Ronald Leonard Egesa

Ndorwa West MP David Bahati is the news man of the moment. What I find interesting though is the fact that those opposed to his private members’ bill are failing to give good reasons to convince the liberals to join their side. The media has been awash with headlines pointing at the powerful people of the west (President Obama, Top US Diplomat Hillary Clinton, British Premier Gordon Brown and the Canadian Premier among others) being against this bill. One of these was quoted as saying that passing this bill into law would be a major setback in the protection of human rights!

Interestingly, top Ugandan journalist Andrew Mwenda and Scientist and leader of opposition in Uganda, Prof Morris Ogenga Latigo argue that homosexuality is a trait exhibited by a small proportion of the human race just as is the case in other animal species. This is the reason they are suggesting that the bill is uncalled for and it is diversionary. I would like to remind these two learned men that every human being is born with a trait of theft and deceit among other common sins! For this very reason Jesus asked the fellows who brought a prostitute before him to front only one who had sinned not to be the first to cast a stone unto her! We all know that at one time in our lives, we have stolen something from a friend, brother, sister or even told a lie to achieve wealth, but we never oppose legislation that is geared towards addressing acts of Theft and telling lies and uttering false documents. Why then are we so much determined to fight the Bahati bill? Something is fishy here! There must be more than meets the eye that we must look out for in whoever is coming out to call sodomy a “HUMAN RIGHT”! It is also on record that Hon. Margaret Muhanga (sister to Andrew Mwenda) once said that God did not create Adam and Steven, but created Adam and Eve. She ought to tell this to her baby brother.

On the other hand, making the legislation is laudable and promising to make Uganda one of the most dangerous destinations for sodomists, but the question is will this law be implemented? What happens when the fellow implicated in sodomy is your brother, sister, father, mother, friend? These people who are close to you would be implicated in having had knowledge of homosexual activity in the vicinity. It is very hard to prove beyond reasonable doubt that someone had prior knowledge of sodomy between a pair of two other consenting adults since this does not amount into a conspiracy. Why then don’t we have such clauses in the penal code when dealing with theft or robbery or trespass?

In conclusion, the Bahati bill is a step in the right direction to let the sodomists not set foot in our motherland Uganda, but it needs to be panel-beaten to remove some clauses that are not directly dealing with the sodomists themselves. There is no point in the law being harsh to third parties who have other pressing issues to deal with.

FOR GOD AND MY COUNTRY

Ronald Leonard Egesa
Email: leo@ronaldegesa.com
Tel: +256-752-442375
Kampala

Since its introduction, the Land (Amendment) Bill 2007 has met stiff resistance from the Mengo establishment. The government, as proponents of the Bill, has always made their case that it seeks to fight illegal evictions and when one reads the Bill, this seems to make sense.

On the other hand, Mengo and a number of MPs from Buganda have only been telling us that the Bill is “targeting” Buganda Kingdom where the Kabaka is the main landlord.

The interesting bit here is that the Bill’s opponents have not for once told us how the Bill is targeting Buganda. I have listened to many opponents of the Bill and none is answering the ‘how’ question.

Since the Bill is only hostile to landlords who seek to forcefully evict tenants, save for failure to pay ground rent, is Mengo then trying to tell us that the ‘Ssabattaka’ has plans of evicting some tenants in future for reasons other than failure to pay rent?

Are Mengo and its supporters telling us that the major landlord may in the future want to sell off his land without giving tenants the first option of buying? Or is Mengo merely playing the political hate card against President Museveni and his regime?

It is also on record that the same Mengo establishment once passionately opposed the 1998 Land Act whereas it is now turning around to say that the 1998 Land Act is sufficient and only needs rigorous implementation!

Ronald Leonard Egesa,
Kampala.

Published in the The Daily Monitor of Monday 30/Nov/2009 and the Weekly Observer of 03/Nov/2009

I am greatly disappointed in the city council engineering team in Kawempe Division. There seems to be a general lack of vigilance in the leadership of Kawempe Division and Kampala as a whole. Since the start of the year, I have observed that the state of Sir Apollo Kaggwa Road at the junction with Makerere Hill Road between Makerere College School and Chez Johnson has been terrible and nothing is being done.

In the past five years, I have witnessed three accidents involving deaths at that point and two of them resulted from someone trying to dodge a pothole. The problems in this area stem from the failure to properly drain water and take it off the road surface. I do not think working on this joint would produce a budget deficit for Kawempe Division or Kampala City Council and even if it did, such a deficit would justify the need for more financial support!

Another dangerous point is the pothole just before the roundabout at Kubbiri on Bombo Road. All vehicles and bikes try to squeeze on the narrow section of the road where the tarmac is still intact. This started like a small pothole, but it has eaten up the three quarter width of the road and it will not be long before we see lives lost at this spot.

KCC, it is my humble request that you take it upon yourselves to always fix these small potholes before lives are lost!

Ronald Leonard Egesa,
Kampala
leo@ronaldegesa.com

Published in the Daily Monitor on Monday August 3, 2009

Just the past few days there has been a lot of talk around town about the hair-raising transfers of Christiano Ronaldo (GBP 80M) and Kaka (~GBP 56M) to the spanish capital to ply their trade at the santiago-bernabeu -home of Real Madrid. Based on records and results, Ronaldo stands out as United’s greatest player of all time and no one can argue about it. Man Utd will have to contend with the fact that CR9 is gone and Sir Alex Ferguson will have to try and nurture a new ‘kid’ to replace Ronaldo.

In addition to losing Ronaldo, the guys from Old Trafford will also go to the new season without the services of Argentine goodboy Carlos Tevez. This ofcourse may turn out to be bad news to all United supporters around the globe and it also goes down as good news to us -the Liverpool fans. It is common knowledge that the season of 2008-9 was our best season since the last title in 1990. We pushed the title to the penultimate weekend and in the same season we had a double over Man Utd and Chelsea. That was not all, we defeated United by 4-1 at the theatre of Dreams!

The heart of our team has remained intact - The same players that scored the highest number of goals in England are still at Anfield as I write now. The likes of Steven Gerrard, Fernando Torres, Yossi Benayoun, Dirk Kuyt, Xabi Alonso, Javier Mascherano, Albert Riera, Pepe Reina are all around and they are going to go for a “win and conquer” season. Last season was so painful to these players as they saw the title slip into United’s hands and they wished they had done better against the weaker teams at Anfield.

Apart from the players staying around and carrying their painful experience forward, there is still one Rafa and he is currently at Anfield- the same place he was last season. There will be a few brilliant names showing up on the teamsheets at Anfield . We should prepare to see people like Glenn Johnson, Jay Spearing (from the academy) and Stephen Darby (also from the academy at Melwood).

Will all this in mind and looking at the changes that have been taking place at Chelsea and Man Utd, If I were to put money for who will walk with the Premier League in 2009-10, my money would go on Liverpool. This is not because am a Liverpool fan, but it is naked reality.

Just like many other countrymen and women, including Prof. Joe Oloka-Onyango, I have been following the on-going IGG- Parliament contest with keen interest.

What I find interesting is that the argument of the IGG is crystal clear and shows that she is a true patriot and not just after retaining the job. Even at a time when the President ignored her report on the Nakawa-Naguru estates, she has stood her position.

Despite all the mess caused by our public servants and politicians, there are Ugandans like us who see the truth and cannot succumb to corruption just because everyone says it is the order of the day or “business-as-usual” and it is this lot of Ugandans that Lady Justice Faith Mwondha has done proud!

My prayer is that the almighty God clearly guides President Museveni to look at Article 223(7) of the supreme law of the land like the rest of us and save this “Iron Lady” from politicians who want to spoil the fight against corruption.

Ronald Leonard Egesa
Kampala
leo@ronaldegesa.com

Published in the Letters Section of Daily Monitor of 3rd April 2009