Between 2000 and 2009, every weekend, people around Uganda converged in the ebimeeza, open debates where « the common man and woman from the street » were invited to air their views, in English or in Luganda. These debates, also called « People’s Parliaments », were broadcast live on private radio stations. In September 2009, after what is commonly known in Uganda as the « Buganda riots », the government banned them.

Talkative Polity (Ohio Univ. Press, 2019), is based on the idea that the ebimeeza and their ban tell us more about the Ugandan political culture and about President Museveni’s regime than the fact that it is aging and less and less liberal. By being at the center of heated controversies about who is entitled to talk politics and how, the People’s Parliaments reflected old concerns about the forms and the basis of citizenship. But they also lead us to a better understanding of how political control is actually enacted in a context often labeled as « semi-authoritarian ». 

 

Indeed, Talkative Polity proposes an analysis of the concrete conditions of the emergence of speech. By focusing on only one little piece of the mosaic that makes Uganda’s complex “public sphere”, it aims at underlining the social thickness and the political ambivalence of the negotiations at play when it comes to defining how to talk about politics in  contexts of political constraints. The rules will differ from one piece of this social mosaic to another. But in all cases, this process cannot be reduced to a great confrontation of an oppressive State VS a liberal civil society. Far from being simply a univocal upsurge of « free speech », « popular participation » or « ethnic politics », the ebimeeza reflect long-term social, economic and political dynamics. The advent of People’s Parliaments tells a history of local capitalism and its intertwinement with the State, of the political economy of international aid, of the professional aspirations of journalists, the mutations of broadcast culture and economy, and of the heritages of colonial education. They reflect the ambitions of a particular class of young men (much more rarely women), the mutations of political mobilisation under Yoweri Museveni’s Movement regime and the transformations of Buganda’s patriotism. By reconstituting this complexity, Talkative Polity aims at reaching a better understanding of the social intricacies of political domination.

 The book shows that the understanding of the emergence of the People’s Parliaments cannot be reduced to the benevolence of the regime, and their termination to its lack of tolerance. Even if there were short-term reasons for the ebimeeza to be banned (gagging the political opposition, especially the new generation of Buganda’s patriots and radical royalists), this move needs to be resituated within a much longer time frame. The ban of the ebimeeza was not only linked to the immediate political context but to a more structural attempt to impose forms of talk, and to impose a certain model of citizenship, that had much wider and deeper implications. The ebimeeza were not only banned because they were harbouring speech that was directly criticizing the regime’s anti-liberal tendencies or because they allowed a renewal of Buganda’s radical politics, but because they challenged established representations about who is entitled to talk about « politics », and who is not.

The book explores the social conditions that led to the emergence of the ebimeeza, and that molded the kinds of speeches they harbored. The phenomenon first needs to be resituated within the history and political culture of Kampala’s Ganda business class. As a matter of fact, the emergence of these new possibilities of expression was not the result of radical struggles for “freedom of speech” but of inter-elite relations within the political, economical and social establishment (and the kind of political culture and sociability these elites promote). Originally indeed, the ebimeeza  were broadcasts of political discussions that were already taking place amongst members of Kampala’s social elite (lawyers, doctors, powerful businessmen), who were attached to a “polite”, distinguished and “apolitical” form of public engagement that reflected their class belonging. At the time, the ebimeeza were tolerated because they were discussions amongst « Old Boys » from posh public schools… That was before they attracted a more varied population, made of students in particular (but not exclusively), political party mobilizers, and, for the one in English, people from other parts of Uganda. 

The emergence of « politics » on the Ugandan private airwaves was very far from being a straightforward process. Radio in Uganda in the first half of the 1990s was a business venture and it was not conceived as being a venue for airing political debates. It has a very different history than the press: it accommodates comedians and musicians rather than politicians and academics. The politicisation of the private airwaves was even more difficult up-country, not only because of political repression but also because radio owners and producers were reluctant to it: they wanted to do “development”, because it allowed them to make money (by attracting international NGOs) and because in their opinion, as professionals, it was the right thing to do. What is important to keep in mind is the fact that the laborious politicization of the airwaves was not simply the result of political pressure or repression, but of particular, relatively autonomous dynamics within the media field and a transnationalized media market.

