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B-10 Transition 106
Settling the Buganda Question
a peek into the future
Frederick Golooba-Mutebi
T
HE
MORE
THINGS
change, the more they remain the same. It is humbling—and
more than a little regrettable—to find myself writing about the kingdom of
Buganda’s unresolved place within the larger Ugandan polity, forty-nine years
after independence and a full fifty years since Transition published its first issue
in Kampala. Indeed, how we choose to see Buganda today—as either a pre-
colonial vestige, unevolved from days long gone, or as an entity deserving of
some kind of federalized, political autonomy within Uganda—has never been
fully resolved. At one end of the spectrum are those Ugandans who would
like to see the kingdom fully integrated and absorbed into a unitary republic
that minimizes or even obliterates differences, while amplifying what is seen
as common to all groups throughout the country. At the other end are the
people of Buganda, whose hunger for a degree of autonomy for the ancient
kingdom remains undiminished. And then there are those who wonder if the
binaries are too extreme. Those who hope for a middle ground are nervous
about what they see as the risks of having a kingdom with political power
thriving within a country whose constitution defines it as a republic. Yet, they
also know that past attempts at suppressing Buganda’s demands have been
futile, and that the Buganda question must be settled once and for all.
The role of kingdoms in modern-day Uganda—political entities that, in
many ways, existed as actual states before colonialism—has always been
difficult for postcolonial Uganda to negotiate. In September of 2009, we
saw an explosion of rioting in Kampala, which is part of the kingdom’s
historic territory, as thousands of young people took to the streets to protest
a symbolic power play by the Ugandan government against the king of
Buganda, Kabaka Ronald Muwenda Mutebi II. Tensions between the two
sides had been rising for a while, although the immediate cause of the riots
was the government’s decision to block the kabaka (the king) from traveling
to an area within the kingdom’s territory, where the government was in the
process of creating an autonomous chiefdom whose new ruler opposed the
kabaka’s visit. According to the government, if the kabaka were to travel
there, his security could not be guaranteed.
The mere fact that such an event, which to a casual observer might
appear minor, could trigger riots that left dozens dead, over eight hundred
'OLOOBA-UTEBIs3ETTLINGTHE"UGANDA1UESTION B-11
arrested, and an immense amount of property damaged is a testament to
the emotive power and political fealty that kingdoms in general—and
Buganda in particular—are able to command in Uganda, a country that
has been a constitutional republic for half a century, and where, for thirty
years, kingdoms did not exist at all because they had been abolished. Cer-
tainly today, in the age of Tahrir Square, the government can’t simply wish
this political fealty away, or pretend it doesn’t exist. It does.
Kabaka Edward
Mutesa II (b.
1924 – d. 1969).
First President of
the Republic of
Uganda and the
King of Buganda.
Father of the
current kab aka.
Photo taken during
independence
celebrations,
1962. Courtesy
of Monitor
Publications Ltd.
B-12 Transition 106
The question, of course, is how the Ugandan government should handle
it. According to some observers, whenever the central government suffers
a crisis of legitimacy from the crushing poverty, the barely-there public
services, and the rampant inequality that our political system knowingly
condones, precolonial institutions like Buganda are there to fill the ideologi-
cal gap. But simply fixing service delivery, for instance, isn’t going to cause
the power of these institutions to dissipate. And the Buganda monarchy in
particular is unique among traditional institutions throughout the country.
The tremendous loyalty it commands cannot and should not be dismissed
as only a reaction to the incompetence of the central government.
Then there are those who claim that a weak, multiethnic state like
Uganda cannot withstand the centripetal forces that could be unleashed by
granting autonomy to regions that want it. This risk cannot be ruled out
entirely. Yet, post-colonial African history has taught us an important lesson.
It is not the granting of regional autonomy, but the suppression of aspira-
tions for it, that has threatened the territorial integrity of so many countries,
and has led, in some cases, to the emergence of new countries—South Sudan
is just the latest example. Whatever one’s point of view, the emotive power
of kingdoms like Buganda has to be acknowledged openly, and at the very
least, grappled with publicly, in the political sphere.
Kabaka Mutesa I (b. 1837 – d.
1884). Thirt y-second King of Buganda.
