COLUMNISTS

By Peter Nyanzi Technocrats urge government to prioritize national values in long-term development plans Permanent secretaries and other technocrats want the government to put citizens and national values at the centre of any new plans if the society is to be transformed. The National Planning Authority (NPA) is spearheading the …

By Andrew M. Mwenda Why the Western powers may keep financing Museveni even when some think he has passed his sale-by date My recent visit to Mogadishu and seeing what our troops have done there made me proud. Yet perhaps the greatest lesson from Somalia was not necessarily the good …

By Ernest Rwamucyo The opportunity to seek lasting stability shouldn’t be missed Since the outburst of the recent military mutiny in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Rwanda has been under intense accusation of purportedly supporting the group of mutineers known as M23. These allegations are based on a hastily …

 By Andrew M. Mwenda The world tends to hold him to very high, sometimes unrealistic standards Over the last one month, a rebellion has been ragging in eastern DRC against the government of President Joseph Kabila in Kinshasa. As I write this article, over 40 armed groups, some of them …

By Harold E. Acemah Duped Ugandans ignore benefits from dissent within political parties This is in response to a comment titled “Limits of internal dissent” by Dennis Musinguzi, published in issue No. 223 of July 20 – 26 of The Independent magazine. The comment reveals the extent to which many …

By Naomi N. Karekaho Government recognises the challenges in managing petroleum waste and the need to agree on a solution On June 15, The Independent magazine published an article: `Living in fear of oil waste’. The article was rooted in the conservationist ideas usually advanced by NGOs and civil society …

By Andrew M. Mwenda To understand how theft of public resources flourishes, one has to observe how it is fought Last week, court dismissed as “no case to answer” charges of abuse of office and causing financial loss against Maj. Gen. Jim Muhwezi in the Gavi trial. Muhwezi had been …

By Andrew M. Mwenda How the UPDF generals are tackling the new challenge On July 26, I boarded a plane to Mogadishu, Somalia “to visit our troops” as the Americans would say.On the same flight was Lt. Gen. Andrew Gutti, overall commander of the Africa Mission to Somalia (AMISOM). I …

By Charles Onyango-Obbo Recently I was visiting with Andrew Mwenda, the Strategy and Editorial Director of The Independent at his Butabika home when he squeezed me for a favour. He asked that I write about what I thought President Yoweri Museveni was trying to achieve with his “reconciliatory” actions towards …

By Andrew M. Mwenda Doesn’t a country that lost a million people deserve to protect its people against the threat of another genocide? In a space of one week in July, the Netherlands, Germany, UK and USA  announced they would cut their aid to Rwanda over its alleged involvement in …