Yoweri Museveni - President of Uganda HARDtalk

people off benefits and into work. That is a summary of the headlines.

Well it is time for HARDtalk. Goodnight.

My special guest on today's HARDtalk is an official visit to to

London, President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda. Since he led a rebel

army into Kampala in 1986, he has delivered relative stability and

economic progress into a country which had been brutalised by

dictatorship. But now he faces a real questions about his commitment

to genuine democracy and human rights. When he took power, he said

that Africa's biggest problem was leaders who overstayed their

welcome. Is he now in danger of falling into that very same trap?

Presidential wherein Museveni, welcome to HARDtalk. Thank you.

Many years ago, you wrote a book, called What is Africa's problem?

And your conclusion was that the club -- the continent's biggest

problem was leaders to stay in power too long. He used it after a

quarter of the century in power. Have you forgotten your own words?

I have not forgotten my words. What I meant was that people state too

long in power or without being evicted. You say I have been in

government 25 years, but I have been elected all the time. That is

true. You have been elected. Some people would dispute whether those

elections were truly free, but leaving that aside, in 1995 you

supported a constitution that imposed term limits on the

President. Years later you decided that he did not believe in term

limits any more. Why was that? think the term that limits are not

really the crux of the matter. I think we are leaving the court

issues aside. We will get to the substance, but one of the thought

of leaders in Africa who have stayed in power for an awful long

worry in the top five now, but the list includes Robert Mugabe, it

includes the leaders of Equatorial Guinea and Cameroon. Is this

company that you are proud to keep? I keep the company of the elected

leaders. That is the company that I keep. That is the issue. More

importantly, you should ask me the question of what Africa needs. Is

it just a change of leaders, or is it programmes? In terms of social

and economic transformation, you are viewing the issue wrongly. The

issue for the African people is which way to go. The problem of

Africa is not who, but what. Let's get to the what. Let's try to

define what you strategy for Uganda has really amounted to. We will

start with politics, we will start with notions of pluralism,

democracy, multi-party democracy. And the right to dissent. If we

look at what has happened in the last year in your country, and

think particularly of the security forces' reaction to popular

protests last year, in April of last year, it does not look as

though you really do like dissent. Not at all. I have no problem with

dissent, and I have no problem with popular manifestations. The only

contention was, when Duke engage in a manifestation, a demonstration,

you should respect the rights of others. Kampala is still a crowded

city. The infrastructure, the roads are still narrow. Our argument was

that if you want to demonstrate, agree with the police about where

to demonstrate, and to which routes to follow. That's all. You say

that's all, but these walk to work protests ended with your security

forces killing nine people, including a child, including two

people shot in the back, including two people shot inside buildings.

That does not sound like the workings of a real democracy.

people who were killed, those who killed, they have been arrested and

tried. They were people who abused their authority, and they created a

tragedy, those particular people. There were some accidental deaths.

Would you accept that it might be used for, given the very high

temperature we see in Ugandan politics today, and we have talked

about the violence that has been all the streets, do you think it

would be useful for you to indicate that you do not intend to run again

in 2016? That is for my party to work on,. No, it is also for ute to

declare what your intentions are. Do you want to run again in 2016?

It is up to my party to decide what we want to do. Of course, with my

input, but I did not come here on television to decide my party

programmes. Well, if you do want to, we would be delighted to hear them,

but if you do not want to let's move on. When we decide what to do

I will come back. Laughter back. And use your services. But you have

made it clear that your party makes key decisions. I would put it to

you that your party is increasingly unhappy with some of that things

that are happening inside your own country, not least, what is

happening with oil businesses and oil contracts. There is one key

Western company that has been in negotiation with your government

for a long time about exploring major tracks of potential oil in

the late Albert region. -- Lake Albert. Parliament suspended any

discussion of contracts until new laws have been passed, but to

override parliament and signed the deal with the company anyway. Why

did you do that? The past 10 resolutions -- they past 10 no

resolutions, the government accepted eight but it did not

accept two out of the 10. But they were rather crucial, because it

meant you could go ahead and sign a deal that the parliament said

should be suspended. At the time the parliament was operating on the

documents which were presented to Parliament which were fraudulent.

When I met with MPs in my party, we had a majority, come in any case,

we have explored for that oil, we have found it, we have now advanced

very far and are now a key production state. What laws are we

using? We are using some laws. So do not give the impression that

there is an absence of laws. We are talking about Updating the walls.

