CEC member, Jacob Oulanyah casting his vote in Omoro district
“Is this the government that I served diligently and loyally as a trusted cadre since it came to power in 1986 or is it a different government I now serve? Does the NRM government love you only when you ate still healthy and useful? Why do they have to abandon me on my dying bed?”
GULU- UGANDA: The good news coming in from Uganda after the recently concluded presidential and parliamentary elections, especially for President Yoweri Museveni is that this election has been historic in that the Acholi sub- region voted overwhelmingly for him.
This is the first election that Museveni won in the traditionally strong opposition base in the previous five elections since he came to power on January 26, 1986 after a bloody civil war he launched on February 06, 1981 after a botched presidential bid of December 10, 1980. He launched this rebel movement to specifically and forcefully purge the national army of domination by the people from northern Uganda who formed the bulk of the army since colonial time. He also wanted to remove the first leader of government, Dr. Apollo Milton Obote, since independence on October 09, 1962.
Museveni also launched his fist anti Amin struggle by getting blessings from two Acholi clan chiefs; that of Puranga and that of Attiak chiefdoms in January 1971 after Amin purged the post independent army, The Uganda Army, police and civil servants from Acholi by killing many of them forcing anti Amin sentiments among them and many fled into exile in Tanzania to follow Dr. Obote. Amin recruited mostly his native Kakwa tribe found in both Uganda and South Sudan and the Lugbara of West Nile.
Museveni, being a strategist got two friends from Acholi, the late Okello- Agwaa and Mzee Akena p’Okok, now in exile in London and came with them with a few other Banyankole like the late Eriya Kategaya to launch his fist struggle to remove Amin, Front for National Salvation (FRONASEA) movement from Attiak and Awere.
When he launched the NRA on February 06, 1981, he used the anti Acholi sentiments of the Baganda and used Buganda soil as his base. He recruited massively his tribesmen, the Banyankole and native Baganda who accuses the Acholis for killing their King and desecrating their revered monarchy in the 1966 Uganda crises. During the crisis, parties who were parties of the coalition first independent government, the UPC and KY, their King, (Kabaka) Sir Edward Muutesa, the first ceremonial president, fled to exile to London and his eventual death while still there. The Baganda derogatively called the Acholi “Anyanya”
The NRA composed a very popular patriotic and moral boosting anti Acholi song using the word “Anyanya”, the derogative word which the Baganda used to refer to the 1966 crisis.
The word “ANYANYA” (Anya- nya) is a Lwo (Luo) word literally meaning “snake venom”. It became known in modern history around 1950s during the quest for political freedom from colonizers by indigenous Africans. The first to employ this word were the South Sudanese who wanted an autonomous state in South Sudan after Second World War. Their movement was called “THE ANYANYA REBELLION”. Most of the soldiers of the group were drawn from among the Acholi WW II veterans.
There was “anyanya” I and “anyanya” II, which eventually signed peace agreement and a power sharing deal with Sudan government in 1972 and its leader, Joseph Lagu, became vice president in a united Sudan. The rest is history.
The NRA used the word to refer to his anti-northern Ugandan by employing the anti Acholi sentiments by the Baganda, who according to him, had dominated the National army and had misruled Uganda since colonial time. According to him, his campaigns to access state power during high school days has always been by forcefully getting rid of northern Uganda domination.
In the song- “’siina’ dollar ‘anyanya’”, it was saying that the Acholi has no wealth (dollar). The word “sina” is a Kiswahili word meaning ‘nothing’. In Luganda, the most dominant “bantu” language pronounces it “sirina” which means the same thing.
The song has been dropped over a period of time after he began to professionalize and recruit more NRA soldiers from other tribes including Acholi, in an effort to make the army a true national army.
The word “opoko” (opoko) on the other hand, is another ‘Lwo’ name of a gourd. The Acholi use gourds in the past to store and keep water at room temperature when they go hunting, on long journeys or to the garden to cultivate crops. Plastic bottles have now replaced gourds and are now found in craft shops to tourist to carry home as souvenirs.
Gourds are also used by the ‘Banyankole’, a ‘bantu’ tribe in Western Uganda, to which Mr. Museveni belongs, to store milk and churn it into geese. The Banyankole are largely pastoralist and milk together with geese is a major food for them.
The Banyankole flocked Northern Uganda after the country got its independence in 1962, looking for employment as cattle keepers of rich people of the region who had large herds of cattle. They came with gourds among the luggage they carry while coming to Acholi land. Their only terms of employment would be that they are paid, not with hard cash but that all the milk cows would produce would be theirs.
Most people in Northern Uganda take this as “cheap” and therefore looked down on the Banyankole and treat them with contempt as second class citizens because of their preference to milk instead of hard money. They would call Banyankole “Opoko”
When the NRA war intensified and closed in on Kampala city, most Acholi in the forces fled northwards with memories of Amin’s era fresh in mind, the Banyankole herdsmen in the north fled the region back to their homeland. The retreating soldiers referred to Museveni as “Opoko ma mwa, pe romo loyo Uganda”. The phrase means a mere “Opoko” cannot rule Uganda”
They even composed a derogative patriotic song on those herdsmen fleeing the sub- region, which says “Nyankole ocoko opoko ni gicito Mbarara !”, literally meaning “the Banyankole have collected their gourds that they are going to Mbarara”..
In Uganda’s Vision 2040 document, Museveni wants his legacy to make the country move away from a poor third world country to a ‘middle income country status’ and has invested heavily on infrastructural development at the expense of livelihood and poverty reduction, especially for war ravaged northern Uganda which went through devastating 20 year LRA insurgency. This legacy is unlikely to be achieved and the predicament has been made worst by COVID-19 pandemic.
Museveni is one of the world leaders to be ‘humbled’ by the pandemic and this is clearly seen by his changed priorities from extravagant expenditure on political patronage to most pressing issues like increase on agricultural budget and poverty reduction. For the first time in history the nation budget for agriculture reached shillings UGX.900 billion. In the 2020/2021 financial year, the ministry of Finance has budgeted over 1.5 trillion UGX shillings.
This is the second good news for the people of Acholi since the pandemic as his younger brother; General Salim Saleh, has pitched camp in Gulu deeply involved in research to find out why the North is still wallowing in abject poverty despite massive reconstruction interventions by government. The sub- region has the most fertile, virgin and large swaps of under- utilized community owned land for massive production. Three sons of from Acholi hold strategic positions in government, the vice-president of NRM and member of the Central Executive Committee (CEC), Jacob Oulanyah, the Chief Justice, Alfonse Owiny-Dollo and his Chief Escort, Major Koch.
If the cultural chiefs of Puranga and that of Attiak, who initially blessed Museveni in 1971, would be used by the three to gain access to Museveni and demand for our belated share of the national cake now that the region has changed pattern in the last poll, then we are in for a big surprise.
“I am ready to speak to the opposition but I don’t want mediators. I know their address and they know my address. I can either drive to them or they can drive to my address. But I don’t want violence”, says Mr. Museveni.
“Anyanya and Opoko” has effectively mended fence leading the way for national healing and reconciliation process.
