Andrew Mwenda asks Museveni to declare himself ‘King of Uganda’

By Watchdog reporter

Veteran journalist cum political broker Andrew Mwenda has said President Museveni is in line to be declared king of Uganda, just as other great leaders in history ended up.
Mr Mwenda never says things for the sake, although Ugandans naively love to dismiss him as loudmouthed.
However Mwenda always says things armed with credible information of what is going on from power circles, and sometimes from the horse’s mouth itself.
Now in his latest article, in the Independent magazine, Mwenda compares Museveni to Augustus Caesar, one of the greatest leaders in history of the Roman Empire. Augustus was the founder of the Roman Principate and is considered the first Roman emperor, controlling the Roman Empire from 27 BC until his death in AD 14, according to Wikipedia.
Mwenda’s column The Last Word, ran a title “Why Museveni will rule for life” on March 27, 2017. The column depresses those debating Museveni’s succession as president nears retirement age of 75 but arguing the Ugandan leader is likely to die in power.
Drawing his argument from history, comparing Uganda with the beginning of the Roman empire, Mwenda says, “But anyone who has read the history of Republican Rome, most especially from the end of the Third Punic War in 146BC to Caesar’s death, would see that the republic was unsustainable.”
“Octavian never declared himself king or emperor although that is what he became,” Mwenda argues cleverly putting it to his readers that actually Museveni has become a monarch, and was treating Uganda as his kingdom.
Mwenda puts that “There is some similarity between Rome in the first century BC and Uganda at the end of the 20th Century and between President Yoweri Museveni and Augustus. Museveni campaigns in elections, spending oodles of money; his handlers stuff ballot boxes, beat up his opponents and even on occasion kill a few.”
As he concludes, Mwenda attempts to absolve Museveni from dragging Uganda into the gutter by blaming Kizza Besigye for being the architect of Yoweri’s life presidency.
“…Museveni does not seem to have planned it this way. Insiders say that when the NRA/M High Command met at Lubiri in January 1986 after capturing Kampala, Museveni insisted he preferred to be president for only two years of a transitional period, after which there would be peaceful succession. He was forced to accept four years. Yet when the four years expired, then National Political Commissar, Dr. Kizza Besigye, led a team to draft a resolution to amend the constitution to extend NRM’s life, and therefore Museveni’s presidency, for another five years.”
Mwenda adds confidently, “This was the first in a series of actions that would create a presidency for life.”
He leaves us this message, “…Museveni may surprise us. But holding other factors constant, I can predict that as night follows day, the NRM is going to amend the constitution to remove age limits so that Museveni can run for president in 2021.”