Janet is clearly more than just Museveni’s wife

By Njoki Ndung’u

Typical reactions greeting the appointment of the Ugandan First Lady to the Cabinet suggest that the world still prefers to assess women in politics through the prism of their personal relationships to men.

President Museveni named his wife, Janet, the Minister for State in charge of the war-torn Karamoja region this week. The appointment has stoked criticism of a dynasty in the making with political pundits seeing the thickening of a succession plot designed to retain crown in the family. The arguments are that Museveni, who has demonstrated reluctance to leave office, could be plotting leadership by proxy; that he is gradually grooming his wife, who was elected MP for Ruhama County in 2006, to inherit his position.

The controversy is not new. Indeed the issue of spousal factor in politics is an international phenomenon. There is a strong temptation to perceive wives of politicians in senior posts who ascend to elective office as having unfairly benefited from their relationships. So despised is this assumed relationship profiteering that some countries like the Philippines have deemed it necessary to purposely legislate against it.

Article II of the Philippines constitution states: "The state shall guarantee equal access to public services and prohibit political dynasty as may be defined by law." This particular law was conceived to put breaks on the presidential ambitions of Imelda, the widow of disposed President Ferdinand Marcos. Yet tailor-making the law to contain an individual suggests that perhaps left to the forces of open competition as provided for in a liberal, competitive democracy, the target could be sufficiently formidable in the polls to cause upsets.

Steady rise

The grumbling over Janet’s steady rise in Ugandan politics is partly informed by the general antipathy traditionally reserved for Africa’s First Ladies. The perception is therefore that when such a spouse seeks an elected office, it amounts to an unfair exploitation of the marital connection; that a brand political name confers special advantages over others.

But such postulations ignore that like in other careers, marrying a co-profession often happens. Just as teachers, doctors or even journalists marry each other, so do politicians, sometimes. Others are good students of their spouses and with time, they become astute politicians of their own. There is therefore nothing really wrong with seeking to sustain or even growing this career inside marriage.

This is particularly evident in South Africa. Having been condemned to exile by the apartheid regime, a sizeable crop of the current leaders, especially in the ruling Africa National Congress, met and married in their foreign abodes. Most of the couples were activists in their own right then. Nelson Mandela’s marriage to Winnie Madikizela or Jacob Zuma’s marriage to Nkosazana Dlamini are good examples.

Formidable character

While Mandela became the president, Winnie was named deputy minister. Nkosazana became the Foreign Affairs minister while his now-divorced husband was the Vice-President before his sacking over graft-related issues.

Even in Kenya Ida Odinga, for instance, is a formidable character on her own. Were she to desire to contest a parliamentary seat, win and earn a seat in Cabinet, are we going to shoot her down merely on account of her marriage to the Prime Minister? Why does it matter so much when a wife runs for a political seat and is appointed into Cabinet while it is assumed to be almost normal for a son, son-in-law, or brother to do the same? Or must one wait to be widowed for such a thing to be acceptable? Why is society so keen on invoking the glass ceiling for women political ambitions?

This perception of spousal inheritance in a way proved expensive for Hilary Clinton. Although the eventual winner for the Democratic party ticket, President Barack Obama, was by far the better candidate, the wife of former President was demonised as seeking to perpetuate a Clintonian dynasty at White House. Hasn’t the world seen ample evidence of wives running the show on their own merit as is the current case with Cristina Fernandez de Kircher who succeeded husband Nestor in Argentina?

Negative reasoning must therefore not apply to the Ugandan First Lady. It is true she has lived under the shadow of her better-known husband. But that does not suggest she has no public life. Educated in Wales, the former hostess with East Africa Airways has been a prominent and successful founder face of the Uganda Women’s Effort to Save Orphans and HIV/Aids campaigns in Uganda. Thus she is clearly more than just the president’s wife. She is not a meaningless appendage to the Paramount Chief. She is her own person. If she will mess up, it will be her mess; if she succeeds it will be her success.

We must wear a gender sensitive lens when it comes to making pronouncements on women who are bold enough to seek public office; nowhere on the marriage certificate is there any prohibition of building a political career. Let wives be allowed to spread their wings and be judged on their own and not their husbands reputation and performance.

—The writer ([email protected]) is an advocate of the High Court.