Museveni may have concluded that bribery is a more effective and even more humane. If this was his conclusion, he must have seen raiding the treasury to buy voters as a tactical compromise to win a strategic objective. He would afford to cause short term inflation to win the presidency. But once he had his five year mandate renewed, he could restore macroeconomic stability as he has done. But 2011 also saw a major shift in how Museveni’s election campaign was financed. Previously, Museveni had funded his campaign from private contributions channeled through the National Resistance Movement (NRM). In 2011, the financing was done through state institutions and the campaign money was disguised as official state spending on public programs. For example, every village was facilitated to form a committee called a Village Development Forum which was given Shs1 million; apparently for food security. Every voting-age resident of the village was a member regardless of political affiliation. There were guidelines on how to spend this money; including starting up projects to keep goats, pigs and chicken or grow cassava and beans. Officially, it was a loan but the voters knew better. Then every LC1 chairman was given 100,000 as salary during the campaigns and every former soldier would get Shs 200,000. There were many other ways through which public funds were used to enhance Museveni’s electoral fortunes. - See more at:
Posted on: Thu, 27 Nov 2014 09:53:46 +0000
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