ARIAKA

I travelled to Kenya over the easter weekend to enjoy a scrabble tournament and tour the Kenyan rift valley (soon to come: My Easter Kenyan Odyssey). On the Akamba bus, there were quiet dicussions about Migingo Island by some  passengers.  But the animation in their arguments is lacking.  This reflecting the general public mood in Uganda, where the matter has been left to politicians and technocrats to amicably resolve.

On arriving in Nairobi, the newspaper headlines is dominated by the reports of the thawing relationship between the president and the prime minister, then Migingo.  Why is the Ugandan flag flying on the island?  Why are the Kenyan fishermen on the island paying taxes to Uganda? And many more questions. The animation is consuming.  A call for drastic action on Uganda is made by sections of the politicians, including war.  The president’s action on Migingo is being sought with many commentators lampooning Mwai Kibaki, calling him a weak president.

Agitations
In Kiserian, where we camped for the scarbble tournament, Kenyan players, seek my opinion on Migingo with many claiming it as a Kenya Island and asking Uganda to lower the flag and withdraw the police and military units from the island.  The mention of Migingo gets people’s attention, and the ensuing conversation takes a marked direction, an agitated state of mind is clearly visibly; finger wagging, contorted faces, rising tones, widening  eyes.  A fight, not yet, but the people are clearly prepared for it. The accepted mindset on Migingo here is clear.  It is a Kenyan Island and Ugandans have no business being there, period. 

Schedules
If the truth about this island be told, we should revisit the Constitutions of Uganda and Kenya, which details the border points of the two countries. In the schedules that map out the countries, it is agreed that the border in lake victory run in the northerly direction in a straight line along the pyramid island.  The pyramid Island clearly lies in Kenya according to the schedules of the two Islands. But there the schedules are silent on another island, Migingo, which lies west of the pyramid island.  This Island clearly lies in Uganda.  Migingo therefore can not lie in Kenya.

Global Warming
But Migingo Island comes to the fore owing to global warming and the activities offshore in the last decade, which has manifested in the dwindling levels of Lake Victoria.  This has meant that many islands on the lake, incliding Migingo have gained ultitude, and in the case of Migingo it’s strategic importance.  It was the smugglers on the lake who gained this knowledge where they included the island on their circuit. Later the Revenue Protection  Services, an anti smuggling para military outfit under now Major General Kale Kayihura, learnt of the island and followed the smugglers to break their back.  At the time, their was no bilateral tension as the activities of RPS had a mutual benefit to Uganda and Kenya.

Moi Exits Kenya
But the politics in this region has changed. President Moi, who was the leaqder of Kenya at the time RPS was operating has left the political scene. A new wave of political despensation has swept Kenya since 2002, with political leaders in the country making and breaking their election promises, new corruption scandals emerging that has dissaffected the Kenyan populace.  Public frustations have now soared to new heights.  Matters are not being helped now by new revelations of corruption, the scourge of post 2007 election violence in a year of famine in parts of the country.

It appears convinient for politicians to create avenues for people to expend their frustratiosn.  Migingo is a perfect excuse.  Media reports carry stories of politicians working up the youths against Uganda.  Their no sympathy for Uganda. The youths have taken the rhetoric against Uganda literally, they uprooted 100m of the railway line slippers in Kibera slums, effectively cutting off the economic life line to the hinterland, including areas served by the raily system in Kenya itself.  It is self defeating. 

Church and Warfare
It appears the Migingo controversy has also found  home in churches, where it was reported a religious meeting in Nyanza province sat to draft a resoultion to government. They  advocated for war to resolve this impasse.  In fact police had to deploy on the muhoroni road to Kisumu, to disrupt an assembly of youths who had taken the message their leaders and where bent to stop the traffic of goods to Uganda. Some commentators have sized up the military capability of Uganda and concluded that the country has not won any wars even when they are in a perpetual state of conflict.  Thy cite the failed Operation Thunderstorm, the percieved humiliation in Congo by Rwanda early this decade etc.  Their conclusion, Kenya can beat Uganda hands down in a war.

A plethora of Organisations
However, if the domestic politics in Kenya was troubled that much, should Migingo offer the pill to cure an internal disease?  For a start, a war with Uganda is unnecessary, as the Migingo case can be resloved through bilateral or even regional initiative as Paul Kagame, the Rwandan president told us this week on a working visit to Uganda.  Already, we have the East African community??? Then a plethora of Lake Victoria organisations - Lake Victoria Fisheries Organisations, Lake Victoria enviromental Management Program, even a Lake Victoria Urban Councils etc,..who work under the aegis of EAC.

