His is a story of an impending apocalypse – an ethnic cleansing.
“The times when we were advising our friends to acquire guns, they thought we were just joking,” he starts the recording.
With the pistol firmly seated just on top of his penis, he adjusts it to expose its nozzle.
“Naye kati bw’obeera omunyankore, nuwa, this is the time you need to look for this ka-thing [the pistol]. And you get another loaded magazine [showing magazine on the side]. Because you can end up being sacrificed for this regime for nothing.”
He must have said more, but this specific clip ends here on a deeply emotional and sombre reflection. I return this video into the fray of our political conversation not because I intend to promote the apocalypse of ethnic cleansing prophesied in it, but because there were too many guns on the streets during those two days of protests.
Just as they came, the guns disappeared without proper accountability. But we all saw them, strutting around like characters in action movies. Dressed in civilian clothes, it was difficult for ordinary folks to differentiate between self-appointed vigilantes and militias – like the man in the video – from legit security operatives.
Didn’t you see some of these chaps pausing for cameras? Sadly, our security departments, and government spokesperson blanketly owned up all these gun-wielding fellows. They claimed working jointly with several security organs and adopting several tactics – including inexplicably donning civilian clothes.
Phew! Could you believe they also owned up those chaps who shot at civilians for sport! There were not any pretensions to investigate possible vigilantes or militias – misusing their legal or illegal gun ownership. But what was the man in the video saying?
His message is both prophetic and pragmatic. He and other like-minds foresee an imminent ethnic cleansing where people of Kinyankore ethnic will be targeted – by unfairly connecting them to the ills of Museveni’s regime. This man contends that flashes of this impending apocalypse were visible in those two days in November.
He is, therefore, warning fellow ethnics to quickly ready themselves with guns. Against who, he does not say. But scoffs at friends – ethnic Banyankore – who have been reluctant to embrace their warning. Prophetically, they see a time of absolute state collapse and everyone will be for themselves.
But the Banyankore will be a special target for no reason. Please note that our man does not aspire to defend Museveni’s record but, rather, readies to defend self when unfairly connected to Museveni’s mess – simply for being co-ethnic. I do not believe this man spoke for all Banyankore ethnic.
But I am not naïve to believe he is alone – or there are just a few of them – who have analysed and prepared for a violent end of Museveni’s presidency. There were many guns on the streets in November and, clearly, not all those gun-wielding chaps belonged to security agencies.
Social media is awash with these fellas with recognisable faces – most of them, professed Museveni radicals and career hooligans. While there are so many illegal guns in private hands, it is a little known fact that private gun ownership is legal in Uganda.
In 2017, GunPolicy.org, a portal at the University of Sydney with stats on guns across the world, noted that by 2017, there were 330,000 guns in civilian hands in Uganda. But the war in northern Uganda ended, in whose hands are all these guns? If majority of these guns are in illegal hands, does Museveni need to continue priding in the security narrative?
Police records show that by 2019, a total of 3,000 guns were legally owned by civilian Ugandans. Why do all these people need guns under Museveni’s tight security? But the complexity of the process of acquiring a gun tells a curious story of who is owning these guns.
To acquire a gun, the applicant must attach recommendations from Local Councils I, II, III, the Resident District Commissioner (RDC), and District Police Commander (DPC). After a month’s training in gun handling, the application is then sent to the Inspector General of Police (IGP) who, finding no objection, sends it to the Minister of Internal Affairs who is the final authority.
By 2019, three thousands Ugandans had successfully fulfilled the requirements – recalled that long chain – and convinced the Internal Affairs minister on the need to own a gun. But from that process, there are no ordinary folks holding guns but, rather the who is who of the land.
But see also, RDCs, DPCs and the minister are known to directly serve Museveni’s interest, and also represent an obvious ethnic imbalance.
So, guns are thus easily accessible to Museveni-leaning politicians and Museveni’s ethnic community – who also feel extremely insecure about Museveni’s presidency as the man in the video showed demonstrated.
But against whom are they seeking to protect themselves – and what does protecting oneself with fire mean in this context of a national condition?
The author is a political theorist based at Makerere University.