Great-great-grandfather of the
current kab aka. Courtesy of New
Vision Printing and Publishing Co.
'OLOOBA-UTEBIs3ETTLINGTHE"UGANDA1UESTION B-13
These realities are all the more important to contend with given the
ways in which history seems to be repeating itself. Writing this essay for
the fiftieth anniversary of Transition, one can’t help but remember the all-
too-storied place that Buganda held within the magazine’s early years—how
Transition ran up against the political battles that pitted the government of
Uganda against the monarchy in the years after independence. It was an
essay published in Transition in 1967 by the avowed monarchist, Abu
Mayanja, that got both the author of the essay and the magazine’s founding
editor, Rajat Neogy, thrown into prison. The
punishment was extreme, but not unique amid
the growing authoritarianism of Uganda’s
second president, Milton Obote. It is striking
that Mayanja’s essay—which critiqued Obote’s
proposals to codify detentions without trial
within Uganda’s constitution—is as applicable
today as it was in 1967: Uganda’s current presi-
dent, Yoweri Museveni, is attempting to ram through just such an amend-
ment in 2011, supposedly meant to control rioters, protestors, and those
whom the president calls “economic saboteurs.”
This is not the only legal provision of concern. Recently, the government
passed the Traditional and Cultural Leaders Act of 2011, which prevents
traditional and cultural leaders, such as kings and chiefs, from speaking
publicly about political matters. Indeed, amid these growing restrictions, it
is becoming increasingly clear just how urgent it is that Ugandans ask and
answer questions about the nature of political power in the country, and
how it should be held and distributed. These questions are not unfamiliar
to Baganda (the people of Buganda); they are the very questions that con-
tinue to animate pressures for federalism.
o o o
OVER A HUNDRED years ago, when the British first began their efforts at “paci-
fication” along the upper Nile, Buganda was arguably the most powerful of
the area’s precolonial states. Its military and administrative prowess, and the
sophistication of its socio-political organization, allowed it to retain pride of
place as a semi-autonomous entity during Uganda’s years as a protectorate
of the British crown. During those years, Buganda’s elevated status created
a unique ethos both within the kingdom itself, and between the kingdom
and the eventual Ugandan polity that emerged from the protectorate.
Buganda, after all, gained its independence from Britain on October 8,
1961—a full day before Uganda as a whole.
It is important to acknowledge that pressures for autonomy did not spring
from nowhere. Toward the end of colonial rule, the Buganda establishment
Buganda, after all, gained
its independence from
Britain on October 8,
1961—a full day before
Uganda as a whole.
B-14 Transition 106
became increasingly concerned about how the kingdom would fit into an
independent Uganda. Those concerns led to protracted negotiations and even-
tually to the 1962 constitution, which granted Buganda federal status and other
kingdoms semi-federal status within the new republic. Underlying hostility
toward the kingdom’s “privileged” status, especially among political elites
from outside the kingdom, ensured that the durability of those arrangements
was, right from the start, under threat. The eventual ease with which the
Obote government swept such arrangements aside, in 1966—going so far as
to abolish kingdoms themselves in 1967—testifies to their precariousness.
While the federal and semi-federal status of kingdoms had been negotiated
and agreed upon by sections of the country’s emerging political elite, such
agreements had fallen short of carrying the whole country along with them—a
mistake the current crop of federalists wishes to avoid.
And yet, if the abolition of the monarchies—along with the federal
arrangements that gave them political muscle—enjoyed significant support
outside Buganda, such edicts aroused a profound amount of hostility inside
Buganda, with Obote being the prime target of disdain. This is not an
ancillary historical point. Years later, in the 1980s, that hostility would be
exploited by Museveni and his associates in the war they waged against
Obote’s second regime (1980–1985), a war which eventually brought the
National Resistance Movement (NRM) to power. However, while Museveni
was mindful to restore the Buganda monarchy and other monarchies where
people demanded them, he was also acutely aware of the dangers that
politically powerful monarchies could pose to the new regime. This
Kabaka Mwanga II (b. 1868 – d.
1903). Thirty-third King of Buganda.
Great-grandfather of the current kabaka.
Courtesy of Monitor Publications Ltd.
