Museveni and Gaddafihave had an ambivalent relation. Way before some of us could even predict what is happening now in Libya, Wikileaks ‘revealed’that Museveni was worried that Gaddafi “would shoot down his plane as he travelled over international air”.Ironically, it is said that he shared his worries with the then US’ top ambassador to Africa. Yet more ironically until recently it is the US that has been spearheading the demolition of Gaddafi’s air force to enforce the contentious UN ‘no-fly zone’ resolution. It is within this context that one tries to make sense of why Museveni’s article ‘Let Libyans Solve Their Own Problems’is circulating so widely and eliciting such divided responses from intellectuals, activists and revolutionaries. It indeed makes an interesting read especially when one reads it with respect to Museveni’s own struggles to maintain what is increasingly seen as dictatorial/despotic power in Uganda.