Well, many people inside your country as well as outside a look

at the wait your country has been affected by having a huge oil

resources. People look at Nigeria, add Equatorial Guinea, and they

talk about the curse of oil. In your own parliament, and MP has

claimed that senior ministers in York government received kickbacks

from the oil company. -- your cupboard. What kickbacks paid to

senior ministers? We worked with the police, including the British

police here, and police in Malta, and we found those documents to be

fraudulent. But you do have a corruption problem. You have had

two senior ministers resign in the last few days, over an allegation

of payments that were made to a senior member of your political

party, a property developer, $60 million. Two ministers signed off

on payments, they said you knew about these payments as well.

you? I did not know about these payments. I am the one he picked

that businessman out of the markets. The problem was that he was given

what people considered to be given too much money. That is where the

contention lies. It does not sit well, in a population experiencing

25% inflation, where a quarter of your people are still living below

the poverty line. It does not look good when this sort of vast sum of

muddy his swerving around the political business network in

Kampala. We started the process of investigation. I am the one who

demanded the resignation of those ministers. And it showed the

strength of our system. The police found out about this programme in

tone. Our Public Accounts Committee did the investigation, and now they

have taken action. That is how healthy systems work. They work by

detecting wrongs and correcting them. Let me ask you about another

aspect of your vision for Uganda, and that is your commitment to

individual rights. There has been a great focus in the last couple of

years in the West on Uganda's treatment of homosexuals. Are you

entirely satisfied that homosexuals in your country are having their

human rights respected? The issue is mishandled by Western countries,

and by their affiliated groups. Homosexuals, in small numbers, have

existed throughout black Africa. They were never prosecuted,...

it is entirely a legal to be homosexual and practise

homosexuality in your country. listen. They were never prosecuted,

they were never discriminated against. But the difference between

us and Western societies, there were also not promoted. So the

problem is on the promotion. The difference between Africa and

Western Europe is on the promotion of homosexuality. Europe sees it as

something good, and so forth. What happens in our traditional society

is that homosexuality is not approved, but it will be ignored.

It is a private issue. Well, it obviously hasn't been ignored, has

it? We had gay activists murdered just last year. A leading gay

activist was murdered in your country. And now you parliament is

considering new legislation which would massively increase the

punishments for what the sexuality, from up to 14 years in prison to a

new punishment of life in prison. What is your view as President of

that proposal? My view is that I do not support the promotion of

homosexuals are to, but I do not support a prosecution or

discrimination of homosexuals. We never discriminated against them,

we never marginalised them or discriminated against them. What we

resent his promotion. But if the parliament passes this legislation

pushing for life in prison for homosexuality will be block that

It will depend on what the life sentences for. Is it for promotion?

For instance youths do not practise by offering money, that is where

the problem is. Manipulating and the way they collect from the West

is what I have a problem with. couple of years ago you said

homosexual relationships are against God's will. You believe

there is a religious as well as a legislative and political needs to

take action against homosexuals are tea? It is true that... --

homosexuality. Certainly the way that is normally is to be

heterosexual. -- that is normal. People are created for different

reasons, though. Our culture is to keep your private life to yourself.

Do not impose it on others. Do not promote it, just keep your own

confidential sexual life to yourself. A final thought on this.

President Obama for one but other Western leaders as well have said

that they will tie future aid and development funding in a host of

countries, including yours, to what they see on the human rights front,

but particularly on these gender and sexual identity issues. How do

you feel about that? That would be their biggest mistake. They should

be very careful about black Africa. Black Africa are a humble people.

