SATIRE: What we should do to revive UTL

My first suggestion is the best. Don't. Don't do it. Let that cadaver continue to rot in whatever sector, stratum or suburb of hell it was assigned to by our just God and do not resuscitate. It died. Let it stay dead.

Do not give government another business. Giving government a business to run is like giving me high heels to walk around in Komamboga-- Every time that happens they get ruined. I don't know if it is my bowlegs or the fact that I tend to walk with this weird off-axis, broken-rhythm shuffle that makes the GPS wonder if I am trying a new despacito-influenced form of jabba, but every time my girl lends me her high heels I ruin them. Deformed in the front and shattered in the back.

Shapeless and broken.

She has learned not to repeat the mistakes of the past. That is why she left me to just wear Puma sneakers.

And it is also why she just left me.

Number two.

Telcoms are not in the business of selling simcards or even of selling numbers. They are in the business of selling airtime. The more numbers you have out there the more business you get.

So, I was going to suggest that they give the utl cards out for free but then even I am not that daring a humorist. That joke is way too extreme and outrageous for me. Mbu give a person a free utl simcard. And he does what with it? Pick kitatis out of his teeth?

You need to add value. Incentive. You can’t just give a Ugandan this card, you have to provide a reason for us to bother to take it.

So, make utl lines OTTT exempt.

Nze me for me as Bazanye, son of Bazanye, muzukulu of Sempebwa, born of Nagawa, I have extensive experience in being a Ugandan, as evidenced by my grey chin. Me who you see here, a man so patriotic I should be carrying a red black and gold vibranium shield and being referred to as Captain Uganda while I strut my mulondo enhanced muscles in tights, even I jammed to pay OTTT. And I don't use VPN either. If you see me online it's public WiFi.

It’s a stupid tax and I am not so patriotic that I will do stupid stuff for my country.

Until gava comes out and says, okay, we lied. It's a tax on educational, business and information communication through these selected channels not a lugambo tax as we said; until you come clean I will keep my two hannad. If you come clean, I will pay it.

But that is besides the point. Editor, do what you feel is appropriate with that diversion. Serve the people.

So, if UTL gives OTTT-exempt sim cards we will take them. Not that we will flock to them because well, it's still utl and Twitter just isn't worth that much bother.

Okay. How about this. Gava really wants guys to register for IDs but significant numbers of us are in no rush to. Not least because the public sector is a tedious, inefficient pain in the ass but also because well, when the choice is between going to NIRA and going to the DVD store, no contest.

They have tried all kinds of threats. They cut off our phone numbers? We are now using the numbers of deceased relatives or at least buddies who went to outside countries. Mugenzi and Mutambuzi are still very busy talking from mast to mast in UG.

They locked us out of our bank accounts, so now Bank of Ugandan records show that my Askari has several million shillings in her Stanchart current account.

How about carrots instead of sticks, gava? How about a change of perspective. Imagine if we were citizens who you are here to serve us, not subjects here to be ordered around. Imagine if you were the government of a democratic republic and not lords of a feudal state. Then instead of beating us you could try incentivising us.

It may be too much to ask you to make getting an ID convenient, easy, efficient and more liable to get the gender right the first time so maybe just give the us the ID with a free a utl simcard with a couple of GBs on it.

It's not the same thing as bribing us to vote but it will work as if as well. And three free GBs will go some distance in mitigating the irritation at being labelled a 23-year-old by NIRA.

Plus, if we all have government issued phone numbers you can track us properly from whatever KGB HQ you are building that made you want to give us Soviet Union-style ID papers in the first place.

Influencers!

I don't really know who Sheila Gashumba is. She may be, and this is the theory I am running with, a kind, pleasant, warm, smart, hardworking, Christian lady; she may be an angel, a paragon of virtue and industry. Don't say I am trying to throw shade.

But I am old so I don't really know much about her.

I did see her on a billboard advertising a service that allowed those who cannot afford to pay for full mobile internet access as well as OTTT to get online.

I mentioned that my interpretation of this was that Sheila Gashumba was the spokesperson for low-income phone users.

Whereupon my head was chewed off.

I stood corrected, aggressively educated nti she is a very wealthy woman who makes it a point to have this fact regularly manifest in her social media. My bad.

But this leaves us with the lesson. Don't use rich chicks to advertise broke chap' stuff. If you want to advertise cheap phone services, use Roger Ochen. Roger is so cheap that he buys a Rolex, separates the ingredients to make three meals for the day. Eggs for supper, nyanya n'emboga for breakfast and chapu for lunch.

That's the one who should influence free utl simcards with no OTTT and free GBs if you go to NIRA.

Finally, don't call it utl in lower case because .auto correct keeps changing it to UTI.

That's my advice.May God Uphold thee.