'OLOOBA-UTEBIs3ETTLINGTHE"UGANDA1UESTION B-15
awareness led to his decision to push for the restoration of monarchies as
cultural rather than political entities whose purview would be restricted to
dealing with matters such as language preservation and economic
development.
o o o
THE JOUR NEY TO restoration under Museveni was not without its hitches.
After the Museveni-led National Resistance Army seized power in 1986, it
didn’t take long before Baganda, represented by a cross-section of the com-
munity’s intellectual, business, and political elite, began asking for the
restoration of their monarchy, although importantly, such agitation was not
focused, at the time, on the kind of monarchy that Museveni would eventu-
ally reinstate (cultural or political). There has long been a debate as to
whether Museveni, while still prosecuting the insurgency against the Obote,
promised to allow Uganda’s traditional monarchs to be reinstated once he
seized power. The debate refuses to die, not the least because no conclusive
answer has been arrived at. On the one
hand, Museveni denies having made any
such promise. On the other hand, some of
the Baganda he recruited into his army
insist that he did. (Among them is Hajji
Abdul Nadduli, currently the chairman
and chief mobilizer in Buganda for Ugan-
da’s ruling party, the National Resistance
Movement.) Also longstanding is the story
that it was indeed because Museveni promised to restore the monarchy that
many Baganda joined him in the war against Obote, who had abolished
the monarchy in the first place.
Wherever the truth lies, and it does not seem as if we will know anytime
soon, Baganda did not delay in (depending on one’s point of view) agitating,
campaigning for, or demanding the restoration of the kabakaship. It is now
well-known that opposition to those demands inside the National Resistance
Movement and Army was robust. At the time, the NRM’s top luminaries
consisted—and still do—mainly of old-style leftists, many of them former
supporters and members of the Obote-led Uganda People’s Congress, the
very party whose government had abolished kingdoms. Many were of the
republican bent with a dislike for accession to leadership “through accident
of birth,” as some were apt to put it. It was their considered view that mon-
archies were anachronistic and that they should not be restored, which was
why they opposed Museveni’s inclination and desire to give in to the
demands of the monarchists, of whom the most vocal were Baganda.
Nearly two decades after the
kabakaship was restored as
a cultural institution in 1993,
a large number of the most
ardent monarchists in Buganda
are aged forty-five and below.
B-16 Transition 106
It is now well known that it took a weekend retreat away from Kampala
by Museveni’s most important political constituency, the military high com-
mand, for him to convince uniformed opponents of monarchism within the
government that it made sense to restore kingdoms in those areas where
people were united in asking for their restoration. This meeting took place
against the backdrop of strong opposition and skepticism toward the resto-
ration of monarchies by key military officers and civilian NRM officials
who feared a possible return to the 1960s’ power struggles between the
Buganda monarchy and the central government. The meeting was intended
to provide President Museveni with an opportunity to convince them of
the political imperative of doing so, away from the fraught atmosphere of
Kampala and Buganda, where the debate was already noisily raging on.
Here, the kingdom of Ankole in western Uganda, with a large number of
implacable detractors, was an early candidate for non-restoration, much to
the chagrin of the small band of monarchists who wanted it treated like the
others. There are stories that one of the reasons Museveni prevailed with the
anti-monarchists was because many chose to be pragmatic. They speculated
that the interest in kingdoms was among older generations, mainly those suf-
fering from nostalgia about “the good old days,” and not among the younger
generations, which had neither a direct experience of monarchism nor, for
that matter, the associated nostalgia. Given the turbulence of Uganda’s post-
colonial politics and the widespread disillusionment with the incompetent,
corrupt, divisive, and exclusionist postcolonial state, it is not difficult to figure
out where the nostalgia of older generations would come from. However, in
believing that younger generations, with no direct experience of the good old
days, would have no time for the monarchy, Museveni’s colleagues in the army
and the NRM disregarded the power of socialization.
Kabaka Daudi Chwa
(b. 1896 – d. 1939). Thir ty-fourth
King of Buganda. Grandfather of the
current kab aka. Courtesy of New
Vision Printing and Publishing Co.
