‘Cyclic talking’ or ‘talking in circles’ refers to repetitive conversations where points are restated without resolution or progress. Cyclic talking folks constantly rehearse their story-lines, memories and topics. When they do it appears as if things are stuck or looping, a sense of stagnation rather than growth or moving forward.

Such talk is devoid of critical thinking or reasoning and also tends to reduce everyone to a non-thinking non-reasoning being – a kind of biological substance whose brain must be stuffed with the thinking, perceptions, interpretations and choices of the cyclic talker.

Circular speaking is when you reiterate a point multiple times within a conversation, using a small variation of your language. It is making the same point – again, again and again. No matter what anyone else says you bring up the same point and continue to discuss it (Knowlejoble, 2021).

To cyclic talker, it does not matter who and what you are. You must fall prey to the intertwined chains of repetitive stories and get hypnotised by them to the point of stopping to think or reason. Indeed, we have seen many academics and intellectuals falling prey and stopping to have any sensible impact on society. They begin to sing praises of rulers the world over and get reduced to the acquisitive culture, which does not require thinking or reasoning but feeling the stomach with food or pockets with money. They leave society wondering why they went to school or universities, and whether acquiring certificates of qualification is of any good where people are struggling for freedom, democracy and justice, let alone meaningful citizenship, sovereignty and independence.

Repeating stories and conversations is important to cyclic talkers, for it brings them a sense of wellbeing or satisfaction, or else fulfillment of the goal of occupation, conquest and domination of a people, including capturing every aspect of human life and endeavour for their gratification at the expense of everyone else.

There is a lot of cyclic talking in politics. Bruno Latour wrote “By politics, I do not mean conversations on explicitly political topics, such as parliamentary elections, corruption among elected representatives or laws that need to be passed. Nor do I limit the term to the statements of men and women called politicians, as if there were a particular sphere or domain distinct from economics, society, law, etc, nor to all the ingredients comprising politics as an institution, as defined in the corridors of political science departments, that is, international relations, constitutional law, power struggles, etc (Bruno Latour, 2003).

If we take politics to mean regime of talk or manner of speech, one can be a Member of Parliament and not talk in a political way. Conversely, one can be at home with one’s family, in an office, at work, and start talking politically about some issue or other even if none of one’s words have any apparent link with the political sphere (Bruno Latour, 2003).

Political expression, apart from taking the form of cyclic communication, can be disappointing and totally inadequate: truisms, cliche´s, handshakes, half-truths, half-lies, windy words, repetitions mostly, ad nauseam. The tautological character of this form of discourse shocks the brilliant, the upright, the fast, the organised, the lively, the informed, the great, the decided (Bruno Latour, 2003). It is the repetitions – the talking in circles in politics – that I want to focus on in this article.

Politics can be a stressful discussion topic. When election season arrives, political chatter is difficult to avoid. Pre-election season is a high stress time every election cycle, especially in a world that feels polarised and divided (Bailey College of Medicine, 2024). As Psychiatrist Dr Aim Shah, cited by Bailey College of Medicine (2024), says, “Anyone who starts the political discussion thinks that they are right and that is the problem. We often forget to respect each other and we begin challenging people without knowing the fact”.

At worst we begin talking in circles in an attempt to show that we are better than the others yet we are adding no value to political discourse. The great mistake we make is feeling the need to change other people’s political views or beliefs to accommodate ours. In politically underdeveloped environment, when this fails, those in power marshal state violence against the others while hyping their cyclic political talk to which everyone is used, and which is unlikely to convince many who may have been treated to it for decades.

The young may not even be interested because they were not there during the period the cyclic talk tends to refer to. A risk of chaos and a risk of further polarisation constantly characterise the sociopolitical environment (e.g Professor Ben Ansell, 2024).

There is no doubt that talking in circles is a form of redundancy in governance and leadership. It can spread like an epidemic such as Covid-19 or Ebola Sudan or Ebola Zaire. One scenario where we have seen a lot of circular talking is in politics.

In Uganda NRM politics has been full of circular talking: arguments about the bush war in Luwero, ambushing Obote’s vehicle, killing Obote’s soldiers ostensible to liberate Uganda. This has gone on since 1986 – a period of nearly 40 years or four decades. At the centre of the circular talking is President Tibuhaburwa Museveni, himself an expert at circular arguments, all intended to raise himself over and above everyone else or every institution. His supporters have also repeatedly said that the only person who can rule Uganda effectively is President Tibuhaburwa Museveni, who they also call “Ssabalwanyi” (The Chief Fighter), liberator and the candle of peace and security without whom there can be no peace and security.

