Thoughts on the Idi Amin phenomenon

[Gary MacLennan <g.maclennan@xxxxxxxxxx>]

From the Guardian

A  one-time heavyweight boxing champ and soldier in the British colonial
army, Amin seized power on Jan. 25, 1971, overthrowing President Milton
Obote while Obote was abroad.
Human rights groups say as many as 500,000 people were killed during Amin's
1971-1979 rule over Uganda. In 1972 he expelled the entire Asian population
of Uganda, with many Ugandan Asians settling in Britain and elsewhere.

I was teaching in Nigeria when Amin seized power.  I followed the news on
the BBC Overseas service - on an old radio I bought from a Peace Corps
volunteer.

I recall clearly the favorable reception given to the Amin govt, and Amin
in particular.  We were assured that this was a great step forward for
Uganda.  We were also told that he had served in the British Army.

Amin was of course the kind of pro-imperialist clown-gangster-thug  that
Noriega proved to be as well.  Years later when the same propaganda
machine, which had given him such a good press in 1971,  cranked up against
Amin we heard tales of bodies in Presidential fridges etc. We were also
told that he had been a torturer against the Mau Mau.    We were informed,
moreover, that his favorite method was to take out the penis of the
prisoner and threaten to chop it off with a machete.

We were not however informed that Amin was working for the British Army at
this time!  So the vital bit of contextualising information was
omitted.  That is in a nut shell how the capitalist media works. It
highlights and contextualises what it wants the people to absorb and the
rest of the time piles on the "facts" so the people know a lot and
understand nothing.

Now in his death Amin renders one final service to the Imperialist forces
he worked for.  The pro-Imperialist media is constructing him as the
prototypical example of how African nations cannot rule themselves without
producing disasters like him.

I am finishing off the reading of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness to day
and I might if I get time put a report on it on the list.

regards

Gary