Bissau: Horta recomenda acordos com BM e FMI

Bissau (Rádio Galáxia de Pindjiguiti, 21 de Outubro de 2013) - O Representante Especial do Secretário-Geral e Chefe do Gabinete Integrado das Nações Unidas de Apoio à Consolidação da Paz na Guiné-Bissau (UNIOGBIS) anunciou sexta-feira, em Bissau, que depois de realizadas das eleições gerais no país,as Nações Unidas irão colocar técnicos do Fundo Monetário Internacional (FMI) no Ministério das Finanças, para a gestão das finanças públicas. De acordo com José Ramos-Horta, a medida será extensiva às Direcções gerais das Alfândegas e Administração dos Portos da Guiné (APGB) e citou exemplos disso que estão a ser feitos no mundo e por ser uma iniciativa de sentimento generalizado dos organismos internacionais na Guiné-Bissau. “Nas finanças públicas, ter ali seis técnicos internacionais do FMI a trabalhar com o ministro das Finanças, as alfândegas de Bissau, o Porto de Bissau a entregar a um grupo inglês chamado Crown , ele faz a gestão da alfândega e do porto, vocês vão ver, o país vai começas a fazer muito mais receitas”, precisou. “E, isso não é novo. Países maiores que a Guiné-Bissau fazem-no. Na Indonésia, o porto de Djakarta, mil vezes maior que o da Guiné-Bissau e foi mil vezes mais corrupto, o que é que fizeram? Touxeram uma empresa da Suiça para gerir o porto de Djakarta”, destacou. Foi nesse sentido que o diplomata timorense ao serviço das NU na Guiné-Bissau anunciou que a comunidade internacional disponibizará o número de técnicos necessário para negociar com o executivo que sairá das urnas. “A minha receita – recomendação para a Guiné-Bissau é esta: depois das eleições, assinar acordos com a ONU, com o Banco Mundial, o FMI, a União Africana, a CEDEAO e países amigos para colocarem técnicos internacionais em número que for necessário – negociações com o governo desde A a Z”, recomendou. Ramos-Horta avisou que, se isso não fôr feito, depois das eleições tudo continuará na mesma. “Tudo isso tem que ser pensado. Por que senão, vai haver eleições, vai haver um novo governo, nada vai mudar. Os professores continuam a não ser pagos, as alfândegas vão continuar a produzir dinheiro, mas não vai para os cofres do Estado, ficará – não sei, com o ministro ou com a esposa do ministro ou a tia do ministro, os primos. Muitos portos americanos estão nas mãos de singapurenses a gerir os portos. Mas não é uma questão de vergonha não. Faz-se assim mesmo. No meu país, em Timor-Leste, o nosso porto é dos que mais mal funciona. Não é por corrupção, é por preguiça. O pessoal entra às oito da manhã e sai às cinco da tarde, enquanto há trinta barcos à espera lá fora”, referiu. Para se sair desta situação, de forma definitiva, Ramos-Horta propôs que os guineenses abandonem práticas do passado, onde quem ganhava, ganhava tudo e aquele que perdia, perdia tudo passando a ser tratado como cidadão de segunda classe. “As vossas excelências têm uma oportunidade única – uma janela aberta para realizarmos as eleições , formar um novo governo, mas um governo abrangente. Os irmãos da Guiné-Bissau têm que abandonar aquela cultura prática do passado – quem ganha, ganha tudo e quem perde é tratado como cidadão da segunda classe”, lamentou Ramos-Horta. “O partido que ganhar, convida o segundo, o terceiro, o quarto e o Presidente da República e o primeiro-ministro têm que colaborar”, recomendou. Em relação aos militares, José Ramos-Horta disse que estes se tornam vulneráveis logo que eles estiverem metidos na política. “Militares, se é militar, ele está no quartel, trata da saúde dos seus homens e das suas mulheres nos quarteis, e não estão metidos na política ninguém os critica. Quando nós nos metemos na política, somos vulneráveis. Se as forças armadas estão mesmo neutrais, estão nos quartéis cumprindo a constituição que é a defesa das fronteiras, da soberania do país, da integridade territorial, e o povo estará todo atrás, porque o povo, o consenso que existe no povo é isso – a nossa independência é intocável, sagrada, as forças armadas estão para isso”, defendeu. O Representante Especial do Secretário-Geral da ONU falava pela ocasião da cerimónia de encerramento da segunda conferência do Instituto de Defesa Nacional decorrida à semana passada em Bissau.

