By Badru Walusansa
Ever since President Museveni announced the tagline for this term – “Kisanja No Sleep” – some of his Ministers seem to have set themselves up to either appease him or prove a point that work without cameras is no work at all.
I assume most of us have seen how social media has been awash with videos of some Ministers in the field, doing inspections and trying to fix a few things. Anyway, I think before some of the Ministers jump onto the car to the field, they first confirm that cameras have been packed; otherwise, what would be proof of work without them?
While their missions have delivered to their expectations, they have also left dents on some of our professionals. Talk about teachers and public administrators who have been humiliated in the course of duty. I once watched in disbelief a headteacher being humiliated in front of his subordinates and students.
While the Minister’s key performance indicator might have been met that day by parading that headteacher before the cameras, he left behind a dented professional. The message sent to such students, some of whom might have wanted to become teachers, is that on top of poor pay and demotivation, humiliation is another punishment reserved for the teaching profession.
How do we expect those children to respect that teacher the next morning? How do we expect that teacher to give his best when we have broken him in front of those, he is supposed to mentor?
Just recently, another video surfaced where a Minister’s temper flared because a medical doctor had his hands in his pockets while talking to her. This is when I realized that our Ministers are either competing for cameras or their powers are too much to be contained. Seriously, why would you act arrogantly towards a doctor who wakes up as early as 3 a.m. to attend to patients, well knowing the meagre salary he takes home despite all his sacrifice?
For heaven’s sake, these are people who spent several years in medical school, who work with no gloves, no medicine, and other structural barriers within our health system but still show up. If a pocket offends you more than a health system without drugs, then we have a problem.
A few tips to save a thing or two, I am not too selfish to share them. One, humility is power. It does not take anything away from you when exercised. I wish it could be added to the long list of sessions our public servants, especially Ministers, go through while in Kyankwanzi. You can be powerful and still be humble. In fact, the most powerful people I know are the humblest.
Two, never undermine a professional because they have invested a lot to become what they are, irrespective of the field. That doctor who was humiliated today can become a Minister tomorrow, yet it may be too late for the Minister who humiliated him to ever become a doctor. This ties in well with someone who once said, titles are temporary, professions are for life.
So, what should be done? Let inspections be done, yes, but let them be done with cameras off and reports on, not cameras on and reports off. Let Ministers inspect, document gaps, and fix systems quietly. If a teacher is absent or a doctor is rude, there are structures to handle that. We do not need to turn every supervision visit into a reality TV show.
Mr. President, you must have set standards for your Ministers, but by the time they end this Kisanja, they might leave many professions destroyed. We need to think about it, before we have hospitals with no doctors and classes with no teachers, not because they ran away, but because we chased them away.
The author, Mr. Badru Walusansa, is a Social-Political Analyst