Against privileges for a few

Makerere students and their cheerleaders in other sectors of Uganda’s public life need to wrestle with three things. First, why should other parents and students be excluded from the “right” of cheap or free university education? Second, why do students in other private or public universities, who come from the same income background and face similar expenses, not find strikes a weapon to employ regularly to advance their cause? Third, why should being at a public university entitle anyone to special treatment?

What we are seeing at Makerere is decades of indoctrination into a mentality of entitlement, victimhood, and grievance. It is a mentality that spreads across many aspects of our national life and is promoted by opposition politicians and by Museveni for selfish reasons – to win votes. This mentality has created a toxic intellectual environment among our elite. They want to get everything from the state for free or cheaply: health, education, roads, etc. and do not want to contribute anything in return. This was most evidenced during protests against the social media tax.

We have, therefore, a highly cultivated sense of entitlement without a corresponding sense of obligation. Many Ugandans want to milk the cow they do not want to feed. Many of them hide behind claims of corruption to abdicate their obligation to the state from which they demand so much. Citizens should always pay their taxes first and then demand accountability. There is also the lack of a sense of proportion to the resources available to the government to meet such entitlements that elites demand.

Many Ugandan elites – journalists, academics, pundits etc. support this dysfunctional entitlement culture because it places them on higher moral or intellectual plane than others, at least in their own estimation. It makes them feel they are championing the interests of the masses. Of course for opposition politicians, promoting a sense of victimhood and grievance among a section of the population is profitable as it brings them votes by projecting themselves as defenders of the downtrodden. For those in government like Museveni, giving concessions to such groups promises similar rewards by coming across as a generous father.

Yet this entitlement culture is economically counterproductive and socially destructive. It has created a dysfunctional dependency culture on the state, which the government cannot afford. Thus when these entitlements are not met, which is inevitable given the resources Uganda’s government commands, they create an ever deeper sense of grievance that someone else is holding the affected persons down. Hence the claims on social media that one’s success depends on the state rather than their own effort are suffocating.

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