“Land theft and human plunder cleared the grounds for Trump’s forefathers and barred others from it,” Ta-Nehesi Coates writes about the United States of America. Trump’s forefathers did the same in Africa – land theft and human plunder, no doubt.

So, when one, therefore, hears that you, Mr. President, are canvassing Uganda’s countryside with the seeming intent to secure Uganda’s land for foreign investors, while at the same time issuing veiled threats to Ugandans who disagree with you, one cringes.

“They (politicians) tell lies and scare away investors,” Mr President you are quoted as having said. But who really is telling lies about Uganda’s land? Who are those investors? Why do they scare so easily if they are above board? Who are the stakeholders in Uganda’s land?

 “There is no country in this world where citizens block government from running its projects,” you, Mr. President, are quoted as having said. For whom are those government projects?  What happened to that whole democratic ideal of “government of the people, by the people for the people?”

If the projects are government projects, Mr. President, then within democratic ideals those projects are automatically the people’s projects. And the people, according to the Constitution of the Republic of Uganda have a say on their government projects, including blocking them, if the people so determine that those projects run counter to the people’s interests.

Government projects, for example, which run counter to your wisdom Mr. President, when you talk about modernising agriculture in Uganda. In your book “Sowing the Mustard Seed”, page 201, you wrote: “When I talk of modernising agriculture, I mean ensuring that the farmers are taught how to use their land optimally.”

Now, if a government project comes along that deprives Ugandan farmers of their land, surely Ugandan farmers should have the right to fight back in order to ensure that they do not lose their land on which they depend for their livelihoods. And that if they must cede their land for the greater good, provisions for alternative land and or livelihoods are made for them.

Wait a minute, isn’t it in fact the case that the right of Ugandans to “block government from running its projects” is enshrined in the Constitution of the Republic of Uganda and it is those rights that you, Mr. President, want removed from the Constitution, as you and your Executive have proposed in Bill 133 of 2017 Amending Article 26 of the Constitution?

How is it that you, Mr President, have seemingly transitioned into becoming the promoter of the interests of Trump’s forefathers in Uganda, while seemingly allowing for the violating of the rights of Ugandans, people are asking.