When The Old Awaken To Politics: A Philosophical Discourse On Uganda’s Ageing Statesmen And The Fate of The Republic 

 

By Isaac Christopher Lubogo

> “You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain.” – Harvey Dent (The Dark Knight)

🧠 Prologue: When the Sunset Wants to Shine Brighter than Noon

There is something profoundly poetic—and disturbing—about a nation where the twilight years of a man’s life become his political sunrise. Uganda today stands as a theatre where the once-retired, the nearly forgotten, the medically fragile, and the ideologically stale are now reemerging with unrelenting fervor to either hold onto power or reinvent their political personas.

Why? Why do Museveni, Rebecca Kadaga, Amama Mbabazi, Moses Ali, Edward Kiwanuka Ssekandi—and even long-fatigued opposition figures like Dr. Kizza Besigye—still circle around Uganda’s political nucleus like moths that cannot resist the fire, even if they helped light it?

⏳ 1. Philosophy of Political Clinging: Between Relevance and Immortality

At the core of this phenomenon lies the existential dread of irrelevance. In Heideggerian terms, death is not merely the end of biological life—it is the disappearance from significance. For leaders who once wielded immense power, to be forgotten is a fate worse than death.

> 🗣️ “Man is nothing else but what he makes of himself.” – Jean-Paul Sartre

 

And so, having built their identities entirely around political power, these elder statesmen confuse retirement with erasure. Rather than being remembered with dignity, they opt to die on their feet—even if they govern from a wheelchair, both literally and ideologically.

🔄 2. Uganda’s Recycling Plant: Old Politicians as Symbols of Institutional Stagnation

Uganda has become a country where the leadership resembles a rerun of old television episodes—same cast, older faces, fewer surprises.

President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni: In power since 1986, he now styles himself as the irreplaceable constant—as if he were a geological formation rather than a political figure.

Rebecca Kadaga: Removed as Speaker but swiftly returned as 1st Deputy Prime Minister. Her political journey is less about change and more about reinsertion.

Amama Mbabazi: Once a powerful insider, now hovers between comeback and political reincarnation.

Moses Ali: The image of a man whose very presence symbolizes the triumph of loyalty over vitality.

Edward Ssekandi: Former Vice President, now reappearing in political and public functions with muted but deliberate frequency.

Even in opposition:

Dr. Kizza Besigye, four-time presidential contender, has now appeared to be indirectly midwifing a new wave of opposition, yet one wonders: is it mentorship or veiled ambition?

🎭 3. Is This Passion to Serve, or Fear of Obsolescence?

We must now ask:

Is it service if your best years are behind you and your return blocks a new generation from rising?

Is it patriotism, or pathological relevance-seeking driven by the fear of death without legacy?

Or is it strategy—a continued political dance out of fear of what a new regime might do once they no longer control the levers of power?

In Freudian terms, this could be interpreted as a repression of political mortality—a refusal to confront the inevitable. Their persistent return may be less about Uganda and more about themselves.

> 🔥 “Every passion borders on the chaotic, but the collector’s passion borders on the chaos of memories.” – Walter Benjamin

 

Their passion, then, is a curated collection of past glories—memories they are unwilling to part with.

🧨 4. The Cost to Uganda: A Nation Trapped in a Timeloop

What happens when a country is governed by the past? It loses the future. Uganda is rapidly being turned into a political museum—where innovation is fossilized, youthful ambition stifled, and institutions weaponized for gerontocratic survival.

This gerontocracy breeds:

Policy paralysis: Aging leaders often lack the digital, environmental, and technocratic understanding needed for 21st-century governance.

Generational resentment: Youth make up over 75% of Uganda’s population, yet they are governed by those born before Independence. A demographic time bomb is ticking.

Delayed transitions: The refusal to step aside peacefully leads to violent or unconstitutional changes elsewhere in Africa. Uganda teeters dangerously close.

> 🗣️ “The old believe everything; the middle-aged suspect everything; the young know everything.” – Oscar Wilde

 

If Uganda keeps listening only to the old, it will ignore the prophetic voices of its youth—and die not of poverty, but of irrelevance.

🧬 5. Philosophical Echoes from Antiquity

Even Plato, in The Republic, warned of the philosopher-king who must know when to rule and when to step aside for the good of the polis. The wisdom of governance lies not just in acquiring power, but in relinquishing it with grace.

And as Marcus Aurelius, the great Roman Stoic, wrote:

> 🗣️ “It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.”

 

To Uganda’s old guard, this message should read: fear not retirement—but fear leaving a nation still caged by your shadow.

🧭 6. The Way Forward: Not Revolution, but Intellectual Succession

Uganda’s political elders should be transitioning into elders of counsel, not combatants in elections. Their wisdom should form the constitutional memory of the nation—not the constitutional obstruction.

> 🗣️ “The task of the leader is to get their people from where they are to where they have not been.” – Henry Kissinger

 

But you cannot lead people to new places with ancient maps.

🕯️ Conclusion: When the Past Refuses to Die, the Future Refuses to be Born

Uganda now stands at a philosophical crossroads. The repeated resurrection of old leaders is not a celebration of experience—it is a confession of failure to build a successor generation.

It is time we asked ourselves:

How many more elections will recycle the same souls in different suits?

When will Uganda reward new ideas over nostalgic loyalty?

Is it democracy if the ballot is a museum catalogue?

The call is not to disrespect the elders. It is to liberate the Republic from the fear that only they can lead it.

Let the elders sit as oracles, not obstacles.

Let Uganda rise—not with the tired breath of yesterday, but with the fresh lungs of a generation unafraid to dream, fail, and build again.

🔥 End of Discourse
By Isaac Christopher Lubogo
Philosopher | Legal Scholar | SuiGeneris Thinker