INSIDE THE UGANDA-RWANDA CONFLICT
LET ME do what politicians always do – claim they run for office due to popular demand. Many people have been asking me to comment on the heightened tensions between Uganda and Rwanda.
I think Uganda and Rwanda will most likely degenerate into war, and this is the reason it is critical that I share my views.
The stand-off is happening only weeks after Uganda President Yoweri Museveni gave a highly acclaimed speech to fellow African heads of state at the AU in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in defence of regional integration, and Rwanda President Paul Kagame assumed chairmanship of the East African Community. That the two could be close to war shows the distance between aspiration and action.
The problems between Uganda and Rwanda could easily be solved if Museveni upheld his core ideological position – that regional integration is critical for Africa’s future, and that the differences between the countries are smaller than the strategic need for, and benefits of, co-operation.
The problem between Uganda and Rwanda – as I know it – is the refusal of Kampala to listen to the concerns of Kigali and/or put its own grievances on the table for discussion.
For example, Rwanda has complained often to Uganda, both formally and informally, about the presence of persons hostile to the government in Kigali.
It says these people abuse their refugee status in Uganda by indulging in politically hostile actions.
Rwanda has further complained that these persons (many of whom it has named) are actively aided by Ugandan intelligence to recruit Rwandans from refugee camps and take them to the Democratic Republic of the Congo for training in rebel camps.
Kigali has always wanted and actively sought to discuss these matters with Kampala. It has been met with stony silence.
Kigali has always wanted to discuss these matters with Kampala. It has been met with stony silence.
Instead, Kigali has been reading in Ugandan traditional and social media that the government of Rwanda is planning regime change in Kampala.
Websites allied to State House in Uganda are leading this charge. Some security chiefs in Uganda have said the same thing. Yet Kampala has never made a formal or informal complaint to Kigali on these allegations. This has placed the government of Rwanda in a difficult situation, on how to respond to media rumours when the government of Uganda has never voiced them.
This situation could have been averted long ago. However, all efforts to begin a dialogue between the two countries have been thwarted by Uganda.
Now here is the slippery slope to war: if Rwanda is convinced Kampala is seeking regime change against Kagame, it will not sit idly and watch. Uganda has enemies too. It follows that Kigali will be driven to aid them.
I suspect Kigali’s decision to close the border is designed to escalate the situation so as to induce Kampala to talk, not to spark a war.
Short of this, I do not see what else Kigali could have done when all formal and informal requests for discussions to resolve the differences have been met with indifference.
Mwenda is a Ugandan political analyst, writer and author