To understand the political trajectory of Ugandan politics and governance, one must first distinguish between colonialism and neo-colonialism. A colonial government operates through direct military conquest, imposes foreign administrative structures, extracts resources for the metropole and maintains control through overt force and legal instruments designed to subordinate the indigenous population.

Its strategies, policies, laws and judicial systems serve one primary purpose: the preservation of power in foreign hands and the systematic exploitation of the colonised.

A neo-colonial government, by contrast, maintains the same structures and objectives but operates with an indigenous face. The conquerors may share skin colour with the conquered but their methods, mentality and relationship with the population remain fundamentally colonial.

The instruments of control – the army, the police, the intelligence apparatus and the administrative hierarchy – are perfected versions of those inherited from the departing colonial power. The goals remain identical: retention of power, extraction of resources and domination of the population.

This essay examines the striking parallels between the British colonial administration’s use of district commissioners and the National Resistance Movement (NRM) government’s deployment of resident district commissioners, demonstrating that despite the passage of time and change of actors, the story remains tragically the same.

What British colonial government sought in Uganda

When the British colonial government established control over the territory it first named the Uganda Protectorate, then the Commonwealth Realm of Uganda and finally Uganda, its objectives were clear and uncomplicated. The British sought to extract wealth, secure strategic control of the Nile headwaters and establish permanent domination over the indigenous populations inhabiting the fifteen ancient traditional-cultural nation states that predated colonial cartography.

These fifteen nations – Buganda, Bunyoro, Toro, Ankole, Busoga, Bukedi, Bugisu, Teso, Lango, Acholi, Alur, West Nile (containing multiple ethnicities), Karamoja, Kigezi and Sebei – each possessed sophisticated systems of governance, distinct cultural identities and established mechanisms for maintaining peace and security among their peoples. The British did not come to develop these nations; they came to conquer, control and exploit them.

The wrongs exacted upon these peoples were comprehensive and systematic

Socially, the colonial government dismantled indigenous governance structures, undermined traditional authorities except where they could be co-opted, introduced foreign religious and educational systems that delegitimised local knowledge, and created ethnic divisions that would fester for generations.

The much-celebrated “protectorate” status was a semantic convenience rather than a practical reality – the difference between protectorate and colony was indistinguishable to those whose kings were allowed ceremonial authority while real power resided with British officials.

Economically, the colonial government transformed subsistence economies into extractive ones. Land was alienated, cash crops were enforced, taxes were imposed to force Africans into wage labour and the fruits of production flowed outward to Britain while the producers remained impoverished. The infrastructure built – railways, roads, administrative centres – served extraction and control, not the welfare of the people.

Politically, the colonial government ruled through the barrel of the gun. King’s African Rifles and the colonial police enforced peace on British terms, crushing traditional mechanisms of conflict resolution and governance. The strategy of divide and rule ensured that no unified resistance could emerge. The colonised peoples were subjects, not citizens; they possessed no social, economic, political or environmental rights that the colonial state was bound to respect.

‘Movement’ government’s colonial characteristics

Since 1986, the National Resistance Movement (NRM) government has perfected the colonial model of governance. The parallels are not coincidental – they represent the deliberate adoption and refinement of colonial methods by a new set of conquerors.

Capture of power through force

Just as the British colonialists captured the instruments of power through the barrel of the gun, so too did the Movement forces. The 1986 takeover was a military victory, not a democratic transition. Having seized power through violence, the Movement government, like colonial regimes, immediately set about using laws, policies and an unfair judicial system to retain that power and dominate the population.

The pattern is identical: conquest legitimized by subsequent legal frameworks, opposition suppressed through a combination of formal laws and extra-legal force and the population reduced to the status of subjects rather than citizens.

Security forces as the source of power

British colonial government relied heavily on the King’s African Rifles and the police to ensure enforced peace and security, simultaneously crushing traditional-cum-cultural means of administering justice and maintaining order. The Movement government has not only maintained this approach but has perfected its criminality.

The army and police, not the people, remain the true source of Movement power. This military foundation is impregnated with an elaborate network of paramilitary groups and intelligence units – the DISO (District Internal Security Organization), GISO (Gombolola Internal Security Organisation), and VISO (Village Internal Security Organization) – that effectively surveil the population and control the actions and movements of the captives.

Where the British had district-level administration backed by visible force, the Movement has created a panopticon: a surveillance state in which every level of society has its watchers, its informants, its enforcers. The captive population is observed, recorded and controlled in ways the British colonialists – with their limited technology and smaller administrative apparatus – could only dream of achieving.

From DC to RDC

Administratively, the new invaders, conquerors, occupiers, and captors adopted the colonial use of District Commissioners wholesale. The title itself – Resident District Commissioner – echoes the colonial “resident” who was posted to native kingdoms to supervise and control. The addition of “Resident City Commissioners” extends this colonial logic to urban areas.

The British colonialists had provincial commissioners, one for each of the four regions (Central, Eastern, Northern and Western), who coordinated the work of District Commissioners on behalf of the colonial governor or later governor-general. Today, all RDCs and RCCs are coordinated by the Office of the President under a Minister for the Presidency who reports directly to State House. The structure is identical; only the titles have been modestly altered.

Indigenous face of neo-colonial rule

Unlike the colonial system, some indigenous Ugandans have been appointed to these posts. This is the essential feature of neo-colonialism: the colonisers now share the physical characteristics of the colonised. But this apparent indigenisation masks a deeper continuity.

Increasingly, the preferred individuals appointed as RDCs are those with blood either completely or partly equivalent to that of the rulers. The rulers themselves, like the British colonialists before them, have exogenous roots – they are not of the soil they govern, not connected by kinship and history to the peoples they administer.

This creates the same dynamic that characterized colonial rule: administrators sent from the centre to control the periphery, accountable not to the people they govern but to the power that appointed them.

Political pluralism as colonial theatre

Perhaps nowhere is the colonial continuity more starkly visible than in the Movement’s approach to political pluralism. The British colonialists did not allow political pluralism until the very end of their rule, and even then, they restricted political activity to their headquarters. It was only during the 1961 and 1962 general elections that local politicians were permitted to interface freely with the population.

The Movement government has replicated this pattern with remarkable fidelity throughout its 40-year rule. Since 1986, political pluralism has been severely restricted. When President Tibuhaburwa Museveni finally allowed multiparty politics to manifest in 2006, it was on terms that ensured the ruling party’s dominance.

Every five years, during presidential, parliamentary and council elections, a controlled opening occurs. Political parties emerge from their confined headquarters, candidates address rallies and the population is permitted a momentary illusion of choice.

But after elections, the pattern reasserts itself. Opposition politicians are confined back to their headquarters, their movements restricted, their rallies prohibited, their supporters harassed. The colonial rhythm of controlled opening followed by reimposed restriction has been perfected. The British did it from the 1920s until 1962; the Movement has done it since 1986 and continues to do so today.

Political role of RDCs

The British colonial district commissioners were political appointees who served the colonial government’s interests. Today’s RDCs and RCCs are overtly political: all are members of the ruling Movement and they perform more political work for the Movement than development work for the population.

These officials are integrated into the security apparatus of the State and serve as heads of security in their areas of jurisdiction. They speak for both government and the Movement, deliberately blurring the line between state institutions and ruling party – a blur that was also characteristic of colonial administration, where the district commissioner represented both the colonial government and the British Crown indistinguishably.

Perfected colonial state

What the Movement has achieved is the perfection of colonial methods of governance and control. Every colonial instrument has been retained, refined, and enhanced:

The administrative hierarchy remains intact, with the same territorial divisions, the same chain of command running from the centre to the periphery, the same assumption that officials are accountable upward to power rather than downward to people.

The security apparatus has been expanded and deepened. Where the British had police and the King’s African Rifles, the Movement has multiple intelligence agencies, paramilitary units and a militarised police force. Surveillance penetrates to the village level through VISO, ensuring that no expression of dissent goes unrecorded.

The legal framework serves the same function it served under colonialism: legitimising domination while providing the appearance of rule of law. Emergency powers, public order management statutes, and sedition laws trace their lineage directly to colonial legal codes.

The economic model remains extractive. Resources flow from the countryside to the centre, from the periphery to the ruling elite, just as they once flowed from the colony to the metropole. Development is what is promised; extraction is what is delivered.

The relationship between ruler and ruled remains fundamentally colonial. The population are subjects to be managed, controlled, and occasionally mobilized, not citizens whose consent and participation form the basis of legitimate governance.

Breaking colonial continuity

At 77 years of age, I have witnessed the transition from direct colonial rule to independence, and from independence to neo-colonial domination. I have seen the British depart and watched as new conquerors adopted their methods, perfected their techniques and prolonged their project. The 15 traditional-cultural nation states that predated colonialism remain subordinated, their peoples still subjects rather than citizens, their resources still extracted, their voices still suppressed.

The district commissioner of colonial times and the resident district commissioner of today serve the same master: a power that rules through force rather than consent, that governs through surveillance rather than participation that develops through extraction rather than investment. The names change; the story remains the same.

For Uganda to become a better country for future generations, this continuity must be recognised, named, and broken. We must understand that neo-colonialism is not an African government but a colonial government wearing an African face. We must see that the RDC is not a development officer but a colonial administrator in contemporary dress. We must grasp that the elaborate security apparatus is not for our protection but for our control.

The path to genuine independence lies not in changing the faces of those who occupy colonial structures but in dismantling those structures entirely. It requires restoring power to the people, accountability to communities, and dignity to the fifteen nations and all their peoples. It demands a government that derives its authority from consent rather than conquest, that serves the population rather than surveilling it, that develops the country rather than extracting from it.

The colonial district commissioners and the Movement resident district commissioners tell the same story because they serve the same system. Until we change the system, we will continue to live that story, generation after generation, always promised independence but always delivered its opposite.

This is the truth I have spent my life observing and now, in my final years, must urgently communicate. The future of Uganda depends on whether the next generation can see through the colonial continuity and summon the courage to finally, truly, break it.

• A Tell Media report / By Oweyegha-Afunaduula. The writer is a retired Ugandan scholar and elder who has witnessed and analysed Uganda’s political evolution from colonialism through independence to the present day.