The ebimeeza were important spheres of mobilisation and recruitment for political parties and they make good observatories of the strong reconfigurations of political mobilisation one could witness in the 2000s. They allow understanding the ways political parties (particularly the ruling National Resistance Movement) have been recruiting, addressing and training followers despite the restrictions of the “Movement democracy” model that strictly constrained their activities up until 2005. But more crucially, they reflect the way  the partisanisation of political life in Uganda has built on the initiatives, from below, of marginalised activists within each party. These people saw the ebimeeza as a chance to gain visibility and influence within closed party apparatus. The People’s Parliaments were spheres, amongst others, where this partisanisation from below could occur, and they were nourished by this process and these ambitions.  

 The ebimeeza were also the product of a renewed, hegemonic form of royalism that appeared in the immediate years after the restoration of the Kingdom of Buganda in 1993. They were an important cradle for the coming of age of a new generation of Ganda patriots, who came from humble backgrounds and who embraced royalism while being actively involved in party politics. Talk radio offered them a platform to formulate and spread royalist thought in a constrained environment – while the Kingdom was only supposed to be a “cultural” institution. Talk radio was the product of the promotion of an alternative form of patriotic verbal discipline, and promoted a particular monarchical order. Also, the ebimeeza were used as platforms to assess one’s loyalty to the King, and thus one’s belonging and identity as a Muganda.

Lastly, the ebimeeza are also the product of attempts from second-class politicians, especially young and peripheral Members of Parliament, to gain visibility, social grounding and gravitas. Contrary to the way they were marketted, the People’s Parliaments were far from abolishing political hierarchies and inequalities. Although they were frequented by people because they staged a casual atmosphere and made MPs approachable, they offered opportunities for politicians to reinvent their leadership in unexpected ways: by performing a pedagogic, witty character whose main role is to « enlighten » citizens. This figure of the « pedagogic leader » having a relatively long history in Uganda… 

As mentioned earlier, the People’s Parliaments were not only banned because they were harbouring speech that was directly criticizing the regime’s anti-liberal tendencies, or because they allowed a renewal of Buganda’s radical politics, but because they challenged established representations about who is entitled to talk about « politics », and who is not. For the political establishment, they represented the abomination of the possibility for anyone, including drunks, peasants, “idle youth” and “hysterical women”, people deemed « immature » (sic), to come to the microphone and give their opinion on a political matter, which would take Uganda back to its postcolonial nightmare of violence and dictatorship.

The repression of popular speech forced the elite of the National Resistance Movement (NRM) to reformulate the citizenship they envision. The way they justified the repression revealed the historical heritages that weighed on their conceptions of « good citizenship », despite President Museveni’s rhetoric of the tabula rasa. According to them, « good citizenship » was based on the imaginary, but very effective division between the realm of « politics » and the realm of « development »: politics should not be put in the hands of those not mature enough to handle it (namely the ebimeeza orators), it should be reserved for those who are educated, whereas the rest are confined to the limbos of « development ». However, the orators of the ebimeeza were not ready to limit themselves to « development »…

What is important to keep in mind is that this model of a « bifurcated » (Mamdani) political personhood was not unilaterally imposed by authoritarian State elites on a reluctant society. It was largely endorsed and constructed from below, although it followed a variety of dynamics and agendas. This is reflected by the fact that the idea that a tight control was necessary in the ebimeeza was already present amongst the orators before the State attempted to ban them. Some had moved to establish disciplinary entities within the assemblies before they were even requested by government. 

 In that regard, the way the ebimeeza were governed, their increasing bureaucratisation, is particularly interesting to investigate. The codes of conduct, the measures taken by the ebimeeza leadership against « unruly » members, the letters the latter had to write to apologize, the way rules were implemented all tells us something on the kind of political speech which was expected and produced. The orators’ representations of the legitimacy to speak and of a desirable « public sphere » coincided, not necessarily intentionally, with the State’s: they themselves didn’t believe everyone was « mature enough » to speak politics either.

