Dani Wadada Nabudere


Dani Wadada Nabudere was an accomplished Ugandan academic, Pan-Africanist, lawyer, politician, author, political scientist, and development specialist. At the time of his passing, he was a professor at the Islamic University and executive director of the Marcus Garvey Pan-Afrikan Institute, Mbale, Uganda.
His political, intellectual and community work spanned over half a century of public activism. He was an inspiring speaker, indefatigable mobilizer, and a prolific writer. Key among his issues of engagement were food security; peace; knowledge heritages; Africa's contribution to humanizing the world; lifelong learning; cross-border solidarities; international political economy; Pan-Africanism; defense of the commons; cognitive justice, community sites of knowledge, restorative governance, economy, and justice.
Professor Nabudere was Minister of Justice in 1979 and Minister of Culture, Community Development, and Rehabilitation in 1979–1980 in the UNLF Interim Government of Uganda. He was President of the from 1983 to 1985 and Vice-President of the from 1985 to 1988. He was engaged in a collaborative arrangement with the in joint research projects under the umbrella theme of "Reclaiming the Future". He was the founder and principal of the Marcus Garvey Pan-Afrikan Institute, Mbale, Uganda. Over the last ten years of his life, Nabudere was working on setting up grassroots organizations to assist rural communities and raise their voices over issues that concern their lives.

Political Life

The early years http://www.pambazuka.net/en/category.php/obituary/83570http://www.newvision.co.ug/mobile/Detail.aspx?NewsID=629966&CatID=417

Nabudere stepped onto the national political scene in the 1960s. As a student
in London in 1961, he was a member of the Executive Committee of the United
Kingdom Uganda Students Association together with the Yash Tandon,
Ateker Ejalu, Chango Machyo, and Edward Rugumayo, who were all later to play a
significant role in the history of Uganda. UGASA was engaged in helping to
raise the political consciousness of young Ugandans studying or working in the
UK and in Europe. One of the main activities of the organization was to lobby
British parliamentarians for Uganda's independence.
When he
returned from the UK in 1964, he quickly began to fall out of favor with the
Uganda People's Congress. The Uganda People's Congress was a radical
nationalist party. Its then Secretary-General, John Kakonge, had broad
communist leanings, and had a strong following among the youth wing of the
party, among them, Nabudere. At the Gulu Conference of the party in 1964, the
left wing was outmaneuvered by Obote and the party mainstream leadership.
He was
also, a Marxist socialist when the UPC government at the time was opposed to
communism. In 1965 he was expelled from the party together with Kirunda
Kivejinja, Bidandi Ssali, and Kintu Musoke. However, even after expulsion from
the UPC, Nabudere remained a thorn in the flesh of the Obote regime with
radical articulations and pro-people stances. Around the same time, Nabudere
and Omongin had just formed the first Maoist Party in Uganda. During this
period Nabudere had also played a critical role in the unification talks
between Zanzibar and Tanganyika.
When
Obote abolished political parties and declared a one-party state in 1969,
Nabudere fell victim to his continued party activism. Nabudere had earlier in
1963 formed a Mbale-based activists’ group called the Uganda Vietnam Solidarity
Committee to campaign against American imperialism and aggression in Vietnam.

Service under Amin http://www.pambazuka.net/en/category.php/obituary/83570 http://www.newvision.co.ug/mobile/Detail.aspx?NewsID=629966&CatID=417

In September 1965, Nabudere was accused by a member of the Uganda Parliament of
organizing a “communist plot” to overthrow the government. In December 1969,
following an attempt on Obote's life at a UPC congress Nabudere
was arrested and placed in detention under the Emergency Laws. He was released
in late November 1970. When Idi Amin took over power in January 1971, a number
of Ugandans on the left decided to work with the Amin government, but
they were soon disillusioned, and beginning with Rugumayo a number of them
resigned from government in 1972.
Nabudere
was appointed by Idi Amin in 1971 as the East Africa Railways and Harbours
chairman based in Nairobi, but in 1974 protesting Amin's brutality he resigned
and moved to Tanzania where he became one of the plotters for Idi Amin's
downfall.

The 'Gang of Four' http://www.pambazuka.net/en/category.php/obituary/83570 http://www.newvision.co.ug/mobile/Detail.aspx?NewsID=629966&CatID=417

1970s: NABUDERE AND THE DAR ES SALAAM DEBATES

There
were at least three politically and pedagogically significant debates at the
University of Dar es Salaam in the late 1960s and the decade of the 1970s. The
first was about Tanzania, the direction it was going and how it might show the
way for the rest of Africa towards the ultimate goal of socialism. It was
mainly a debate among the Tanzanian radicals, sometimes joined in by others
from outside Tanzania such as Walter Rodney and Nabudere. The second was a
debate mainly among the African members of the teaching staff of the
University, in particular in the Faculty of Social Sciences, on how the prevailing
pedagogy of their disciplines might be challenged and changed to reflect the
African context and conditions.
The third
was a debate among primarily the Ugandans on “the Hill”
and those living in exile in East Africa occasionally joined by others even
outside East Africa. It was partly inspired by Nabudere's book Imperialism and
Revolution in Uganda and its critique by Mamdani, Bhagat, and Hirji.
Later these discussions were reproduced as a book called The Dar es Salaam Debate
on Class, State and Imperialism, which was edited by Yash Tandon, with a
foreword by Mohammad Babu, the well-known Marxist revolutionary from Zanzibar.
The ‘Debate’ had intellectual, pedagogical and also political and strategic
value for Uganda but also Africa and the third world. The key analyses and
messages argued by Nabudere in the ‘Debate’ remain valid to this day. The
significance of this debate, latent when it was taking place, became clear in
the early months of 1979, as those same very issues took on a practical
political salience after Amin's invasion of Tanzania in December 1978. Tanzania
repulsed the invasion but then Nyerere faced a dilemma. Should he proceed to
Kampala, with his army thus effectively becoming an “occupation force”, or
should he try to forge a united Ugandan political front to take over the reins
of government? He opted for the latter. But to forge unity of contending forces
from Uganda proved a nightmare.
In his recount of the period of the Uganda National Liberation Front, the
political organization around which Ugandan exiles united to topple Amin, