterical?” and I told him, “ask yourself that or ask Mr. Mwesigye”. I never go to the commission with any tool – not even a safety pin or a razor blade. How come they fear me? I know sooner than later we shall dismiss Ugandan dictators without arms. And I am happy I am becoming an expert on non-violence revolution using nobody’s experience. I am not using Mahatma Gandhi’s experience; I am not using Martin Luther King’s experience. I only request the journalists to always cover me so that in the near future there’s a video, audio and written evidence of how to overthrow decadent regimes. I have learnt that to overthrow Museveni, we must start with his roots – who are his cadres in state institutions. Museveni merely thrives and survives on decadent institutions. That’s why I will go for some elements in the police such as Edward Kale Kayihura and Andrew Felix Kaweesi; I will go for his cadres in the UHRC, I will go for his cadres in the judiciary and his cadres in the Electoral Commission. We eject cadres from state institutions, we shall have ejected Museveni.
I find it laughable that with my levels of education, with my work experience in academic institutions, research institutions and human rights organizations, I Vincent Nuwagaba, can be branded by the UHRC a vagabond that has to be kept off its premises! I have stated this several times and I have to reiterate it. Public institutions are impersonal. They only exist to serve the public. The UHRC doesn’t belong to Gordon Mwesigye, Med Ssozi Kaggwa, Roselyn Karugonjo or Florence Munyirwa who shamelessly abuse the otherwise revered institution. I definitely love the UHRC. Incidentally, I even love and respect the UHRC staff including those who degrade, dehumanize and torture me. But I vehemently hate their filthy actions and character. I separate sin from the sinner. I accordingly, hate the sin but I unreservedly love and respect the sinner. 

7. Visits to detention centres
I find it laughable if not ludicrous that the UHRC says it visits detention centres yet it has never published the grave human rights violations inflicted on the prisoners especially in prison farms. Please, go to Murchison Bay prison and ask for a prisoner called Gerald Kamanzi. Ask him how he had three bullets showered into his foot. Ask him whether he is a convict. If he is not, tell the entire world why remands are used to do hard labour in the prisons’ farms. Mao Tse Tung once said “No investigation, no right to speak”. The truth of the matter that UHRC only does propaganda not human rights work. The Commission should let people like us who do human rights work do the talking and the commission does the listening. By the way, very soon, I will publish the glaring case of a young man who was castrated by the state operatives and his case was abandoned by the commission depending on flimsy and uncalled for technicalities.
8. Partisan officials at the UHRC
I know that all fairly educated Ugandans know for sure that very few state institutions if any employ people on meritocracy basis. By the way this also goes to non-state institutions. My concern, however, is about state institutions. Before one gets a job, they must be from an NRM family, they must be NRM members or sympathizers and in a number if not all cases, investigations have to be carried out up to the Local Council level. We have village internal security officers (VISOs), parish internal security officers (PISOs), Gombolola internal security officers (GISOs), District security officers (DISOs) and so forth. We also have MISOs (Makerere internal security officers) and I have friends in ISO who tell me that ISO deploys everywhere – including in churches, mosques, non-governmental NGOs, hospitals, academic institutions, name it. At the function at Makerere University, Mr. Med Kaggwa acknowledged that he was appointed to head the commission because he was an NRM cadre. Prof John-Jean Barya, expressed worry that president Museveni has always stated that he wants to appoint NRM cadres to run the judiciary. IGP Kale Kayihura is an NRM cadre and all the leaders in the police are NRM cadres – on Tuesday, November 13, the OC CID at CPS proudly told me and some two Makerere students of how he is an NRM cadre and how they are ready to crush the opposition. He even candidly pulled out his NRM card and showed it to us! The entire Electoral Commission is headed by NRM cadre (we have done a scientific study for the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa and UNDP headed by Professor John-Jean Barya). Thus, if all other state institutions are run by the NRM cadres, what’s so unique, what is so special; what is so spectacular about the UHRC?
9. UHRC position on topical human rights issues
I am glad that the UHRC says that it gives its position on topical human rights issues. How come, I don’t see its position on the right to education; the right to health; the right to employment and the right to adequate standards of living? How come the Commission is not upfront and forthright on socio-economic rights which in most of my newspaper articles I have accentuated? How come the police stay in condemned asbestos roofed houses far contrary to ILO Convention 162 that was ratified by Uganda many years ago? How come the commission has always been silent about workers’ rights which are a springboard for all other rights? How come in the wake of public universities’ fees hike tuition, Mr. Kaggwa said it was alright? How come many civilians are tried in military courts and stay in prison for more than six years as remands? Go to Murchison Bay and look for John Bosco Olweny. Follow his case to its logical conclusion and then tell me that UHRC does human rights work. Talk about human rights reports is hogwash. Unfortunately, the UHRC will win an award as the best NHRI from the ACHPR and will get an A status from the UN International Coordinating Committee for National Human Rights Institutions on the basis of the reports it makes. But do reports promote and protect human rights? I am in the field and know what is taking place. If I was allowed freedom to utilize my brains and time, I would write a paper on each of the components raised. I believe, though that I will do my best before I am exterminated. If I am killed before doing that so be it.
Conclusion
The UHRC rightly states that it is the only National Human Rights Institution and it will remain so. The statement adds that UHRC has no need to compete for supremacy with any other organization. I know the UHRC personnel feel offended whenever Foundation for Human Rights Initiative (FHRI) is appreciated. But that’s because UHRC has abdicated its duties and obligations. It has been overshadowed by FHRI in the field of human rights and in Uganda human rights is synonymous with Livingstone Sewanyana and FHRI. I also want to state that organizations such as the National NGO Forum currently headed by Mr. Richard Sewakiryanga are doing a more relevant job than the UHRC. However, I will not overly critique the UHRC. Surely, virtually all state institutions in Uganda are now kaput.
Anybody who tries to block me from accessing the services of any state institutions is a somnambulist; a sleep walker for I know I am a citizen and not a subject. The UHRC can only do that if they banish me. Unfortunately for them, several direct and indirect overtures have been made to banish me and I have refused. Ask the human rights defenders who are close to me how many times they have attempted to get me asylum in the most highly developed country America. Conduct research and establish how many US government officials have had interviews with me and asked me what I want and I never tell them I want asylum.
I would like to refer everyone including the UHRC of the scripture “We are afflicted in every way, but not constrained; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed” (2Corithians 4:8-9).
Finally, I advise my sister Florence Munyirwa not to be used. After receiving the statement in my inbox I asked her in a text message whether she was ready to finish the battle she had launched against me and she replied by saying she was not involved in any fight against me because she doesn’t want strife adding that the statement was by the UHRC. My worry, however, is why does she accept to be used as though she is a robo? As a matter of fact, I cannot fight her for I know she is not a problem. Let her learn that she can only make a plausible point by attacking the points I raise not by labeling me a mentally deranged person for I am sure readers can decipher who is mentally deranged between me and her owing to what we write. Labeling me insane is just diversionary aimed to forestall us from asking the tough questions. I know I am not only a critical thinker but a philosopher king who cannot indulge in trading insults.
The UHRC should also apologise to HURINET’s Patrick Tumwine for abusing his name in matters the commission doesn’t know. The truth of the matter is that on September 28, when we had a workshop about the right to know, I was grabbed by the police from the hotel at the orders of the Director for information in the Office of the Prime Minister Simon Mayende because he felt uncomfortable with the truth I was speaking. Patrick Tumwine followed me out after my arrest and pleaded with the police to release me in vain. When I told him about the UHRC statement he was very disappointed that the UHRC can disgrace itself to that level! I cannot rule out anything including but not limited to being put to death for my advocacy for total, real liberation of this country. Therefore, I request that whatever I have documented be published online and in hard copies in case I have been exterminated by Museveni and his cadres including UHRC staff. All generations will thus know what Vincent Nuwagaba stood for.
Vincent Nuwagaba is a human rights defender
vnuwagaba@gmail.com
+256702843552/+256772843552