'OLOOBA-UTEBIs3ETTLINGTHE"UGANDA1UESTION B-17
They therefore gave in to pressure from Museveni on the grounds that
monarchies would die a natural death as older generations passed on and
younger ones came to the fore. In the case of Buganda, it is now clear how
fanciful that line of thought was. Nearly two decades after the kabakaship
was restored as a cultural institution in 1993, a large number of the most
ardent monarchists in Buganda are aged forty-five and below. These are
the people whose parents and grandparents were at the forefront of agitat-
ing for the restoration of the kabakaship and with whose passing it was
supposed to descend into irrelevance. It is the generation to which the older
generations, through socialization and informal civic education, have
handed their aspirations for a Buganda with a measure of autonomy to
determine matters of purely local importance in which other socio-cultural
groups have no direct interest. Perhaps most significant for Buganda’s con-
tinuing pursuit of autonomy is that arguably the largest and most organized
youth group in Uganda is the monarchist Baganda Nkoba za Mbogo. Popularly
known by the short version of its name, Nkobazambogo, it brings together
Kabaka Edward Mutesa
II, President of Uganda,
with Prime Minister Milton
Obote. Independence
Celebrations (1962). Courtesy
of Monitor Publications Ltd.
B-18 Transition 106
young people from secondary schools and tertiary educational institutions.
It is worth noting that the organization predates the restoration of the mon-
archy, having been founded almost two years before the current kabaka,
Mutebi II, was crowned. More than twenty years later, Nkobazambogo is
reported to have 100,000 active and former members, and disciples in every
nook and cranny of society, including all the major professions, political
parties, and in parliament, at the very center of national politics.
I was in my final year of university when Nkobazambogo was launched
in 1991. The founders were a group of young men and women who wanted
to provide students from Buganda with a way to contribute to the rebuild-
ing of the kingdom after the devastation of the insurgency that brought
Museveni to power. Other objectives included what one might call re-
awakening kiganda culture and the promoting of a sense of understanding
with other cultural groups. The abolition of the monarchy by the first Obote
government had pushed cultural practices associated with monarchism
underground—and this meant a wide range of practices, given the centrality
of the monarchy in Buganda’s sociocultural organization. The ouster of
Obote’s second regime (1980–1985) had therefore set in motion a wide
range of revivalist processes of which the founding of Nkobazambogo by
university students was only one.
Obote Reading the
Constitution. Obote was
Prime Minister of Uganda
from 1962 to 1966, and
President of Uganda twice:
from 1966 to 1971 and from
1980 to 1985. Cour tesy of
Monitor Publications Ltd.
'OLOOBA-UTEBIs3ETTLINGTHE"UGANDA1UESTION B-19
With President Museveni pushing for the restoration of monarchies in areas
where the people concerned wanted them restored, the era of self-censorship
in matters of cultural self-expression had come to an end. At the time, there
were other cultural groups already in existence such as Basoga Nseete and
Banyankore Kweterana, but none has grown at the same pace or shown the
same vigor and resilience as Nkobazambogo. That should not surprise anyone,
as none of those other groups has enjoyed the same level of patronage as
Nkobazambogo has enjoyed, and continues to enjoy, courtesy of the Buganda
monarchy’s ministry of youth affairs. Buganda’s various ministries are part of
an effort to reorganize the monarchy into a “government,” albeit one that is
not recognized by Uganda’s constitution, but which is intended to help the
monarchy revive and perform some of the functions it used to perform in the
past, especially in the arena of service delivery.
Mutesa in Exile.
Pictured after being
deposed by Milton Obote
in 1966. Courtesy of
Monitor Publications Ltd.
B-20 Transition 106
Some would like to think that by assuming the administrative trappings
of a state, the monarchy and its supporters are determined to take on the
formal functions of a state, which may as well be the case, given their contin-
ued advocacy for a federal system of government. In thinking about the
aspirations of monarchists in Buganda, it is important to identify the driving
forces and influence behind groups such as Nkobazambogo and their adherents,
who never had any experience of monarchy prior to 1993. Only then can one
begin to comprehend why the Buganda monarchy is so resilient and virtually
impossible to abolish today, despite the recent spirited attempts on the part of
the Museveni regime to stem the growing tide of self-assertion with restrictive
legislation laying out what the monarchy can and cannot do.
In exploring the factors behind the emergence of groups such as Nko-
bazambogo, one has to remember that in a typical Baganda family, a child
grows up with a clear sense of belonging to a corporate group, the clan. At
the apex of Buganda’s fifty-six clans is the king, who is significant to each
clan by virtue of the unique roles that clans play in the service of the mon-
archy. In other words, clans are the pillars on which the monarchy rests.
Yoweri
Museveni. The
current President
of Uganda,
pictured during
the insurgency
that brought him
to power (1981–
1986). Courtesy
of Monitor
Publications Ltd.
'OLOOBA-UTEBIs3ETTLINGTHE"UGANDA1UESTION B-21
From an early age, an individual Muganda (the singular of Baganda) grows
up fully aware of the special ties that bind him or her, through her clan, to
the institution of the monarchy. It explains the tendency of Baganda to feel
personally attacked whenever anyone is seen attacking the monarchy, and
to react accordingly. While many other ethnic groups are organized in a
similar fashion, nowhere else in Uganda does one find the king at the apex
of the clan structure with each clan boasting special ties to the institution
of the monarchy. It is in this organization that one finds the answer to the
question of why clans so easily coalesce around the monarchy in periods
of crisis or perceived threats to its existence and well-being.
Kabaka Ronald
Muwenda Mutebi II.
Current king of Buganda
(1999). Courtesy of
Monitor Publications Ltd.
B-22 Transition 106
Museveni’s determination to restore the kabakaship when he did, despite
resistance from his senior lieutenants, is a reflection of his understanding of
the dynamics between Baganda and their monarchy. Unlike his lieutenants,
Museveni knew that Buganda’s continued support for him personally, and for
the National Resistance Movement, would depend on how wisely he handled
the monarchy issue. But there were also immediate concerns to advance. By
the early 1990s, Uganda was in the process of making a new constitution and
gradually moving towards the Constituent Assembly elections, in which the
general support and goodwill of Baganda would
be critical. If it took the restoration of the mon-
archy to ensure all this, Museveni would fight
for its restoration. And so he did. The rest is
history. This is where those who would like to
believe that the restoration was an act of friend-
ship or charity get it all wrong. Museveni
restored the Buganda monarchy first in recogni-
tion of the role Baganda played in the war that
propelled him to power, then in recognition of the role the restoration would
play in keeping the Baganda within the large political tent into which he had
invited friends, potential rivals, and even enemies, ensuring that they were
sufficiently content not to want to fight or undermine him or his still young
and vulnerable government.
However, in restoring the monarchy and seeming to believe that he had
bought off the Baganda permanently, Museveni made a mistake. The
demands of Baganda were never going to stop simply at asking for the
monarchy to be restored as a cultural institution. Baganda went on to put
other demands on the table, much to the annoyance of people who have
always thought that Buganda’s demands are excessive and a threat to
national unity. These people see unity as possible only from within the
framework of unitarism. Moreover, the kingdom would not stop at multiply-
ing its demands—including for a measure of autonomy under a federal
system of government—and has gone ahead and offered what, at times,
turns out to be the only sustained and coherent intellectual challenge to
the government’s current policies and aspirations. None of the political
parties within Uganda’s opposition, given their weaknesses on all fronts,
are strong enough to play this role. That Buganda’s demands would grow,
regardless of what its opponents and critics thought, should have been
predictable for a number of reasons. Baganda had a well-developed sense
of nationhood by the time colonial rule was introduced, and this pride was
never fully undermined by it. If anything, the kingdom’s insistence on
retaining a measure of autonomy in the years leading up to independence
is evidence that it only grew stronger.
It is during those times when the patience of President Museveni and
his government are tested to the max (as was seen during the debates on
The demands of Baganda
were never going to stop
simply at asking for the
monarchy to be restored
as a cultural institution.
