Predatory leaders are destroying trades unions movement

There are two movements that have let down and continue letting down Africans. These are the Pan-African and the trades union movements. The trades union and the Pan-African movements were founded on the social democratic principles of social justice, social welfare and equality. This explains why genuine Pan-Africanists and trade unionists are leftists and abhor western imperialism and exploitation. The two movements cherish equality so much that they address themselves as comrades and brothers and sisters for the Pan-Africanists and trade unionists respectively.

The Pan-African and trades union movements were started to fight multifaceted injustices ranging from slave trade, colonialism, discrimination, exploitation. To date they are still engrossed in fighting neocolonialism and injustices as a result of globalisation. Many post-independence African leaders were trade unionists and Pan-Africanists. Both movements are mass movements as trade unions can recruit from all workers but also have the goodwill of non-workers, because those who are young aspire to join the working class, while many of the elderly have been workers and need social security – a reason why they need the trade unions.

I have had an opportunity of reading the literature of both movements and have for some time now been associated with the two groups. My first experience with the trades unionists was for academic purposes but because of what the trade union movement stands for, I ended up falling in love with the trade union movement and for some time I worked with the National Organisation of Trade Unions (NOTU). With the Pan African Movement, when I joined university, myself together with Comrade Richard Muhumuza, Comrade Rukidi-Mpuga and Comrade Doreen Namara among others genuinely started the Pan-African Universities Students Union (PAUSU). We were well intentioned and organised some activities where we would invite Pan-African staff at the secretariat then. PAUSU died a natural death because of the malady that has engrossed the Pan-African Movement.

In Uganda, workers have been turned into another branch of the National Resistance Movement (NRM) party and so is the way the Pan African Movement has been treated. Workers’ members of parliament are at the same time on the leadership of NRM workers’ league, a situation that has always made them compromise the interests of the workers for the party interests, which are more often than not antithetical to the workers’ interests. Those who become loudmouthed are branded rebels and later panel-beaten back into line. They are cowed into submission either through favours (read bribes) or threats. If you cannot be swayed by the bribes they threaten to campaign against you come the next election and given that many of our politicians exploit situations to pursue their selfish interests, they end up yielding to the pressure and abandoning the cause of their constituents. Accordingly, the NRM has used both the stick and the carrot to muzzle trade unionists. As for the Pan-African Movement I have written before in Pambazuka and I wish to restate it now that it has been reduced into an NRM branch and some of us feel it is an extension of state house. Our conviction is informed by the composition of the secretariat staff and appointment. If you are not a staunch NRM cadre, forget about working at the Global Pan-African Movement secretariat. This poses a threat to the trade union and Pan-African Movements as the secretariat staff are heavily bent on promoting and protecting their partisan interests at the expense of the broader interests of the movements.

It is vital to note that the two movements are necessarily political movements. That notwithstanding, it is imprudent for them to serve petty, trivial partisan political interests. They must strive to promote the common good. They are meant to be the voice of the voiceless. They predate our partisan politics and they are aimed at the social wellbeing. Forget this current bandwagon of liberal democracy – the trades union movement and Pan-African Movement should have no illusions about liberal democracy. They are social democratic movements. They are leftist movements and leftists they will remain. It is because of the ideological confusion that the Pan-Africans we have here in Uganda who at the same time serve the NRM regime that has wholeheartedly moved to the right are always caught between a rock and a hard place. You will never hear avowed Pan-Africanists like Chango Macho, Kajabago ka Rusoke and Kirunda Kivejinja singing the Breton Woods institutions lullabies. This means they are held hostage in a regime whose ideology they don’t believe in and this is purely because of monetary or other inducements.

The trades union movement and the Pan-African Movement should be at the forefront of denouncing dictatorship. It is also vital to note that the slogans of the two movements have been abused, desecrated and rendered meaningless. The trades union movement slogan is ‘solidarity for ever for the union makes us stronger’. The Pan-African movement slogan on the other hand is ‘don’t agonise, organise’. These slogans, given the current state of these movements, have remained for window-dressing purposes. A closer look at the trades union movement in Uganda shows visible absence of solidarity. Infighting and internal squabbles with some leaders and members pulling one another down is the order of the day. The same applies to the Pan-African movement where the national chapter headed by Comrade J.P. Mwesigwa Karooro has another team under Comrade Daniel Rugarama masquerading to be the bona fide team heading the chapter. Paradoxically, the masquerading team is supported wholeheartedly by the executive assistant of the Global Pan-African Movement’s Tony Othieno, whose appointment, I hear, is linked to him and his father being NRM cadres.

From the foregoing, it becomes clear that what the trades union movement and the Pan-African movement have in common is the absence of solidarity and incessant antagonism. This situation is brought about by the fact that there are two categories of members: Those that are genuinely passionate about the ideals, values and objectives of the movements, which are centred on social welfare, and those that seek personal and self-aggrandisement. Unfortunately, self-aggrandisement seekers carry the day in the short run. We must however not give up because winners are not those who never face challenges but those who never give up in spite of the challenges. Trades unions and the Pan-African movement must extricate themselves from the claws of African predatory leaders, who promised too much upon capturing power and have destroyed too much instead. They have turned state houses into their family’s, and are determined not even to be evicted by death, for they put in place situations that make it possible to bequeath statehouses to their offspring.

* Vincent Nuwagaba is a Ugandan human rights defender.
* Please send comments to [email protected] or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/.