Makerere University lecturer Prof August Nuwagaba urged Ugandans to work hard if they if only they want to achieve democracy.
He said it becomes difficult if a country has high levels of poverty because democracy has no socioeconomic base to sit on.
The revered economist cited countries like South Korea (under General Park), Indonesia (under Suharto) and Singapore (under Lee Kuan Yew) made tremendous progress and in a short time under what can be termed as a ‘positive/benevolent’ dictatorship. There was no Western-style democracy.
“General Park, for example, changed his people’s mindset on two principles: love your country and work hard,” said Nuwaagaba.
He made the revelations last week while speaking at the ‘Uganda for All’ Conference in Kampala held under the theme “Can democracy be an impediment to socioeconomic development?”
“Our version of democracy has to be one that can nurture development, and not have people with ‘private’ thinking manning public services because, in the end, countries like South Korea and Singapore, and now the likes of Rwanda and Kenya, are practicing the kind of ‘democracy’ Uganda needs for now, which is the delivery of services,” he added.
He cited Libya as a sad example of what happens when an African country is forced to ‘copy & paste’ the western style of democracy.