BORN TO BE KING?
Mark Amory joins the heir to the Kabaka of Buganda on his return from exile
Kampala ON a Thursday in mid-August Prince Ronald Mutebi discreetly slipped across the border from Kenya to Uganda and was driven to Kampala. He had not been for more than a brief visit since the palace of his father, Kabaka of Buganda and first President of Uganda, known in Britain as King Freddie, had been attacked at dawn by Amin on the orders of Milton Obote 20 years before. Soon he was installed in a comfortable suburban villa belonging to a loyal supporter who. had prospered in insurance. There I found him and gave him the copy of Shiva Naipaul's last book that he had requested.
I had been brought out as his tutor in 1962 when he was seven and set up in a similar but smaller house with a gardener, a cook, a servant, a driver, a nanny and two policemen. He had been a friendly little boy, but capable of being serious and good at formal politeness when it was required; I was wrongly given the credit for this. Later he some times seemed worrying- ly private but by then his parents were both dead and he was living in exile, his future uncertain; preoccupation was understand- able. English education — King's Mead, Bradfield, Cambridge — produced an im- peccable upper-class accent and manner, which his father had had also, and recently he has acquired great social ease. Now he handled a stream of varied visitors impress- ively. They knew who he was, he had to ask them, a weak start. He was expected to set the mood, fill any silences and indicate when the meeting was over with not much in the way of private secretaries as back- up.
Then there was the problem of kneeling. Everyone knelt to his father, which used to draw attention in the Savoy for instance, nor in Africa would any of his own people sit on a chair in his presence. Times have changed, but more for some than others. Many of the young would feel uncomfort- able and self-conscious kneeling and Ron- nie was quick to spot this, shake hands and gesture towards a sofa. A poor old man, however, bringing a present, threw himself full length, pressing first one cheek and then the other into the sitting-room carpet. Our host in a well-cut three-piece suit crouched when speaking to Ronnie, who remained in his armchair, so that his head should be lower. Besides receiving greet- ings, Ronnie spent the day in endless discussions of the same topic: now he was back, what was his role to be and how could it be achieved? He is already 'Saba- taka', head of the clans, he is not `kabaka', king.
His own people are pleased to see him, indeed the embarrassment may be that too many of them are too pleased. They are the largest tribe, perhaps a fifth of the whole country and they have been domi- nating their neighbours for centuries, aided by the British in the 80 years before independence. Buganda is the centre of southern Uganda on the shore of Lake Victoria and contains the capital, the uni- versity and the airport. Bugandans have always said that it was impossible to run the country without their support and recent years have not disproved this. The country has been in the hands of northern- ers, the least educated 20 per cent of the country, from Independence in 1962 until this year. Obote, though no mean man- oeuvrer himself, was the first to appreciate that force not manoeuvring was the key to power and recruited northerners into the army. Amin, also a northerner, came to power with a defensive coup (he was going to be deposed, perhaps worse, and person- ally I believe that he was sincere when he said in his very early days that he was a simple soldier with no wish to rule) and lasted an astonishing eight years. Then there was muddle, followed by the return of Obote, backed by Tanzanian troups.
The people of Buganda insist that the horrors under the second Obote regime were worse than anything under Amin, because more random. Under Amin if you kept your girl friend and any possessions out of sight and did not talk politics, you could survive; under Obote there was no knowing. Also if Amin's soldiers came looking for a man and failed to find him, they would merely call again; Obote's would kill whoever they did find and burn the house. I went on a family outing to the Luwero triangle, an area that has been devastated in the last few years; the seven- year-old son was disappointed because we missed the worst remains but we did find him 20 or so skulls laid out on a table with assorted bones behind, gleaming white in the afternoon sun. Their view may be distorted but most people in Buganda regard Obote as the worse villain, their enemy. Museveni, not from the north or Buganda, became President by refusing to be drawn into unsatisfactory deals and eventually storming the city of Kampala with very considerable help from the Bugandans. 'Well survived,' people said to each other in the streets in relief.
