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Amin was no one’s fool – Abu Mayanja

In our continuing series, Serving Amin, to mark the overthrow of Idi Amin on April 11, 1979, Abu Mayanja talks to Peter Nyanzi about his brief time as minister of education: - Idi Amin's first Cabinet consisted mainly of people who had been permanent secretaries. Mr Emmanuel Wakhweya [finance] had been secretary to the treasury. Dr John Gesa [health] had been permanent secretary in the ministry. Mr James Zikusooka became minister of works and communication. [Valeriano] Ovonji had been a civil servant at the East African Community and was appointed to public service. Abu Mayanja Justus Byagagaire [who went to labour] was the most experienced because when Frank Kalimuzo went to Makerere University as vice chancellor, Byagagaire took over as PS in public service. Mr Nkambo Mugerwa had been solicitor general and he became minister of justice and attorney general. [A few] of us [had not been PSs]. Mr Apollo Kironde [planning and economic development] had been ambassador and permanent representative at the United Nations. He was one of the first Ugandans to graduate in South Africa. Prof. William Banage was teaching zoology at Makerere. He was brought in as minister of animal industry and fisheries. Fabian Okware had been the commissioner of prisons and was brought in as minister of agriculture and forestry because of his experience in managing big prison farms. Then Erinayo Oryema, who was the inspector general of police, was appointed to be minister of water, land and mineral resources. [Yekosofati] Engur had earlier been a dispenser then he joined Ignatius Musaazi in the co-operative movement and became a strong member of the Uganda National Congress. When Obote saw that he was a very clever man and he had become a 'King of Lango', he tactfully appointed him ambassador to the Soviet Union. Amin appointed him minister of culture. Lt. Col. Obitre-Gama was the only person from the army. He did not want to have many soldiers in Cabinet because he probably wanted men with political acumen and he wanted to show that his was not a military government. One time he described his Cabinet as the "Cabinet of the talents" because it had more educated, qualified and experienced people than any of the other governments that there had been before. As for me I was a lawyer but had been a minister of education in the Kabaka's government. But I had spent the previous two years [before Amin took power in January 1971] in detention in Luzira prisons. I had been accused of writing an article in Transition, which was deemed seditious. Amnesty International adopted me as a prisoner of conscience as well as [Rajat Neogy], the editor of the magazine. International lawyers defended us and court acquitted us of the charges. But we were immediately rearrested and whisked back to Luzira under the emergency laws, which were then operational in Uganda. So it is not true that Amin released me; I had been acquitted about two months earlier. I remember the day Obote was ousted I was in Mulago suffering from tonsillitis and I shouted so much that I hurt myself. It was not really a large Cabinet. I do not know who advised him to pick the kind of Cabinet he picked, but you know Amin was not a fool and he had the Army Council also. About a day or two after the coup, the announcement of the new Cabinet was made on the 7 O'Clock news on UTV. I did not listen to the news but somebody rang me up to congratulate me upon being made a minister. There was no question of being sounded out first. I could not want to decline the appointment because the whole country was in jubilation because of the things that Obote had done to Baganda. There had never been such jubilation before and I do not think there has been such jubilation since. So I was really excited about it. Soon after the swearing-in ceremony at Kololo [Airstrip], we held a long Cabinet meeting at State House, Entebbe. One of the decisions taken was the release of political prisoners. Some of the people who were released were some of [Obote's] former ministers [Grace Ibingira, Balaki Kirya, George Magezi, Mathias Ngobi, Emmanuel Lumu], Benedicto Kiwanuka, Sheikh Kulumba, Prince Kakungulu and several others. At first things were hard for Amin. I remember on the first graduation ceremony that was held at Makerere University when I was minister of education, I had to read his speech to him first. Then when he looked at the text he said: Please Abu, you are killing me. You have to type in capital letters. When you wrote a Cabinet paper, he could call you to read it first while he listened. Then he would make decisions basing on that. He had a problem reading the Cabinet papers at first but later he picked up. Was I afraid of Amin? No. I had no problem with him. In fact, the first time he went out of the country, he made Obitre-Gama acting President. The second time he went out, I was the acting President for about a week. But most importantly he appointed me to chair a committee that was to make arrangements for the return of the body of Ssekabaka Sir Edward Mutesa from London. That was quite a heavy responsibility. But the years of difficulty were not during my time in Cabinet. So most of the killings of people