Julian Mwine's Blog

Kampalans lining up to buy GOTV decoders. What most don't know is that digital migration is not the same as subscribing to a digital PayTV provide r (photo courtesy of Daily Monitor) The confusion surrounding the recent switch-off of some TV stations in and around Kampala as equipment to enable migration to digital television was being installed on the Kololo TV mast exposed just how little sensitisation has been done to prepare the public for digital migration.  The Uganda Communications Commission (UCC) has done a poor job sensitizing Ugandans on the digital migration to the extent that even the few who  have an idea of what digital migration is about associate the move to digital with subscription services like StarTimes and GoTV. UCC has not done enough to sensitize the public on the purchase of free-to-air decoders (for which no subscription is required) and how these will work and it has instead kept quiet while the PayTV stations are raking in millions fr...

Mbarara residents recently under police detention whose only crime  is not possessing ID. Photo by Colleb Mugume Courtesy of Monitor Publications. Early in the morning on Wednesday 3rd July 2013 the police in Mbarara municipality conducted a pre-dawn security operation in the municipality’s Kakoba division ostensibly to weed out criminal elements that have been terrorising the area's residents for some time. The event that triggered this operation was, supposedly, the murder of a World Food Programme employee Andrew Mpubani, who was killed outside his home in the area a few days earlier. During the raid the police rounded up hundreds of people and detained as suspects those who could not immediately identify themselves with resident Identity cards. While the police should ordinarily be applauded for vigorously trying to combat crime, one cannot help but think that the Kakoba operation was nothing more than a show for the public and media, which will ultimately prove counter-...

Egyptian Foreign Minister Mohammed Kamel Amr resigned Tuesday, becoming the most high-profile minister to step down since protests against the rule of President Mohammed Morsi began over the weekend. Amr's resignation came after the Egyptian military issued an ultimatum Monday, demanding that Morsi and the ruling Muslim Brotherhood start a dialogue with opposition members within 48 hours, or risk the military stepping in to impose a "political roadmap" on all parties. This move comes amid the latest in a series of political crises in Egypt since the ouster of former President Hosni Mubarak in February 2011. The political turmoil facing Egypt, its political class and its powerful military has become almost a given, with all sides turning to public displays of unrest and emotion as often as they do to the democratic process. And as Egypt's political system evolves, it is becoming clear that -- with the exception of a few critical issues, including Gaza, the Suez Cana...