Abyei, na confluência entre os dois Sudões

Sudanese president Omer Al Bashir plans to travel to Juba on Tuesday 22 October at the invitation of his South Sudanese counterpart Salva Kiir. The foreign minister Ali Karti said on Sunday that the two leaders , among other things, will discuss the issue of Abyei and the decisions of the African Union on Abyei, in addition to the decisions agreed by the two sides on the disputed area. The Sudanese official is referring to the formation of Abyei interim institutions agreed on 20 June 2011. But the Nogk Dinka refuse the implementation of this deal saying they are no longer ready to share the administration of their region with Misseriya. Karti, however, was keen to minimise the impact of Abyei issue on bilateral relations saying that the two presidents are capable of banishing any fears that may trouble the evolving relations between the two countries. A delegation from the African Union Peace and Security Council is expected to visit Abyei on Tuesday to inspect the situation there, Sudan Tribune, has learnt. The visiting delegation would meet the leaders of Ngok Dinka and meet with the UN mission in Abyei. Sudan Tribune

A desgraça que é a Líbia pós-Khadafi

Two years after the death of Libyan President Muammar Gadhafi, political developments in Libya are still influenced by assassinations, kidnappings and other acts of politically motivated violence. Last week’s assassination of the Benghazi military police chief Ahmad al Barghathi shed light again on the consistent role of the militias in Libyan feuds. Supporters Barghathi accused the commander of one of the militias as being responsible for the assassination. They then torched his Benghazi home and threatened him with assassination on a live radio talk-show. Amid all this turmoil, Libya was still reeling under the impact of the unprecedented kidnapping, carried out by Libyan militias, of the country’s Prime Minister Ali Zaidan. Most of the militias are supposed to be under ‘state control,’ acting as surrogates of the army and the police, sometimes even charged with the security of state buildings. A tribal alliance, for instance, controls the defense ministry, while the “Libya Shield” –the country’s most powerful militia- protects the interior ministry. At times, militias can function as substitutes to government forces. In other instances, however, they serve their own agendas. The disparate nature of the more than 225,000 militiamen reflects the divisions within Libyan government and society. In recent months, militias carried out a blockade against a number of ministries and other institutions, including the interim parliament, to make sure the ‘exclusion law’ against former government officials was voted. In the wild world of the militias, the last word usually goes to those who have amassed the largest quantity of weapons after the 2011 civil war. Uncountable amounts of arms and ammunition, including thousands of Man-Portable Air Defense Systems (MAN-PADS), have been unaccounted for since the fall of the Gadhafi regime. Prime Minister Ali Zaidan commented on this phenomena saying, ‘Weapons are being smuggled out of and into Libya by groups which are trying to murder and assassinate people and spread terror in the country.’ The lack of structured domestic security led U.S. Special Forces to be able to intervene in broad daylight and an Al Qaeda figure, Abu Anas al Libi from the streets of Tripoli. Abu Anas had been on the U.S.’s ‘Most Wanted List’ as a suspect in the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania. Jihadist militias were predictably upset about the kidnapping. In retaliation, Ali Zaidan was eventually kidnapped. The rising power of local militias, at the expense of the central government, has also led to the disruption of oil exports, as Cyrenaica ‘regionalists’ sought to ‘make up’ for the neglect they felt they suffered during the Gadhafi years. Geoff D. Porter, managing director of North Africa Risk Consulting, sees a paradox in Libya: ‘Instead of hydrocarbon receipts being the glue that holds the country together, they have become a tool for prying it apart.’ Autonomist trends in the Cyrenaica, Tripolitania and Fezzan provinces represent a challenge not only to the central government but also to the territorial integrity of the country. In most of the Arab Spring countries, there are legitimate grievances from the long-neglected regions. However, there are also new local actors competing for the various spoils made available by the Libya’s instability. This was in recent months the reason for much of the oil production and export blockages. Exports dropped from 1.4 billion to about 300,000 barrels a day in September and down to 60,000 in early October. The loss in revenue as a result of such disruptions has been estimated at about $ 7.5 billion in just two months. The central government in Tripoli has a hard time also controlling its thousands of kilometers of land and sea borders. Despite announcements by the authorities of ‘military zones’ and ‘closed borders,’ substantial parts of the southern border areas are controlled by the Tebus, the Tuaregs and other tribes and not the state. The nearly 1,700 km maritime borders are just as porous. This situation has allowed traffickers to transport illegal emigrants -- more than 30,000 so far this year -- across the Mediterranean to Italian shores. Neighbors north of the Mediterranean are anguished about the waves of refugees departing from Libya. Neighbors to the east, the west and south are anguished about the two-way flow of weapons and terrorists across Libya’s borders. Zaidan himself admits that the movement of weapons ‘endangers neighboring countries, too.’ The forgotten war In the long run, Libya could eventually rely on its hydrocarbon riches and relatively small population to pull itself together. But to get anywhere close to cashing in its chips, it needs to stop the deteriorating security situation from further destruction. Paul R. Pillar, a former senior analyst at the Central Intelligence Agency stated, ‘Libya today exhibits some of the attributes of a failing state.’ He is not the only security expert to hold that view since the country has had four decades of an eccentric authoritarian rule. Former Amnesty International Secretary General and UN representative in Libya Ian Martin notes that “Libya has aptly been called the ‘stateless state,’” not only lacking security forces but left devoid of almost every institution of modern governance.” But there is more to Libya’s current quandary than the legacy of Gadhafi’s misrule. There are the unintended consequences of the foreign military campaign which helped topple him. The 2011 NATO-led military intervention was meant to quickly get the job done. The ‘job’ was regime-change and not maintaining the peace in Libya. NATO did not heed the warnings that once the air raids stop, the situation on the ground could unravel uncontrollably. In April 2011, U.S. retired General James Dubik, among others, called for a continued role on the ground from the international community after the departure of Gadhafi. He believed the United States and NATO should be ‘providing security to prevent liberated Libya from sinking into chaos’ while ‘the responsibility for security, reconstruction and nation-building will likely fall to the United Nations.’ In May 20011, Russia called for “activating the peacekeeping potential of the United Nations and African Union.” There were also calls for Arab and Islamic peacekeeping forces, which went unheeded. Western fear of ‘mission creep’ made the idea of international troop deployment unappealing. Budget considerations, wariness about entanglement in yet another boots-on-the-ground situation in the Middle East, and the opposition of the Libyan Transitional Council were enough reasons to discard any notion of post conflict involvement. Then, everyone simply forgot about Libya. This selective amnesia is not without precedent. Shashank Joshi, Research Fellow at London’s Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) was right in his observations that “Wars, once won, tend to be forgotten. This was the fate of Afghanistan in the years after 2001, Iraq in 2003 and Libya in 2011. But Libya’s problems will not stay within its borders.” The Tripoli victory tours of French and British leaders, after the fall of Gadhafi, were not matched by any real follow up to prevent things from getting out of control in so called liberated country which they came to celebrate. Libya once again made world headlines again when U.S. ambassador J. Christopher Stephens and his staff were murdered in Benghazi, when oil exports stopped flowing and then when Abu Anas al Libi was kidnapped by the U.S. Delta Force. And while the West was not watching, Mali happened. It was a predictable blowback from Libya’s unfinished war. Weapons and fighters had been flowing out of Libya for months. Still, Western powers seemed somehow surprised when Jihadist and Tuareg fighting happened in northern Mali . A whole chain of blowbacks have unfolded since then. Even before the Mali campaign started, the In Eminas gas installations south of Algeria were struck by terrorists. Fleeing the French-led bombardment of the “Azawad” territory, Jihadists moved back north and sought safe harbor in Libya’s southern deserts and Tunisia’s western mountains. What’s the world to do? The situation in Libya has clearly become a regional and global issue. But what’s the world to do about it? Awareness about possible regional and international ramifications of the Libyan crisis has already convinced many in the international community of the need to help the fledgling Libyan state, especially in matters of security. Recent incidents encountered by Western security trainers in Libya are likely to mean that much of the training of Libyan will take place, at least initially, outside of Libya. A number of European countries are expected to host some of that training. Various programs are being considered by Libya and its Western partners. About 8,000 Libyans will be trained by a number of NATO members, including at least 2,000 who will be trained in the UK. An additional bilateral program, the Security, Justice and Defense program (SJD) will be funded by Great Britain. The SJD program will ‘cover all aspects of security to enable Libya to guarantee the security of the state from any form of threat,’ said British Minister for International Security Strategy Andrew Murrison. A border control support program has been agreed upon between Tripoli and the EU in Brussels. Another potential field of cooperation will be to advise the Libyan government on how to deal with the huge arms flow. Western security assistance will probably be inhibited by a number of considerations having to do with Libya’s domestic dynamics. Beside the safety issues, foreign trainers and advisors in Libya could face the resentment, if not the hostility, of Islamist and nationalist factions. Whatever good will and technical assistance it can get from its Western partners, Libya will have to figure out how to closely coordinate its national security requirements with those of its immediate neighbors. And despite his insistence on the pressing need of his country for foreign security assistance, Ali Zaidan is certainly aware of the caveats. ‘The last thing Libyans want is foreign soldiers on the ground,’ warned Charles Gurdon, director of the UK security and risk consultancy Menas Associates. The West is also careful not to see its technical assistance lead to a full-fledged involvement in a civil war. As with other Arab Spring countries, the West will probably remain wary about over-committing itself financially in places where political and economic prospects are not yet clear. In Libya’s case however, there is incentives of ample oil and gas revenues that should reassure the country’s foreign partners which will allow the country to pay for its needs, especially if stability and security are restored. Most importantly, what the world will do about Libya depends heavily on what Libyans are willing to do about their own country. It is them who will eventually have to do most of the heavy lifting, not the outside world. Nobody can decide in their place if they want to keep their nation together. Nobody can sit in their stead, when the time comes, around the national dialogue and reconciliation table. Nobody but them can decide what kind of future country Libya should be. ________ Oussama Romdhani (a former Tunisian minister of Communication)

Obama decidiu: Para África, em força!

FORT RILEY, Kan. — Here on the Kansas plains, thousands of soldiers once bound for Iraq or Afghanistan are now gearing up for missions in Africa as part of a new Pentagon strategy to train and advise indigenous forces to tackle emerging terrorist threats and other security risks so that American forces do not have to. The first-of-its-kind program is drawing on troops from a 3,500-member brigade in the Army’s storied First Infantry Division, known as the Big Red One, to conduct more than 100 missions in Africa over the next year. The missions range from a two-man sniper team in Burundi to 350 soldiers conducting airborne and humanitarian exercises in South Africa. The brigade has also sent a 150-member rapid-response force to Djibouti in the Horn of Africa to protect embassies in emergencies, a direct reply to the attack on the United States Mission in Benghazi, Libya, last year, which killed four Americans. “Our goal is to help Africans solve African problems, without having a big American presence,” said Lt. Col. Robert E. Lee Magee, a West Point graduate and third-generation Army officer whose battalion has sent troops to Burundi, Niger and South Africa in the past several months, and whose unit will deploy to Djibouti in December. The American commando raids this month against terrorist operatives in Libya and Somalia underscore the spreading extremist threat in Africa, and a renewed urgency to choke off insurgent cells before they can grow, according to counterterrorism specialists. Teams from the brigade here have already helped train forces in Kenya and Tanzania, which are battling fighters from the Shabab militant group in Somalia. President Obama, at a news conference three days after the commando raids, said Africa was one of the places “that you’re seeing some of these groups gather.” “And we’re going to have to continue to go after them,” he added. For that reason, it is no surprise that the military’s Africa Command is the test case for this new Army program of regionally aligned brigades that will eventually extend to all of the Pentagon’s commands worldwide, including in Europe and Latin America next year. These forces will be told in advance that their deployments will focus on parts of the world that do not have Army troops assigned to them now — creating a system in which officers and enlisted personnel would develop regional expertise. Gen. Ray Odierno, the Army chief of staff, said in an interview that the goal was to field an Army that could be “engaged regionally in all the combatant commands to help them shape their theaters, set their theaters, in order to sustain and execute our national security strategy.” Even as soldiers prepare for tasks as far-ranging as combat casualty care in Chad or radio training in Mauritania, in a recent visit here they were also conducting target practice in their M1A2 battle tanks on a sprawling firing range, to keep their skills sharp for a future land war against an unforeseen foe. Chad and Mauritania are both combating Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, an offshoot of the main terrorist group. But with the United States military out of Iraq and pulling out of Afghanistan, the Army is looking for new missions around the world. “As we reduce the rotational requirement to combat areas, we can use these forces to great effect in Africa,” Gen. David M. Rodriguez, the head of the Africa Command, told Congress this year. Missions that were once performed largely by Special Operations forces, including the Army’s Green Berets, are now falling to regular infantry troops like members of the Second Armored Brigade Combat Team, nicknamed the Dagger Brigade, here at Fort Riley. This summer, nearly two dozen of the brigade’s soldiers deployed to Niger, in West Africa, to help train troops for United Nations peacekeeping duty in neighboring Mali. The Americans set up tents on a government-owned farm two hours north of the capital, Niamey, shooing away the goats, cows and chickens. For 10 weeks, they weathered sandstorms and temperatures that soared beyond 110 degrees to teach the Nigerien troops marksmanship, patrolling skills and medical care. The troops drilled in the morning, rested from the midday heat and then resumed classes in the evening. Among the worries in Niger is the threat posed by Boko Haram, an Islamic militant group with ties to Al Qaeda. The New York Times

O Pentágono à conquista de África

The Pentagon has begun a burst of spending in Africa, expanding its main base on the continent and investing in air facilities, flight services, telecommunications and electrical upgrades as the U.S. military deepens its involvement in a region with a rising threat of Islamist terrorism. Hundreds of millions of dollars in expenditures, detailed in unclassified federal documents, demonstrate Africa's increasing importance to U.S. military and counterterrorism operations as the war in Iraq has ended and American troops withdraw from Afghanistan. By far the most significant expansion is occurring at Camp Lemonnier in the deeply impoverished nation of Djibouti, a sleepy backwater on the coast of the Gulf of Aden, just north of Somalia. The sprawling base, built out of a onetime outpost of the French Foreign Legion, has been the Pentagon's primary facility in Africa for a decade. Defense officials last month awarded $200 million in contracts to revamp the base's power plants and build a multistory operations center, aircraft hangar, living quarters, gym and other facilities on a sun-scorched 20-acre site next to the tiny country's only international airport (with which it shares a runway). The projects are part of $1.2 billion in planned improvements over the next 25 years that will accelerate Camp Lemonnier's transformation from a makeshift installation where a few hundred Marines once slept in tents into an enduring 600-acre base that now houses about 4,000 U.S. military personnel and civilian contractors. "Africa is front and center now for the Pentagon, so that means Lemonnier is front and center," said Rudolph Atallah, former counterterrorism director for Africa at the Defense Department and now chief executive of White Mountain Research, a security consulting company. The changes come as U.S. officials grapple with the threat posed by al-Qaida-linked militants in Somalia, Yemen and North Africa's impoverished Sahel region. The U.S. commando raids last month that nabbed a long-sought terrorism suspect in Libya and tried but failed to capture a senior figure in Somalia's Shabab militant organization underscore the Pentagon's growing focus on Africa, including an increasing reliance on elite special operations forces. Though most of the troops at Camp Lemonnier are conventional forces specializing in training African militaries, several hundred special operations troops also are based there, occupying a compound with its own security perimeter. Officials declined to say whether Djibouti-based troops were involved in either raid last month, but the base has quietly evolved into what Pentagon planning documents call "the backbone" of covert missions across Africa and the Arabian Peninsula, and is one of the military's most important bases for drone missions in Somalia and Yemen. Military officials declined to elaborate on the role of the special forces, citing security, but their numbers at Camp Lemonnier are likely to grow. Late last year, the first special operations rapid-response team was established at the base, made up of Green Berets from the Army's 10th Special Forces Group. When the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, was attacked in September 2012, leaving four Americans dead, lawmakers criticized Pentagon officials for a lack of crisis-response capacity in Africa. But there hasn't always been consensus on the role of Camp Lemonnier, which U.S. troops began using in 2002 primarily as a base for civil affairs and humanitarian missions. Now Pentagon planners see the base as the center of a constellation of U.S. military sites across Africa, including small facilities in Manda Bay, Kenya; Entebbe, Uganda; and the West African nation of Burkina Faso. In September, the Pentagon awarded Houston-based Kellogg, Brown & Root a contract for support services at Manda Bay. Navy engineers recently extended the runway there - on a mangrove-covered island near Somalia - to allow it to handle larger aircraft, such as C-130 cargo planes. http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/10/20/205923/pentagon-dollars-flow-into-africa.html#storylink=cpy

Moçambique retrocede duas décadas

Mozambique's opposition Renamo movement has ended a 1992 peace accord after government forces attacked the jungle base of its leader, Afonso Dhlakama. The government forces captured the Sathunjira base in central Mozambique, forcing Mr Dhlakama to flee. About a million people were killed in the civil war that raged in Mozambique after it achieved independence from Portugal in 1975. Mozambique's economy has been booming since the civil war ended. Renamo spokesman Fernando Mazanga said that government soldiers had bombarded the Sathunjira base with heavy weapons before occupying it on Monday. "Peace is over in the country... The responsibility lies with the Frelimo government because they didn't want to listen to Renamo's grievances," Mr Mazanga told Reuters news agency. Continue reading the main story “ Start Quote This irresponsible attitude of the commander-in-chief of the defence and security forces puts an end to the Rome peace deal” End Quote Renamo statement The attack was aimed at assassinating Mr Dhlakama but he had managed to escape to an undisclosed location, Mr Mazanga said. In a statement, Renamo blamed President Armando Guebuza for the attack. "This irresponsible attitude of the commander-in-chief of the defence and security forces puts an end to the Rome peace deal," it said. The BBC's Jose Tembe in the capital, Maputo, says Renamo's statement suggests that it plans to go back to war, but it has denied this in the past. Defence ministry spokesman Cristovao Chume said government forces had taken control of the base in response to an earlier attack on an army post by Renamo fighters. He confirmed that Mr Dhlakama had fled. Mr Chume and Mr Mazanga did not give any casualty figures. Force of hundreds Mozambique's Frelimo government has repeatedly accused Renamo of dragging the country back to war, an allegation it denies. In April, at least five people were killed in central Mozambique after Renamo members attacked a police post. A force of about 300 Renamo men has remained armed since the peace accord, despite efforts to integrate them into the army or police force. Mr Dhlakama has said he needs his own personal bodyguards, and the men usually stay in his bush camp in the Gorongosa mountains. After the civil war ended, Mr Dhlakama moved out of the camp to live in Maputo and later in the northern Nampula province But he returned to the mountains last year, saying he needed to be close to his men who were feeling ignored. Mozambique is due to hold local elections in November, and presidential and parliamentary elections next year. Mr Guebuza's Frelimo party has governed Mozambique since independence in 1975. Renamo, which was formed around the same time, was backed by white rulers who were then in power in neighbouring South Africa and what is now Zimbabwe. BBC

