4 May 2026
Hello Yusuf,
Thank you very much for the response.
I was very happy because I didn’t expect one, and certainly, not one so complimentary. Thanks, also, for the link to “Surrounded”, and some of your other work. As you point out, the term “layers” is a better description of what ties your many writings together.
I very much like that you point out that empires/governments are brutal by default. This is important because it relates to your point about the ends which justify brutality. Your argument, which I can summarize (perhaps reductively, and imprecisely) as “protection of sovereignty justifies brutality” is probably where you and I differ the most.
Here, I must confess that I am reading “justifies” in moral terms, loosely and very uncomfortably saying – because it is a slippery slope to hell, that I’d support brutality if it leads to some end that is good for a nation’s people, and not for just whatever group happens to rule at some point in time.
Because only a government can protect a country’s sovereignty by being brutal to its enemies – foreign and domestic.
I have become suspicious of the term, questioning (1) whether a government also becomes the arbiter of what is and isn’t sovereign, (2) where a government derives its sovereignty (from itself – by the power of its guns, or from some or all of the people in the territory it runs), and (3) how much brutality, especially to part of its population, is justified in the defence of sovereignty.
I think, however, that disposing of the moral lens brings a degree of clarity showing that defence of sovereignty is simply a euphemism for the survival of a government.
In this case, the only difference between the Uganda and Iran governments’ 2020 “pro-colonial” and 2026 “anti-colonial” slaughtering of protesters respectively, is which strategy better ensures long term regime survival.
Imagining myself as a protester in either case leaves me without much sympathy for either strategy.
And I suspect that the behaviour of non-imperialist governments is part of what drives many people to the catastrophic error of sympathizing/supporting what you called “neo-colonial human rights and democracy merchandisers,” which gets us from the frying pan into the fire.
I agree that the Iranian government faces genuine external threats, as do governments in Uganda, Tanzania, and elsewhere. But the fact that so many ordinary citizens, not colonial agents or proxies, are willing to take huge risks in opposition to these governments, should itself give our rulers pause.
Your article questioning whose children the NRM is protecting its gains for is wonderful on this front. For whose children are the rulers of Iran protecting theirs? Thank you again for your response.
Victor
12 May 2026
Dear Victor,
Thanks a lot for your message and the ever-careful reading. I must admit I’m a little – maybe entirely – biased when it comes to Iran.
In fact, I must say it is such a stretch discussing Uganda and Iran in the same sentences. The only time this comparison would be warranted is only when we are taking lessons from Iran.
Dear Victor, power has its own morality – and violence is part of the moral anchor. In fact, it cannot be a state without the power of violence. Without doubt, states have often abused this moral anchor to selfish ends.
This is why a state ought to have a philosophical-ideological anchor to regulate and guide its use of violence. In the case of Iran, there is a religious moral philosophy (which extends towards the fatwa against the development of nuclear weapons).
For Uganda, one could say, behind the claims of Pan-Africanism and decolonisation, is the imperative of accumulation by dispossession in service of foreign capital. Of course, all states lie.
Noam Chomsky has told us, “Governments used to have a department called propaganda before the word became unfashionable.” Nowadays, it is called “Ministry of Information” or “national media centre,” and oftentimes, “mainstream media.”
But all these are platforms of lies. When states unleash violence against own populations, the casual observer, scholar or journalist has the difficult task cutting through this maze of deception.
This challenge is a definitive one. I should say I’m compelled to believe Iran propaganda than I could ever countenance the same idea about Ugandan propaganda. This is not because I’m Muslim, nor because Iran is too far from my location to be able to cut through the propaganda.
But because Iranian propaganda can stand thorough historical scrutiny. How far we need to go? The 1953 British-American coup that overthrew PM Mossadegh, or the Iraq-Iranian war that Americans opened funded and facilitated including the use of chemical weapons.
Have you heard about the Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK) rebels? How about the assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists? The bombing of Iranian civilian Airliner, Air 655 in 1988!
How about the inexplicable crippling sanctions, or more recently Ayatollah Sayid Ali Khamenei? Notice however, that all these colonial aggressions notwithstanding, Iran is globally ranked top in STEM sciences, woman empowerment, education, provision of public services and goods.
I do not know what to show for Uganda under Yoweri Museveni – who is, incidentally, bosom buddies with the US, Israel and Western Europe.
The point I’m making is that Iran can actually back its anti-colonial posture, and claims of protecting the interests of its people. Of course, there are many innocents, but one can agree that Iran has an active foreign aggressor.
Dear Victor, I hope this is not a too-lengthy response. But thanks a lot for reading, and we keep in touch.
yusufkajura@gmail.com
The author is a political theorist based at Makerere University.