We do not impress our views on any body. We are not like Europeans or

Arabs, who want to impose their views. I normally tell people that

when I hear Arabs talking haram, something is haram, I always tell

them that my list of haram is much longer than that of the Arabs. I

don't eat fish. I don't each chicken because I believe if you

each chicken you will be unstable. I don't eat peas, I don't eat many

of those things that many people eat. When I go abroad I have a

problem of what to eat but I keep this to myself. This is the

difference with black people. yo yormined to keep it to

yourself then will you sack you will Minister for ethics who just a

few days ago forced a group of homosexuals out. He invaded their

personal space. This question, I have told you, home of sexuality --

home, sexuality, you are not prosecuted or you are not

persecuted. It depends on what you are doing. You told me when I

mentioned President Obama's position, that Western governments

and leaders need to be careful. Let's explore that idea a bit

further. You said not so long ago that Western countries do not

listen carefully, they are full of themselves, they think they know

everything. It sounds like you are rather frustrated in your

relationship with what are supposed to be some of your closest partners

in western capitals? They are our closest partners but they should

avoid this comment like tying aid to promoting sexuality and will not

be accepted. It would be a very big mistake. Let's talk about what you

are doing with the United States for example. At the moment I

believe they have 100 military advisers working closely with your

government. I know they have given you tens of millions of dollars of

military assistants, all of it aimed to fight the Lord's

Resistance Army, the insurgent group, who have done so much damage

and killed so many people in the North of your country. Is it your

belief that with US assistance, even though the leader, Joseph Kone,

is no longer in your country, that you can now once and for destroy

the Lord's Resistance Army? We have gotten rid of that group. They are

now in the South African Republic and very far away. So what are the

military advisers for? To help, to work with the country's who are

killing and kidnapping. Our Ugandan forces going to go after Joseph

Kony and his people? You are going to go into the Central African

Republic and take this to the end. Is there a military solution there

is. It is only the people in the Central African Republic that can

hunt him there. If that is your belief, that you can find a

military solution to the NRA problem, do you believe the same

thing about Somalia where you have thousands of troops, the biggest

single contributor to the African Union military mission in Somalia,

do you believe if you ramp up the mission even more, as is being

discussed right now, that you can destroy the Al-Shabab movement in

Somalia? Somalia is a different issue. It is not just military it

is also political. You just can't talk about a military solution. It

is a part of the effort but it must be accompanied by political

negotiations and injuring that there is an accountable government

for the foreseeable future -- enduring. The current mission is

around 12,000 strong and half of the trips are from Uganda. You want

that forced to go up to about 17,000 -- the troops. How many are

you prepared to put on the ground in Somalia? Uganda is a country of

4 million people so we are not short of people, we can mobilise a

bit army to help our people. there a danger for Uganda? In 2010

you had a terrible incident in the streets of Kampala, we believe

planted by the militant Islamists from Somalia, killing many people.

There is the danger of jihadists, an Islamist, looking at Uganda and

seeing a target that they want to hit. These jihadists are very non-

African in their attitude. I have told you about black Africans and I

have a long list of haram but I never impose it on anyone else.

This is my private business. When you speak like this it seems like

you don't want to see Islam in Africa, you are suggesting to me

that somehow Africa is not compatible with his lambing belief

and thought? Not at all. Not at all -- with Islamic belief and thought.

You can look around Africa and there have been huge Muslim

communities all over the confident. Muslims are my biggest supporters.

But also Muslims engage in that kind of chauvinism. They abuse

themselves. I wonder whether you look at your long ruled and you're

beyond borders engagements with your military forces, a long and

extraordinarily costly engagement in the Democratic Republic of Congo

from 1998-2003, the forces you have now got in Somalia, the forces you

have got in Central African Republic fighting the Lord's

Resistance Army. Do you believe in the end that you have resorted to

often to military solutions? need to remember the history of

Africa. Our Brothers in Mozambique got their freedom assisted by

Tanzania, I Zambia, that is how they got their freedom -- by Zambia.

We got our freedom assisted by Zambia and Mozambique and Tanzania.

We work together. We work together and defeat the resistance in

southern Africa, in Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Angola, and we are ready

to act together to defeat these foreigners that are coming in with

these chauvinistic ideas from the Middle East to plant them in our

continent. In our continent, we are black people and we live the way we

want to live there. We do not impose our opinions on anybody else.

This business of saying I will not give you aid unless you change your

position on homosexuals, and how you address homosexuals, why don't

they led us do things our own way? Keep out. Exactly. A man you know

well, for a former minister for justice to you, Mr Otafiire, he

said that if the Yoweri Museveni of 1976 would meet the Yoweri Museveni

of today, they would fight on site and probably shoot each other.

that true? The Yoweri Museveni of 1976 was for democracy. So no

change at all. Are you sure he is as convinced and as strictly

sticking to his principles today as he was then? Absolutely, even more

than men because now I am more informed with more facts, more

exposure, I know how to run governments more than I did at the