Família Museveni, Limitada

The story of the dominance of the Museveni Family Network in Ugandan politics and their monopolistic grip on the most important business sectors goes back to the "bush" days of the war that brought Yoweri Museveni to power in the mid-1980s. Already, during the 6-year old war (1980-1986), General Museveni was exhibiting tendencies of exclusive dependency on close family members for personal protection and the consolidation of his grip on power. Most favored in the emerging Family Network was Museveni’s young brother Salim Saleh, now a major general. To the chagrin of other Ugandans involved in the war, Salim Saleh quickly became the de-facto Number 2, in terms of the bush-time power hierarchy, wielding more power than the likes of the Late Eriya Kategaya, who was officially RO 002. Salim Saleh and his brother Museveni ruthlessly dispensed the power they had, and, according to a former Bush War Commander, grossly abused and misused it for personal aggrandizement. The deaths of Bush-time top Commanders, like Sam Magara, are commonly attributed to the power machinations by the Museveni-Saleh central axis. Testimonies by some Bush time fighters have also exposed the absolute control that Museveni and his brother Salim Saleh exercised in relation to the management of the war-time financial affairs. It is said that Museveni would receive huge financial donations from far away sources, like Libya, and would keep the spending process totally classified – only for his own eye and that of his brother. 27 years later, and with the Museveni Family Network firmly entrenched in Uganda’s political and economic body fabrics, justifiable questions are being raised in all sections of Ugandan society about the wisdom of allowing this Family to continue its monopolistic enjoyment and clearly visible abuse and misuse of political and economic power in a country of 37 million politically disempowered and economically emasculated citizens. To fully understand the extent to which the Museveni Family Network monopolizes political power in Uganda, one has to simply take a glimpse at the profiles of the five most powerful occupants of the highest power pyramid in the country. The Gang Of Five: 1. General Yoweri Kaguta Museveni (President/CEO) – He has been President for 27 years. His stay in power has been largely achieved through imperious authoritarianism, violent repression of any form of criticism, and the abject manipulation of constitutional order. On coming to power in 1986, Museveni consolidated his personal and family hegemony by enforcing non-competitive politics, and banning opposition political activism. This was followed in 1995 by a constitutional amendment, which removed Presidential term limits a move which was initially condemned by Johnnie Carson before he became Assistant Secretary of State for Africa during President Obama's first term. Carson, who left after Obama's first term, never brought up the matter again. By this heinous violation of constitutional order, engineered, according to a former ruling party top official, by General Museveni personally, the beginning of a journey that would lead to the timeless monopoly of Presidential power by the Museveni Family was effectively launched. In order to maintain state power, General Museveni has, according to a former senior military officer who has since fallen out with the regime "deliberately undermined and subverted state institutions and structures so as to weaken the state, so that they can advance their personal ambitions.” According to this source, Museveni’s family-cantered dictatorship manifests itself through the total control of all the most important political and economic activities in Uganda. The Museveni family's stranglehold on political power is manifestly meant to enhance the “abuse of power for personal and collective family survival.” That, essentially, is the core task of the Museveni Presidency. It is the reason why the Museveni Family Network is prepared to savagely and ruthlessly violate the freedoms and human rights of Ugandan citizens on a day-to-day basis. Simply put, it is why they cannot and will not voluntarily give up political power, unless they are forced to by the People of Uganda. 