20101025
East African

Nairobi — On Monday, January 25, the bell tolls for the start of the third and final round between the two bulls of Uganda's politics.

The nomination of presidential candidates for the February 2011 election will see Colonel Kizza Besigye and General Yoweri Museveni presenting themselves to contest against each other for the country's top job for the last time.

In theory, they could both stand again in 2016, but both have stated this is their last contest. Museveni will be too close to the 75-year age limit, and said so last year on a live public broadcast.

The first time the two faced off was in the 2001 election, which everyone then described as the toughest, nastiest race for the job ever and Besigye ended up in exile. But that was before 2006, which proved still tougher and nastier than 2001.

This time Besigye was nominated from prison after the Attorney General's Office uttered some gibberish about candidates having different levels of innocence, and he spent half the campaign time battling treason and rape cases, both of which have since been dismissed.

In 2006, as in 2001, Besigye challenged the results in the Supreme Court. After the seven judges unanimously declared the election unfair but then upheld the results, the colonel ominously declared that this was the last presidential election petition to be taken to court.

He then vowed that he was going to "expire in the struggle" and has spent the past five years at the grassroots, preparing his supporters to resist known forms of rigging.

Now comes Round Three. It is not so much about the parties they lead, as about the two men's legacy. While Museveni has kept his succession plans secret, he will have to start preparing some sort of handover in 2016.

He cannot afford any "spoilers" to mess up the country's first "smooth transition" by getting voted out in 2011.

But Besigye definitely has other ideas. Believing deep in his heart that he won the 2006 vote but lost the results, he is throwing his all into this contest, and he is not taking any prisoners.

He needs to vindicate himself -- and this he will do by bruising Museveni so badly the president spends the next five years tattered, making his anointed successor unelectable in 2016.

What makes Besigye's challenge unique is that he is the only politician in Uganda whose power Museveni can't reduce or increase.

Look at Vice President Gilbert Bukenya, who is still trying to figure out what hit him at Mandela Stadium last month when he contested for the ruling party's secretary generalship when Museveni preferred another candidate.

Bukenya was not even runner-up and has since been reported to be busy writing a scientific paper for an international conference. Museveni's power is real, solid and not for giving away to his rivals. He too is not taking prisoners.

Besigye's resolve is unwavering. Whatever the outcome next February, there will be too much blood on the floor for the winner to really enjoy the victory.