Sometime back, using the imagery products – both organic or industrial – I sought to explain the pains of losing a co- struggler to the side of oppressor.
This was the time when Minister Nobert Mao was about to become minister. It looks as betrayal, impatience or greed. I noted that this was neither greed nor betrayal, but rather exhaustion and someone reaching the end of their political shelf-life – sadly before being utilised.
I called it expiry, and a natural result of struggles which take forever to end. (And there will always be people in the business of procuring expired products).
Before writing about natural disasters and accidents that are also true of politics – being hit by a hurricane as recently happened to our friends – let me reiterate that thesis about expiry and exhaustion.
My point is that we need to open our eyes to the difference: victims of natural disasters or accidents can be easily rehabilitated. Or can easily rehabilitate themselves. But expired products are, yes, expired.
Opposition politicians and activists are like organic or industrial products – with shelf lives and sale-by dates. And that these products are all built with different life-spans and sale-by dates.
There could be a politician or activist built in the image of a rose flower, thus so beautiful to the eye and can spice up relationships and places, but their shelf-lives are very small. Value has to be extracted as soon as the flower blooms. Otherwise, unused, it becomes useless and dangerous to the environment.
Then there are politicians built like Caterpillar tractors such as Col. Dr. Kizza Besigye, and there are vintage cars, who keep their shine even in acute illness or death such as late Hajji Hussein Kyanjo, Sheikh Nuhu Muzaata Batte.
But you’ll find bicycles and motorcycles. Whichever product – organic or industrial – will be entirely useful but has to be utilised within its shelf-life. (On the other hand, there are corrosive weeds able to withstand all forms of pesticides.
There are snakes, and hounds and vultures. There are industrial viruses like Covid-19, which, within their shelf-lives can obliterate entire neighbourhoods. But maybe this will be conversation for another day).
IN THE ERA OF CLIMATE CHANGE
No product is immune to accidents or natural disasters. Either while still on the farm or processing plant, or enroute to the market, they could be attacked. Especially in this era of climate change; hurricanes, floods, landslides, wild fires or even volcanos have become too common.
This is the era of immense unpredictability. These natural disasters can cause damage and huge losses. Still useful products are lost or damaged; they could be covered in the mud or just washed into the wild.
Either way, if not completely dead or burned to the ground, these products could be retrieved, washed, and returned to full functionality. I need to note here that sometimes in the course of these natural disasters or accidents, some good comes therefrom: entirely decrepit structures are swept away creating space for new ones.
Gems and underground minerals hitherto hidden are exposed. Consider for example, in Sierra Leone, after floods, ordinary folks are said to wake up to golden stones in their backyards.
Volcanic ashes are said to make fertile soils when phosphorus, potassium, magnesium, and iron are injected into the normal soils. In the end, entire populations benefit. As I show below, the People Power hurricane unveiled some really wonderful gems.
Dear reader, I could be biased for personal reasons, but it is through the lens of natural disasters and accidents – not expiry – that I see folks such as Hons. Medard Ssegona, Ssemujju Ibrahim Nganda, Erias Lukwago, Muwanga Kivumbi, Mathius Mpuuga and many others.
While most analyses have accused them of long-stay or abandoning the struggle for personal benefit, it is my humbling position that their losses in the 2026 election is not entirely own-making but a natural disaster.
These are victims of (political) climate change. Since 2021, the political environment in Kampala has been hit by a hurricane in the name of People Power. While some structures have withstood this hurricane, its waters and winds have swept many things in their paths.
While these winds have lost a great deal of their oomph in the five years gone past, they are still capable of much damage. Oh, they felled some really well-groomed and still strong trees.
As this hurricane twisted and turned through walls and rocks, it continues to (somewhat haphazardly) destabilise the entire political party spectrum in Kampala including the National Resistance Movement (NRM) and NUP itself, which is claimed to have the priestess behind this hurricane. (As I write in “Five years of Bobi Wine’s Iconography” (10 September 2025), the priestess, too, only slightly controls these winds).
Not only buildings and trees shaking and firmly holding against or swinging in the direction of the hurricane (the corrosive power of the people) many individuals have not survived the hurricane this season.
Sadly, many of the victims are actually still useful to the country. But hurricanes have neither eyes nor judgment. They are just hurricanes.
IN THE AFTERMATH OF DISASTER
But as the thesis goes, natural disaster or accident victims, unless dead, remain entirely useful especially after full rehabilitation. The challenge facing the comrades above is how they rehabilitate themselves in the aftermaths of the disaster that befell them.
If they choose early retirement, that will be a huge loss to country. But being still in a national condition of political quagmire – an autocracy masquerading as democracy – Uganda will need their brilliance, expertise and experience in the aftermaths of this quagmire.
A new Uganda will still need Erias Lukwago’s insistence of the law and procedure, Ssegona’s legal mastery, Ssemujju’s elegant thinking, indefatigability and candidness, and Mpuuga’s negotiation abilities.
(Please Note: Uganda will not be rebuilt by angels, but by conflicted but credentialed men and women from amongst us – operating under a new ethic).
yusufkajura@gmail.com
The author is a political theorist based at Makerere University.
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