2. General Salim Saleh, whose real name is Caleb Akandwanaho, is Museveni’s brother (some say half-brother), who wields mighty influence in a way that overshadows all other military officials. Officially, General Salim Saleh is referred to as Senior Military Advisor to the President, but a source who is familiar with the workings of the Ugandan military as well as the Museveni Presidency confirmed that the General is routinely allocated the most sensitive and critical duties, far beyond what Museveni allows any other senior army officer, including the Chief of Defense Forces. According to this source, General Saleh’s mostly secretive, assignments are usually in form militarized business operations, whereby military resources are deployed to actualize specific high-profile business ventures for the benefit of the Museveni Family Network. Most of the operations are carried out within Uganda, but as has been the case in recent years, General Salim Saleh has been dispatched by his brother Museveni to make incursions into mineral-rich neighboring countries particularly the Democratic Republic of Congo for the sole purpose of extracting minerals and other natural resources, and selling them off to earn the Family money. His Congo exploits, according to the UN, dates to the late 1990s. A number of senior army officers, who know about these secretive operations, have described Salim Saleh, as an extremely ruthless and no-nonsense operator, who can kill, if need be, to achieve a business goal. Most recently he was named in a United Nation's Group of Experts report looking into the outside supporters of M23, the Rwandan proxy army which is now fighting against the UN and Congo's army. The UN report said one of the M23 leaders Bosco Ntaganda, now at the International Criminal Court (ICC) at the Hague, owned two homes in Kampala and met regularly for consultations with Gen. Saleh and with Uganda's police chief Gen. Kale Kayihura. 3. Mrs. Janet Kataaha Museveni – the all-powerful wife of General Museveni, who currently serves as Minister for Karamoja and is also an Member of Parliament in the legislature dominated by Museveni supporters, after opposition parties were emasculated through the last of several rigged elections. Beyond her functions as Minister for Mineral-rich Karamoja, Janet Museveni pulls the levers of political and economic power that sustains the Family Network. Janet Museveni is an undeclared, unofficial adviser to her husband. According to State House sources, General Museveni has secretly provided Janet Museveni with the spare keys to his Presidential power, enabling her to dictate some of the decisions that Ugandans falsely believe Museveni the president has taken. 4. Brigadier Muhoozi Kaneirugaba – Museveni’s son is now the most powerful military officer, after his father Museveni and his Uncle General Salim Saleh. As an over-privileged Commander of the Special Forces Command (SFC), he is more powerful, in real power terms, than General Katumba Wamala, the newly appointed official Chief of Defence Forces. He is responsible for the security of General Museveni, but it is also tasked to guard the vital oil and other natural resources fields across the country. Brigadier Muhoozi’s operational remit extends beyond the officially outlined responsibilities, and, more often than not, encroaches onto public policing duties, with the brief of containing, by any means necessary, any form of political opposition activism and any type of civil disobedience against the Museveni regime. Recently, when he visited Ugandan troops serving in Somalia, an enlisted man asked him how it was that he had been promoted so swiftly in the army. The enlisted man was immediately arrested and loaded onto a plane back to Uganda where he's since been incarcerated for having the temerity to pose a question to the all-powerful presidential son. It is an open secret in Uganda that Muhoozi SFC operatives, trained in extra-repressive techniques against unarmed civilians have been regularly donning regular police uniforms and taking lead roles in the brutal suppression of the increasingly regular public demonstrations against the Museveni regime. A particularly well-informed former State House security operative, who has now joined hands with other Ugandans to demand for political change in Uganda, one such Special Forces Command operative was the hooded man who, in 2011, savagely attacked and sprayed chemicals in the eyes of Dr. Kizza Besigye, the former President of Uganda’s biggest opposition party, the Forum for Democratic Change FDC. Currently a major row has broken out between General Museveni and several senior army officers, including top Generals who fought with him in the 1980-1986 bush war, about the secret plan by Museveni to transfer political power to his son Muhoozi, at some point after the 2016 elections. General Museveni is not so sure that his son Muhoozi would be able to engineer and manage electoral victory against an emboldened, battle-hardened political opposition in 2016. So he has made the strategic decision of going for another term as Presidential candidate in what would be obviously rigged elections, and then mid-way in the next term of office, he would consider handing over to Muhoozi, as a conclusion of what has been dubbed "Project Muhoozi". 