Risky Business
It is true Kenya offers Uganda and other countries in the hinterland  a passage to the sea, an important economic life line. But is also true that Uganda is Kenya’s leading trading partner, and the country offers Kenya the route to lucrative markets further afield in Southern Sudan, Western DRC, Rwanda, Burundi, Central African Republic all the way to Angola.  Whereas Uganda can chart alternative routes to the sea through Dar-es-Salaam, Kenya can not afford to lose its markets upstream.  In order to grow their presence in Africa, many Kenyan business have set up post in Uganda whence they hope to penetrate the continent.  You have to wonder what wisdom Kenyan politicains have to want to destroy that strategic relationship.

Small Fish
Migingo is small fish, President Kibaki’s silence is a loud and luadable message.  Keep quiet. Stop fishing omena.  Go for Nile Perch.  Uganda is more importantb than a whismical Island .

Stoct taking
After stock taking, it dawned on Kampalans that the time was now to right a wrong of so many decades.  The original Nakivubo war memorial stadium is now taking shape.  With the parking yard burnt down, now is the time to take on the mighty Owino market.  Burn it down so that we can now have the parking yard for all the fuel guzzling SUVs to park for the banene to enjoy an evening or weekend respite without the tensity that is the arua around the stadium today.

A better place
Kampala will also be a better place.  Thinking of the traffic jam?  Yes, with a recalimed Nakivubo, the jam that normally starts on Namirembe road and infect the whole city will reduce by a factor of three.  We can now arrive in time for everything.  To reach the taxi, park, the bus park, the office, the shops, upcountry and even out of the country.  We will reclaim three quarters of lost time that is consumed by the jams.

Delirium
That is a good thing. Asking how, time is wealth, is it not? Now, with the added time the productivity of the residents and dwellers and visitors can be expected to match the reclaimed time.  Measured in economic terms, we can now double our productivity.  The overall contagion of the inferno on the economy in real time will generate gross domestic product manifold, using last year as the base year.

Good for business
With the improved terms of trade, we will add another five years on the life expectancy in Uganda as people will reach the hospitals faster to get treatment, leave the bar fast to hit the sack, get to that ATM faster to replenish their wallets, eat better food - which will not decay on the trucks, all thanks to unjamming the city.  Our womyn folk can reach the hospital and find the nurse has arrived on time for her to deliver that bundle of joy. 

A message from the mountain
It is good feeling.  Behold thee mortals in Kampala, as the dust settles in Nakivubo, there will arise a great saviour that will deliver thee to the promised land.

A whiff of the gas from the bowels (E kinyapo)
You must emerge from the reverie now.  For if you do not you will remain firmly in the annals of day dreaming.  As the embers died down that fateful dawn, the traders resolved to rebuild their lives (literally).   Keep the prize away from the hyenas.  The wails and mourns had attracted the hyenas hmmm!! as well as certain people whose idea of redevelopment is skewed upside down.  The traders remained on the ground rebuilding their shattered lives.  They spent the night and the day nailing this and hammering that, that for someone who saw Nakivubo three days later could not believe the fire story.

Crying more than the berieved
The political machine swung into action.  FDC chief camped in Nakivubo and offered loads of building material.  Then the celebrities did their thing, as a Social Responsible thing to do, Chameleon offer millions so that Bobi Wine offered tens of millions.  Mukwano offered millions and a certain bank, waived the loans traders had taken. In between many well wishers offered their token of goodwill and prayed for the matter to rest.  But a one seya, who made his mark by fraternising with the folks in Owing and their ilks in Kampala was in for a shocker.  He arrived to ridicules and heckling. Finally, some one through a pair of shoes at him.  Harraaam!! the seya picked up clean pairs of heels and beat a hasty exit.

Grand Entrance
To put matters to rest. To stop this small thing of: Sh 100K, I mean tens of millions. The old man, he of the Ssabagabe distinction, the holder of vision and the omnipresent, enduring leader of this republic made a grand entrance.  I want this circus, this nonsense to stop.  He offered a billion shillings.  The shear weight of that offer put to rest any lingering intentions as the maestro had again proven his superiority.

Trouble is, he meant that money to come from a kitty that supports NAADS, a government/donor partnership to uplift the lives of farming communities in Uganda.  So the optimism can not last forever, that is if the traders can understand the ramifications of digging your hands in the family cookie jar.