took place when [I was] out. The four of us who did not know the goings on of power were dropped from the Cabinet in November 1972. That was I, Engur, Kironde and Banage. Amin had just announced the economic war and the expulsion of Indians. They announced our dismissal from the Cabinet over Radio Uganda one Friday afternoon. I was then in the mosque for Juma prayers so I did not hear the announcement. But when I got home I had lunch and prepared to go back to the office. Then somebody asked if I was going back to the office. I said yes. He said you should call Mr Kironde first. Kironde said, "Don't you know yet?" I said, "Know what?" He said, "We have been dropped, you are no longer a minister." Later that evening, Amin announced on radio that he wanted to meet the four of us at the Command Post at 7 a.m. the next day. We went there and he told us he had nothing against us. "You see we are now running the government at supersonic speed," he told us. "You could not cope with the speed at which the government was running." That was the time when Akii Bua had just won a gold medal in the Olympic Games in Munich. So Kironde, whom we had nominated to be our spokesman, said: "Your excellency, if it is speed, we concede that we cannot run at a high speed like Akii Bua." Amin told us we could take up any business and that if we didn't go into pokopoko he would not follow us. I felt I should not practice law in the country because defending people whose rights had been abused would bring us into conflict with the government. So I went into farming in Mityana. I never went into exile. Once or twice we were invited to some state functions. And sure he never followed us because we kept a very low profile and lived a sedentary life. I would only come to Kampala twice a week. I was not harassed and so I did not have to run away. Some of us were not as clever as President Museveni who decided on the first day that he would fight and remove Amin. One thing I know about Idi Amin was that he was not corrupt. You could not find things or property that you would say belonged to him. You could not find palaces, hotels, banks or whatever that belonged to him like you find some of our leaders have these days. In fact, he forbade members of his family from taking possession of the properties left by the Indians. One time he learnt that his most senior wife got some of these properties and he divorced her immediately. He was a jolly man; he would play the accordion for us at parties. Sometimes he was a bit comical. If it had not been for Amin, the [black] Africans of this country would not have got into business; they would never have come up to become exporters and importers or manufacturers. They would have remained growers of cotton and coffee and only a few of us would be professionals. Idi Amin’s reasons for ousting Obote The unwarranted detention without trial and for long periods of a large number of people The continuation of a state of emergency over the whole country The lack of freedom in the airing of different views The frequent loss of life and property arising from almost daily cases of robbery with violence and kondoism The proposals of National Service which will take every able bodied person from his home to work in a camp for two years only to lead to more robbery and general crime when homes are abandoned Widespread corruption in high places The failure by the political authorities to organise any elections for the last eight years Economic policies have left many people unemployed and even more insecure and lacking in the basic needs of life High taxes have left the common man of this country poorer than ever before The prices which the common man gets for his crops like cotton and coffee have not gone up and some times they have gone down where as the cost of food, education, etc have always gone up. Tendency to isolate the country from East African Unity, e.g. by sending away workers from Kenya and Tanzania The creation of a wealthy class of leaders who are always talking of socialism while they grow richer and the common man poorer In addition the Defence Council of which the President is chairman has not met since July 1969 and this has made administration in the Armed Forces very difficult The Cabinet Office [Office of the President], by training large numbers of people largely from the Akokoro County in Lango District where Obote and Akena Adoko, the Chief General Service Officer come from) in armed warfare has been turned into a second army The Lango Development master plan, written in 1967 has decided that all key positions in Uganda's political, commercial, army and industrial life have to be occupied and controlled by people from Akokoro County, Lango District Obote on the advice of Akena Adoko has sought to divide the Uganda Armed Forces and the rest of Uganda by picking out his own tribesmen and putting them in key positions in the Army and everywhere Obote and Akena Adoko have bribed and used some senior officers who have turned against their fellow soldiers We all want only unity in Uganda and we do not want bloodshed. Everybody in Uganda knows that. The matters mentioned above appear to us to lead to bloodshed only

Monitor, April 17, 2005

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