Some ultra-Movements have joined the president in the political manouvres to ensure that the presidency of Uganda is hereditary or that Uganda becomes a ‘hereditary democracy’  with the president’s son, General Muhoozi Kainerugaba, heir apparent.

President Tibuhaburwa Museveni, while accepting the principle of elections since 1996, has habitually presented himself as the sole presidential candidate for his NRMO Party. He has repeatedly said he cannot hand over power to the Opposition, whose members he has characterised as criminals. However, some writers (e.g. Helen Epstein, 2021) have recorded, “Despite Western claims that he brought peace to Uganda after years of violence under his predecessors, his regime has been bloody from the start”.

To support Epstein, recently the NRM unleashed violence onto a journalist and a candidate of the National Unity Platform in a North Kawempe by-election that was to take place on March 13, 2025. The outfit that reigned violence is called JATT. Initially the police and army denied any knowledge of JATT but later admitted it was their joint outfit created to fight terrorism. It was even praised by the Chief of Defence Forces, General Muhoozi Kainerugaba, for work well done in North Kawempe. What has become evident is the capture of civic elections by the crusaders and practitioners of politico-militarism since 1996 when Tibuhaburwa Museveni offered himself for presidential elections, thereby weaning himself from the military politics of the National Resistance Army/Movement. Unfortunately, this seems to have simply metamorphosed into politics of National Resistance Movement/UPDF committed to the continued hold onto power.

Elections are simply held to disguise this fact. Everything is done to ensure that however discontented the people are with occupational politics of NRM/UPDF, the status quo remains after every election.

So long as President Tibuhaburwa Museveni continues to be central cyclic movement talk, emphasising liberation, peace and security ushered in from the bushes of Luwero, chaos and violence will continue to characterise elections organised by the Movement government – not to lose them but to win them – and chaos and violence will continue to be at the centre oof them.

There is widespread belief that chaos and violence during the 2026 presidential election will supersede the chaos and violence during the 2021 presidential elections, and that as in the past it will be chaos and violence initiated and sustained by the State against the citizens. Ultimately, however, it is God, whose plans never fail who will prescribe what happens in 2026. God sees farther than we can and His plans are faultless. He has the whole plan for Uganda.

For God and my country.

• A Tell report / By Oweyegha-Afunaduula / Environmental Historian and Conservationist Centre for Critical Thinking and Alternative Analysis (CCTAA), Seeta, Mukono, Uganda.

About the Centre for Critical Thinking and Alternative Analysis (CCTAA)

The CCTAA was innovated by Hyuha Mukwanason, Oweyegha-Afunaduula and Mahir Balunywa in 2019 to the rising decline in the capacity of graduates in Uganda and beyond to engage in critical thinking and reason coherently besides excellence in academics and academic production. The three scholars were convinced that after academic achievement the world outside the ivory tower needed graduates that can think critically and reason coherently towards making society and the environment better for human gratification. They reasoned between themselves and reached the conclusion that disciplinary education did not only narrow the thinking and reasoning of those exposed to it but restricted the opportunity to excel in critical thinking and reasoning, which are the ultimate aim of education. They were dismayed by the truism that the products of disciplinary education find it difficult to tick outside the boundaries of their disciplines; that when they provide solutions to problems that do not recognise the artificial boundaries between knowledges, their solutions become the new problems. They decided that the answer was a new and different medium of learning.

Further reading

Baylor College of Medicine (2024). How to talk politics with pears during election season. Livingstone County News, October 16 2024. https://www.thelcn.com/townnews/hydrography/how-to-talk-politics-with-peers-during-election-season/article_0bea2056-8b6c-11ef-abdd-9f26c31539be.html Visited on 12 March 2025 at 11:41 am EAT.

Bruno Latour (2003). What if we talked politics a Little. Contemporary Political Theory, 2003, 2, (143–164). Palgrave Macmillan. http://www.bruno-latour.fr/sites/default/files/downloads/83-POL-GB.pdf Visited on 12 March 2025.

Helen Epstein (2021). The Truth about Museveni’s Crimes. The New York Review, March 11 2021. https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2021/03/11/uganda-truth-museveni-crimes/ Visited on 12 March 2025 at 12:27 pm EAT.

Knowlejoble (2021). Talking in circles: A Great Way not to make your point. Knowlejoble, March 6 2021. https://knowlejoble.com/talking-in-circles/ Visited on 12 March 2025 at 10:56 am EAT.

Professor Ben Ansell FBA (2024). Why Politics Fails. The British Academy, July 19 2024.