Speaking of Gordon and elections, Lynn and I headed out to the village that I coached soccer in when we lived here to say hi to some friends. She went back to town to visit the hospital while another friend, Moses, and I went walking through the village catching up with old friends (we must have walked 8-9 miles that day). We were told that Gordon was somewhere down the trail doing something for the elections. The primaries for electing new Mayors and MP’s (Members of Parliament) had just happened the day before, except that they had to be canceled at the last minute in 40 out of the 90 counties in the country due to missing ballots, fraudulent ballots and violence at the polling stations. Can you imagine an official primary being canceled at the last moment in the US? Anyway, Gordon happens to live just across the boundary in a different district from Mbarara and the primary was not canceled in his district. He was acting as a junior officer in charge of handing out the ballots and counting them afterwards. We found him as he was finishing up some paperwork for the chairman of the election committee in that area (mind you, this is taking place on his lap, sitting on a dusty bench outside a mud hut). After a hearty greeting, as we had not seen each other in 16 months, I asked him how the voting went. He said that many people showed up to vote and that many were still lined up at 4pm when the polling station was supposed to close. I said, “Isn’t 4pm very early to close a polling station?” He explained that they kept it open for 30 extra minutes, but that the ballot buckets were full by that time so they closed for good. I came to find out that he was given two plastic buckets about the size of a large bathroom trash can to collect ballots and when those were full, the polling station was closed. He was then told to count them and then the chairman would come by to pick them up. The chairman did not show up so Gordon took them home. The chairman called him four times throughout the night saying he was coming by to get the ballots, but did not show until the morning when we found them at about 10am. Now I know that Gordon is completely ethical and extremely honest, not to mention he volunteered to do this, but I can only imagine what happened to thousands of other ballots around the country. Accountability is in no way a part of the election system in place here at the moment.
Sadly, this coming election has been a forgone conclusion since Museveni bullied the Parliament into changing the constitution in 2005 and scrapping term limits. He “won” a contentious victory in 2006 and will most likely win again in 2011 even in the midst of an electoral process that seems to have virtually no validity, at least among the people I have talked to. The most hypocritical part of this for me is that for all the misplaced rhetoric the US spews about bringing democracy to wanting nations (i.e. Iraq and Afghanistan), Musevini pulled the most egregiously undemocratic act possible by changing the constitution to keep himself in power, and yet the US continues to pour hundreds of millions of aid dollars into Uganda while holding them up as some kind of example of good governance. So not only has aid money worked counterproductively all over Africa, but it seems also not to really matter all that much who we shovel money towards. Try to ponder the fact that between 40-60% of the Ugandan budget is from foreign aid while you read this quote from a local magazine regarding the pseudo-primary held last Monday. Also, keep in mind that this was the ruling party’s primary not the oppositions’. “During the NRM internal elections, voting was scuffled…in Kapchowa, violence erupted between two NRM MP’s. In West budama Minister Otala drew a gun at supporters of his opponent; in Kibale MP Tinkansimire’s car was stoned;…In Kaliro, elections were canceled twice over malpractice. In Butaleja the elections were canceled after a mob attacked the organizers. Up to 12 people were seriously injured.” If this is kind of mayhem is going on during the primary for the ruling party, can you imagine the scene that will play out during the general election in February? And yet developed nations around the world perpetuate these actions by continuing to send unaccountable loads of money. Makes you wonder really. And before my comments degenerate into whether it’s the Democrats or Republicans fault, which seems to happen with every single issue these days; rather, the finger points to everyone because it has been going on for five decades.
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