By Oweyegha-Afunaduula
The key issues in this article are indigenes, land, unethical money and immoral money. Le me say something about each of these right away.
Indigenes
Indigenes are people who have biologically, culturally, ecologically and historically belonged to and owned a particular piece of land and environment as a community for centuries. Their culture, emotions, psychology, ethics, ecospirituality, morality and philosophy of life are shaped in relation to their land.
By owning the land, they also own the natural aboveground and belowground resources, including water, fish, plants, energy resources, food resources and minerals thereof. They have sacred places on the land, including burial grounds, which may have existed for centuries.
They organise themselves in families, extended families and clans, which may interconnect with others of the same kind in other families, extended families and clans of the same king. They till the land for survival and sow characteristic crops and also use certain plants to ensure thei health security. Â They are unlike people who belong to the nomadic-pastoral energy system, came from elsewhere and are not attached to the land but the cow.
Land
Land is many things in one. Land is the part of the earth’s surface that is not covered by water. It is a composite of soil, water, air, biodiversity and minerals, interacting to provide goods and services that benefit humans and sustain ecosystem functions.
Unethical money
Unethical money refers to money acquired or used in ways that respect moral principles or ethical standards often involving actions such as corruption, exploitation, fraud or unfair business practices. However, the boundary between unethical money and immoral money is thin.
Immoral money
Immoral money generally refers to money earned through illegal or unethical means suchas through prostitution, corruption or other activities, or money used to support such activities. In Uganda, public money is frequently allocated to projects and businesses that are evidently corrupt and anti-country or anti- Ugandans, which is immoral.
Unethical money and Immoral money may be jointly referred to as Black Money. Black money includes all funds earned through illegal activity and otherwise legal income that is not recorded for tax purposes.
Black money proceeds are usually received in cash from underground economic activity and, as such, are not taxed. Recipients of black money must hide it, spend it only in the underground economy, or attempt to give it the appearance of legitimacy through money laundering (Will Kenton, 2024).
In this article, I include, under black money, money extorted by the Executive from Parliament through the ruling party caucus in Parliament and used in deals that are unlikely to benefit the public but select individuals or firms, or which ends up being used in political schemes such as elections.
I also include, under Black Money, money earned from the immoralNyege Nyege music and arts festival in Uganda (Abaho, 2023) because there is no transparency and accountability for the money obtained, although it hotly defended by the Minister for East African Cooperation and the President of Uganda.
Unethical money and immoral money are earned by both unethical and immoral people who do not value ethics and morality of anything and are quick to employ unethical and immoral ways and means of accumulating the money. Often such people are unscrupulous and shameless and do not care what others say so long as they continue to accumulate money unethically and immorally at the expense of society. Apparently, the unscrupulous and shameless people are very greedy people too. Greed is the immediate love and desire for riches and earthly possessions. They are intertwined with the State and politics, and will do everything possible to exclude others from the leadership and governance of Uganda.
I have written about Mafias in Uganda, engaged in power struggles, business, money- sharking, money laundering, and other human activities such as racketeering, gambling, prostitution, fraud. drug-trafficking, human trafficking, organ trafficking and extortion. The money they get is both unethical and immoral and is used to achieve unethical and immoral goals and/or emotions. However, increasingly non-mafias looking to become rich in unethical and immoral means are also involved in thse activities.
The immoral and unethical activity I want to focus on is land grabbing where by unethical and immoral moy is being used by people of power or connected to power and often armed to buy indigenes from their land and at peanuts. Many of them are high ranking in the government, the army and the increasingly militarised policemen. Apparently, the people are too poor to resist the money, often given to them forcibly and quickly removed from the land.
Buying people off their land has so far been mainly in the central region of Uganda. However, currently people of the nomadic-pastoral human energy system and with a lot of money and armed are bust grabbing land in Northern Uganda. Indigenes in Acholi and West Nile are very annoyed. They expected development, but instead they are reaping land grabbing, sometimes involving killing of the local landowners.
What has perplexed the people is that their cries for justice over land has been received by the silence of the government. They are now saying they will not give votes to President Tibuhaburwa Museveni until he removes the nomadic pastoralists from their land and he begins to show evidence of taking development to their area.
Like in the times of Biblical Prophet Amos in the 8th Century BC, when there was great prosperity, notable religious piety and apparent security, all of which were fed on exacerbated injustice and oppression, in Musevenite times in Uganda, the poor and needy are being oppressed through land grabbing and excessive taxation. Religious observance is insecure and security is more apparent than real. People lose their land and properties easily to the unethical and immoral either in power or connected to power, especially ethnically. Leadership and governance is becoming more and more confusing and geared towards power retention that assuring the people of good leadership and good governance. It is not rare to posit political parties with linkages to power to compete for power alongside the ruling party and the known political parties seeking to provide alternative leadership and governance of and in the country. Injustice, chaos and violence are on the rise as exemplifies by the recent by-election in North Kawempe elections whereby state cushioned criminals were protected by power even when there was evidence that those who reigned havoc belonged to the official terrorising group called JATTI. Billions of unethical and immoral money was spent during that by-election in North Kawempe Constituency. One wonders how much more unethical and immoral money will be use in the 2026 elections. Political corruption is real although it is hardly mentioned in Uganda.Immoral money and political influence moved together in Italy, France and Germany in 19th and 20th centuries. This has been the case in Uganda since 1996.
There is no evidence that the use of unethical money and immoral money in elections and in land grabbing is about to decrease. So long as political ethnisation, ethnic politicisation and abetting of some illegal activities by power continue, it is unlikely that we shall see less use of immoral money and unethical money in politics and land grabbing, let alone in acquiring certain properties and opportunities or excluding some Ugandans from properties and opportunities for self-aggrandisement of some people, including foreigners.
If we continue like this, Ugandans will have to forget about belonging, ownership, identity, independence, citizenship, sovereignty and nationality. There is a growing school of thought, which holds that the indigenes of Uganda are now third-rate citizens, now being displaced and dispossessed from thei land and everything they called their own.
For God and My Country
Further Reading
deMilked (2024). 25 Unethical Money-Making Strategies that Remain Within Legal Boundaries. https://www.demilked.com/unethical-legal-money-making-ways/ Visited on 7 April 2025 at 14:14 pm EAT.
Erminio Fonzo (2018). Immoral Money in Italy During World War! The case of Ansaldo. Researchgate, June 2018. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/325553924_Immoral_money_in_Italy_during_World_War_I_The_case_of_Ansaldo Visited on 7 April 2025 at 14:38 pm. EAT.
He, Z., Lin, W., & He, G. (2024). Immoral money aggravates myopia in intertemporal investment decision-making. Journal of Pacific Rim Psychology, 18. https://doi.org/10.1177/18344909241293834https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/18344909241293834 Visited on o7 April 2025 at 14:05 pm EAT.
Sorravich Kingsuwankul, Marie Claire Villeval (2021). Risk Taking with unethical Money: An Experimental Study. Gate, May 2021. https://www.gate.cnrs.fr/RePEc/2021/2109.pdf Visited on 7 April 2025 at 14:19 pm EAT.
Will Kenton (2024). What is Black Money? Meaning, Definition and Criticism. Investopedia, July 17 2024.