Eight months later that mood continues. You can walk anywhere without a thought, where last year people began to be nervous about getting home in mid-afternoon. A respectable middle-aged banker spent three months sleeping in the garden with his pregnant wife in the early 1980s be- cause the gangs, perhaps 30 or 40 strong, might kill you if they found you in the house. All that is over. There are road blocks but the soldiers smile and there is no question of anyone taking your watch. The roads themselves on the other hand are so full of such enormous holes that, where once there was tarmac, it is now impass- able. There are no new or even recent buildings in Kampala. Burnt-out sites on the main street remain. The most preten- tious hotel is a near-wreck, windows broken, furniture gone. Everything is old, patched and shabby. White walls are stained, corrugated iron is rusty. The feel is as I imagine it was here in 1946. Great relief that the worst is over but a daunting realisation of the size of the problems ahead.
Everything needs replacing. The dam at the source of the Nile which provides much cheap electricity has apparently been kept going by great ingenuity; if the money is found and renovation starts soon, in four years it could be back to the level of 1972, when Amin arrived. The constant power cuts, which muck up the videos of the rich, and there are a few, are from a different cause, the digging up of the streets which led to the destruction of cables. Sugar became scarce and is rationed. There are no tciurists. Compared with Kenya, Ugan- da seems to be in a time warp, to have suffered a nightmare version of Sleeping Beauty.
Museveni, the fairy prince, is seen as the saviour and a one-man government. Is he also a king-maker? Any grumbles about naivety or dogmatism are still only mut- tered in the lowest tones. Ugandan politics have never been about what needed doing but about who should do it and he is thought to be a good man. His great plea has been for unity and forgiveness (though his patience with enemies in the north is running out and he used the word `exter- 'Another illegal immigrant.' minate' on television). So why would the champion of unity create a factional lead- er? He is also supposed to be left-wing and has said that he is unsympathetic to inher- ited positions. Why revive one? Particular- ly as there are other, lesser monarchies whom it would then be hard to refuse.
Because Ronnie would not be in politics even if he were the kabaka, some answer, but, however modest his intentions, this cannot be entirely true; the least he would be is the unifying symbol for a powerful group. Out of gratitude to those who helped him when he was without friends, say others. This is more plausible than it might appear and is part of the reason for Museveni's somewhat provocative trip to Colonel Gaddafi, who is even now en- joying a return visit. Because he must, say more forceful voices, he needs our sup- port. Wilder yet are the cries that Bugan- dans have learnt how to fight and will take their machine guns back to the bush if necessary.
While I sipped Pepsi-Cola waiting for Ronnie to return from a game of squash, another waiter asked me the secret of our continuing monarchy. I pointed out that there had been an interruption, a behead- ing. He pondered this and then said, `Ah, so you needed force for your counter- revolution?' But how many feel so strong- ly, would give up the new life of safety if not of riches? So far the .meetings have been decorous and quite small. This is because no public appearance has been announced. The closest is attendance at church on Sunday, when crowds estimated at between 10,000 and 20,000 gathered. If he announced that he was visiting the summer palace, which has been restored though not yet furnished by volunteers, I was assured 'People would be footing it from all over everywhere.'
The government is taking the (rather convincing) line that, what with fighting in the north, economic problems and state visits, there is really very little time to devote to this essentially minor affair. Little appears in the papers, nothing on television. Twenty-five arrests were made last week of 'the lunatic fringe of the monarchists', but there was also an im- mediate statement by those rather closer to Ronnie that they were completely uncon- nected with whatever plot had been dis- covered. Was this a warning shot by Museveni? There is an election planned in four years; perhaps it will suit him to win the votes of Buganda by this comparatively inexpensive gesture? Much depends on the characters of the two men involved. So far they have co-operated effectively. Ronnie has said little, possible disappointing some of his followers, certainly not endorsing the rash ones. The discreet arrival was planned with constant reference to the President There is pressure for him to take some government job. `Low-key' is the word that the elders of Buganda mutter and that is how all want it for the moment.
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