By Julius Peter Ochen
In a country where opportunities for young people to explore their potential are not only indolent but also languid, efforts must be made at a personal level to create prospects.
Politics influences everything in Uganda at the moment, including law and its application, judgment in courts, the release of convicts before termination of their sentence, promotion in armed forces, tax collection, recapitalization of failing corporations and enterprises, award of tenders and contracts, job placements, and posting. You wouldn’t want to be far from it unless you stopped being serious.
As we get into the political year, there are more than 600,000 positions to be competed for. The 146 districts and their councilors, 312 counties, 353 constituencies, 2,184 sub-counties/towns, municipal divisions, and their executives, the over 10,000 parishes, and more than 72,000 villages. Other positions include party structures. NRM alone boasts of over 2.4M party leaders.
Some of these positions are life-changing. Others are status-altering. While others are for self-actualization. And they come with different levels of opportunity for the victors, for those who made it possible (....you can call them mobilizers), and for the communities (..also read wananchi).
The second good news is that you can choose where to belong in the said scale of opportunities. I mean, you can be the lucky guy. You can also be the lucky guy’s lucky guy. But you can also be the community. In another breakdown, you can happen to things, you can also contribute to things happening. You can also watch things happen. For every action, there is an opposite and equal reaction; an old fact.
For those contending for listed positions, it comes with all departments of stress and distress. From the financial strains to the endless phone ringing, backstabbing from within the camp, threats from opponents and their supporters, restraining overzealous fun, licentious insults, endless sexual assaults, and advances, witchcraft, defacing posters, and government security pursuits. The list is endless.
While all these are happening, there are those jobless, hopeless, despondent, dejected, desperate, frantic, hysterical young men and women conveniently watching from a distance, hoping to jump in with their CVs and scholarship applications after all is done and dusted. You will not reap where you didn’t sow. Time has changed.
If you can’t happen to things, contribute for things to happen. And here are the tips. Since you are doing this as an investment, creating opportunities for yourself or your children and siblings, identify the candidate with the highest potential of winning. If you have a little money, make a campaign contribution to your identified candidate or print for him/her some posters. At the height of things, no amount is little. Even 100,000/- can look like 1M when it’s most needed.
You don't have money, there is still more to do. Send him/her encouraging messages, which can be religious verses from Holy books. You can choose to do this every day, at 6 am as he begins his hard days. Don't worry whether he replies or not, sometimes the pressure is too much to swing. Attend his rallies (make sure your presence is noticed) and give him/her feedback, do not dwell so much on the negatives. Attend opponent rallies, and give your candidate feedback, this time dwell on the negatives of the opponent. Get his poster, and make it your profile picture, it’s the greatest assurance of support. You have some time, to volunteer to distribute and paste his posters. If he/she attempts to pay you for doing that, reject it, and tell him/her that the good days are ahead. Ask for glue only. It sends a salient message that you don't have money, yet not taken a coin from him/her. You have created debt in his/her heart. You will return and reap that if the struggle succeeds.
You work far away, take a trip home one week to vote. Organize an evening campfire for your village. Call him to come and address your people, or ask him/her to send a representative. Better still, facilitate it. It may cost you 100k only but you have secured your place in his ‘regime’
When all is done and success is on your side, pursue the opportunity you created. If your candidate was an LC3 chairperson or LCV, you can easily scoop the Parish Chief slot. Start by managing that annual 100M PDM fund. Before you know it, you are acting CDO at the sub-county. By the end of 5 years, you could be acting sub-county chief. That position is sold for 3M cash by District Service Commissions. You don’t have that money, the reason you or your children or siblings are jobless.
Have I talked about the student loan scheme yet? One phone call from your lucky guy and your child's education is paid for. You have saved yourself more than 10M.
Merry Christmas and a Happy 2025/2026.
