08/13/2026
https://medium.com/.../the-myth-of-stability-in-uganda...
This is an invitation to think seriously about Uganda, not merely to choose sides. The background question of this series is therefore deceptively simple: “What precisely do Ugandans mean when they say their country is stable?”
Uganda deserves a political conversation more demanding than the contest between official propaganda and partisan outrage.
That conversation must begin by understanding the machinery we inherited.
I want to opine that the system governing Uganda today may not have emerged from empty grounds in January 1986. The NRM inherited a country already shaped by centralized control, unequal administration, territorial bargaining, regional specialization, and coercive government. The National Resistance Movement altered that machinery, expanded it, and perfected many of its instruments. It might not have invented its foundations. But it perfected it.
Next week, the historical investigation begins with the state Britain constructed, not simply to unite different peoples, but to administer them from a narrow center of authority.
To understand why Uganda’s peace depends so heavily upon the man at the center, one must first understand the country that was constructed to be governed from the center.
A Weekly Conversation About Uganda’s Past, Present and Future
