Well, if you are the kind of observer and listener who is easily impressed and does not like to look beneath the flummery and cosmetics, all this is true; isn’t it?

Look carefully at the actions, though, and you begin to see the gaps between appearances and reality. Opponents do not simply end up in court. Before they get there they are first beaten and humiliated.

As for elections, the important thing is not that they must be won fairly. No, they just have to be won. A notable recent beneficiary of this approach is one Singh Katongole, now officially a ruling party member of parliament.

Katongole, who first lost the election by a margin of over 5,000 votes, eventually won it after a controversial recount and was hurriedly gazetted, well ahead of people whose victories were beyond dispute.

As his opponent sought a court injunction against his being sworn in, he was allowed to jump the queue before the court could pronounce itself on the matter. Meanwhile, the opponent was being held by the police on some charge.

While all this indecency was playing out, news broke that a group of people calling themselves army veterans operating under the umbrella of the Uganda Patriotic Voluntary Organisation (UPAVO) had invaded and seized a wetland and were hurriedly and illegally erecting market stalls there.

When the hapless Minister for Environment Maria Mutagamba, turned up to stop them, she had to be hurriedly whisked off after they tried to attack her.

Where was the police? News bulletins were claiming that some of them were busy beating up and tear-gassing newly sworn-in opposition MPs and their supporters in Mityana and Entebbe as they prepared to hold parties to congratulate themselves.