 

These representations of order and civility are inserted within varied and intertwined histories. One thing that was particularly striking in the ebimeeza was the heritage of British higher education debate clubs. Debate societies were largely appropriated in Uganda from colonial times up to today in order to promote distinguished ways to compete and express oneself politically. This elitist heritage was translated into orators’ conceptions of their role in the polity as utterly morally and intellectually superior compared to the « masses ». By doing so, they performed and reinstated the value of a model of citizenship which is masculine, socially exclusive, and in the case of Uganda, ethnically connoted – because sometimes thought as exclusionary of « Northerners », and the basis of the reinvention of a particular « Gandaness » grounded in good manners and politeness. This pattern also links the ebimeeza to a history of university politics and culture, based on the strong endorsement by students of a « mission to enlighten » that can be retraced throughout Uganda’s postcolonial history. By taking the floor, ebimeeza orators didn’t want to prove that common people could « talk politics »: they wanted to prove they were better than « common people ». The paradox lies in the fact that they were never acknowledged as such by the authorities – as « mature » enough to handle « politics »: hence the ban. 

Remains to be raised the crucial question of who the orators were, and of the social resources needed to take the floor, especially to face political risk and potential repression. People were definitely not equal in that process, and classical patterns could be observed to explain the discrepancies. Most people in the audience remained silent. However, some of these quiet participants tried to influence the deliberations in alternative ways, typically by sending anonymous little notes to the chairman. But one striking feature of the People’s Parliaments was how ambitious and compulsive orators put on an immense amount of energy in trying to enhance their oratory and intellectual skills, and thus to reinvent themselves. Ebimeeza were constantly compared to « schools »: they were seen as training grounds for future politicians but they were also places where former students could continue practicing their wits and be called or call themselves intellectuals even when under-employed or unemployed.

Some orators did manage to turn public speaking into a profession, by being recruited by NGOs which used them as professional clappers, or by being paid by influential people in exchange for a good word. The ebimeeza were hubs of a particular form of patronage that orators call “mentoring”, which involved not only an exchange of money against political support but sometimes turned into an intellectual and affective relationship. Many orators envisioned entering a political career themselves, and there are a few examples of such success. However, failure stories are much more common. The success of the ebimeeza was deeply linked to the ambitions of social success of this class of educated, underemployed young men (more rarely women): for these frustrated intellectuals, the ebimeeza were one of the places where their skills were still of value, economically and socially. 

Eventually, the underlying question raised in the book has to do with the controversial and emic partitions made by varied people in contemporary Uganda about what can be talked about out loud, what cannot, and by whom – a central issue in the history of Uganda, and in its current politics. What are the limits on what can be said, and how are these limits drawn? The book shows that the State or the regime were not the only ones trying to impose limitations on what could be said and what could not in the ebimeeza: this process involved a great variety of actors within society, with many different agendas and ideologies. This case study illustrates thus the social depth of political control. It seeks to underline the necessity to take into account the social embeddedness of authoritarianism, in order to better understand the forms of voice and political action that take place in such contexts. It illustrates how political rule is co-produced, from above and below, by actors who are sometimes antagonistic, and in sometimes unintentional ways: members of the ruling party just as opponents and even some orators themselves agreed the ebimeeza needed to be under control, according to a shared conception of a citizenship of distinction. The ebimeeza were the product and reflection of a speech order that was carefully elaborated, constraining and that echoed a composite heritage. Conformity can be produced without necessarily being equated with support for the regime or involving absolute constraint. Instead, conformity may follow from relatively autonomous social dynamics. The way power is concretely enacted goes far beyond mere relationships of obedience or resistance. It also involves autonomous ideas of the good polity, social ambitions, along with intimate and collective aspirations of morality whose plural historicities need to be reconstructed.

Florence Brisset-Foucault

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