July 22 (UPI) — Uganda’s residents planning anti-corruption protests on Tuesday are “playing with fire,” President Yoweri Museven warned.
Young Ugandans have drawn inspiration from activists in neighboring Kenya in east Africa who forced President William Ruto to drop plans to increase taxes. They now want him to resign.
But at least 50 people have been killed in clashes with security forces since June 18, according to figures released by the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights.
Museveni, who took power in 1986, is taking a hard stand against the demonstrators.
“What right … do you have to seek to generate chaotic behavior?” Museveni said in a three-hour address Saturday. “We are busy producing … cheap food, other people in other parts of the world are starving … you here want to disturb us. You are playing with fire because we cannot allow you to disturb us.”
Protesters are worried they may be harmed.
“Just in case I get abducted or I die in the march, you can use this [photo] for creating awareness. Otherwise, tell mum I played a fundamental role in saving my country! I know she will be happy!” one activist Ashiraf Hector wrote on X.
Another wrote: “Tomorrow, very early in the morning, I will join my fellow young people as we march to parliament against escalating corruption in Uganda. We will come face to face with murderers and in case things go south for me, this is my official portrait.”
Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index reported Uganda is high in public sector corruption, ranking 141 out of 180 countries.
An estimated $2.7 billion in public funding is diverted each year, to its anti-graft body, the Inspectorate of Government.
“The thieves are parasites that must be stamped out,” Museveni said about his administration’s fight against graft last month.
The U.S. and British government earlier this year barred Uganda’s parliamentary speaker, Anita Annet Among, from traveling there after she also was accused of corruption.
Mary Goretti Kitutu and Agnes Nandutu have been charged in court over a scandal involving the theft of thousands of metal roofing sheets intended for vulnerable communities in the north-eastern Karamoja region.
In Kenya, Ruti says “Enough is enough.” He came into power in 2022. More protests are planned there in Kenya on Tuesday.
Kenya’s main opposition leader Raila Odinga is backing the protesters.