'OLOOBA-UTEBIs3ETTLINGTHE"UGANDA1UESTION B-23
land legislation in 2007 and 2008, and during the 2009 riots) that the old
republicans crawl out of their ideological lairs and talk about how they
warned Museveni not to restore monarchies. Some go as far as suggesting
that the only sensible response from the government should be to take the
same step that Obote took: abolish the monarchies once more. However,
Museveni is smarter than that. He knows only too well that the issues
behind Buganda’s restiveness run deeper than simple stubbornness on the
part of the monarchy and its supporters. He is also aware of the threat that
the Obote route would pose for him and his government, not only in
Buganda—which is Uganda’s economic heartland—but also wherever griev-
ances against him personally, and against his government, have built up
over the years. In other words, by attempting to re-abolish the monarchies,
especially the Buganda monarchy, Museveni would offer his opponents a
golden opportunity—the kind of opportunity that he himself was offered
by Obote’s troubled relationship with the people of Buganda.
o o o
THERE IS NO doubt that Museveni is fully aware of the proverbial Buganda
question, how it remains unanswered, and why it must be answered with
or without him. Put in its simplest form, the question is simply this: how
should Buganda fit, or be made to fit, into a modern, democratic, multi-
ethnic, multi-cultural, and united Uganda? It is a longstanding question
that all postcolonial governments in Uganda have tried to evade or answer
with shortcuts. But these answers have not addressed Buganda’s core
demands nor satisfied its insatiable pursuit of autonomy.
Like his predecessors, Museveni would like to preside over a country
where people focus on being Ugandan and not members of this or that cul-
tural or tribal group. Or at least that is the rhetoric emerging from his
speeches and pronouncements on the matter. By contrast, those pushing the
unity-in-diversity agenda see no contradiction whatsoever between themselves
being members of different cultural groups, while simultaneously being Ugan-
dan. Opponents of federalism counter that autonomy for Buganda and other
regions would somehow threaten the coherence of the country. But this notion
is not based in fact. It is true that some federalists in Buganda occasionally
talk about secession, but they are at the fringe. And let us not forget that this
is usually said in the context of a refusal by the powers-that-be to allow the
question of what political system is appropriate for a multi-ethnic, multi-cul-
tural Uganda to be discussed openly and publicly.
Indeed, those who argue that, for stability’s sake, the country must
pursue unity-in-diversity are being more honest than the many politicians
who claim to be Ugandan over and above their regional identities. In prac-
tice, these politicians demonstrate the worst forms of tribal and cultural
B-24 Transition 106
bigotry by privileging their tribesmen and women in opening up employ-
ment and other opportunities. Fortunately, those who cling to the idea that
being a good Ugandan requires the renunciation of their ties to any cultural
or ethnic group are gradually becoming an endangered minority. Signifi-
cant political groups now express support for federalism or, at the very least,
a willingness to engage in a national conversation about the kind of political
system that Uganda should adopt to bring about the much-needed, but
currently severely eroded, collective sense of belonging and patriotism.
It is easy to dismiss the pro-federalism position, which some opposition
political parties have adopted, as driven by opportunism and the desire to
dupe Buganda into an unholy alliance, such as the one the kingdom entered
into with the Obote-led Uganda People’s Congress during the 1960s, and
which many people today hold responsible for all the political upheavals
that postcolonial Uganda has experienced. However, this amounts to the
Kabaka Mutebi II and
President Yoweri Museveni
(1999). Courtesy of
Monitor Publications Ltd.
'OLOOBA-UTEBIs3ETTLINGTHE"UGANDA1UESTION B-25
view that federalism is merely “a Buganda thing.” The constitutional review
commission of 1993 (the Odoki Commission) showed emphatically that it
is not. During the presidential elections this past February of 2011, Beti
Kamya’s largely single-issue and hugely under-resourced Uganda Federal
Alliance party had representatives from across the country, and won more
votes outside Buganda than inside it, where federalism is reckoned to be
most popular. The federo bug has travelled far since the days of Milton
Obote’s first government.
As the country enters what seems to be the NRM and Museveni’s sunset
years, there are grounds for arguing and believing that eventually, the
Buganda question will be settled once and for all. The settlement may never
be arrived at through the introduction of federalism. On the contrary, it
may come by way of a much-needed national convention in which Ugan-
dans of all stripes agree to go for a completely different approach to gov-
ernance. But provided that the position is arrived at through a negotiated
rather than enforced or manipulated consensus, it is hardly far-fetched to
argue that Buganda would go along with it, and happily so.