5. Mr. Sam Kutesa is Gen. Museveni’s brother in law. He is father to to Charlotte Kutesa, the wife of Museveni’s son Brigadier Muhoozi. He serves in government as Minister of Foreign affairs.Kutesa is believed be one of the most trusted Museveni Ministers and a close business associate. This closeness to Museveni is what has ensured that Kutesa remains at the heart of political power, in spite of numerous accusations of impropriety. The more muddled up in scandalous adventures Kutesa’s name has been, the more Museveni, the Head of the Family Network, has entrusted him with important political responsibilities. In recent times, Kutesa has been linked to some of the more pronounced financial scandals of the Museveni era – for example the accusations that were levelled against hleveledde allaged corruptionalleged the organization of the Commonwealth conference and more recently for having received bribes from global oil business companies involved in the nascent Ugandan oil sector. Sam Kutesa is believed to be among the wealthiest people in Uganda, and, according to various sources, has been a long-time front for significant business interests of the Museveni Family Network. Mafia-type operational Methods: Deaths of Prominent Business people: In the past few months, Ugandan newspapers have been full of grotesque stories of point-blank shootings of prominent business men in Buganda region, Western Uganda, and other parts of the country. The recent spike in the murders of prominent business people has raised questions as to who might be behind the crimes. There is suspicion that the murders have foot-prints emanating from State House. Gen. Kale Kayihura, the ruthless army General and Museveni confidant who commands the Ugandan Police Forces, has been accused by some high-profile opponents of General Museveni’s regime of nurturing and harnessing special killer squads and mafia-type gangs, which, in addition to assassinating and persecuting political opponents, have been busy ‘eliminating’ Ugandan business people, who are deemed financially too powerful and yet unsympathetic to the ruling regime. In most of these incidences, the police, commanded by General Kayihura, have either come too late for purpose, or have not put serious effort in finding the perpetrators. Land grabbing: The Museveni Family Network’s linkages to the centres of economicenters are as unashamedly corrupted and sullied, as are their monopolistic endearment to the political landscape. Examples of these economic-centred excesses icanteredland grabbing by Museveni and his Family associates in wide-ranging areas of Uganda - from Luwero and Kayunga in Buganda, to Bunyoro, Ankole Karamoja, and Acholiland. A source with deep insights about the goings-on in Museveni’s State House attested to the fact that even the famous Kisozi ranch in Mpigi district, which is owned by General Museveni was irregularly acquired from the Uganda People’s Defence Forces. According to the above source, the Museveni Family Network is said to have also firmly set its sights on land in Western Uganda and Northern Uganda where proven oil deposits have been discovered. Great suspicions abound that the first family have massive interests there, with a crucial piece of evidence being the decision by General Museveni to allocate guard duties at the said oil-rich land sites to his son Brigadier Muhoozi and his Special Forces Command. One Northern Ugandan politician, who has been at the heart of on-going local resistance to Museveni’s plans to forcefully acquire massive pieces of land in Amuru, Acholiland, had these questions for the Museveni Family Network – Why does Museveni keep referring to the country's oil resources as "...My oil, which I personally discovered, and I am not going to go away before it starts flowing..."? According to the source with links to the Museveni State House, the empowerment brought to the Museveni Family Network through land grabs enables them to economically disempower and emasculate Ugandan citizens, who then become less able to stand up and resist political repression. But, crucially, according to a prominent Ugandan opposition politician, the Museveni Family Network is physically re-drawing the electoral map of Uganda through the creation of a multitude of new districts, but also by dissecting the country-side land masses through land grab operations. Thousands of evicted citizens are often re-settled in other constituencies away from their traditional places of settlement. Some of the grabbed land is also allocated, as bribe and thank-you gifts, to some heads of Museveni’s coercive forces, besides bringing direct financial muscle to the his Family Network. Karuma Dam Saga: The recently-launched Karuma dam in Northern Uganda looks set to become one of the most shameful travesties of the Museveni era. The involvement of the Museveni Family network, whenever it fully surfaces, will shock Ugandans. According to impeccable sources, Museveni personally intervened to overrule the Inspector General of Government (IGG), and went on to launch the project without a contract, because of the entrenched financial interests of his Family Network in the dam project. Revelations from well-informed sources point to the Family Network’s interests, in the approximately $1.4 billion project, being driven by the following members: Geoffrey Kamuntu, who is married to Museveni’s third daughter Diana; Museveni’s son Brigadier Muhoozi, through Amon Muheirwe, who owns companies ravaging Karamoja district using the Special Forces Command; Museveni’s wife Janet’s ministerial portfolio; and, the participation of Joviah Saleh, the wife of General Salim Saleh and her sister Kellen Kayonga. http://www.blackstarnews.com/global-politics/africa/how-a-country-named-uganda-became-museveni-family-incorporated.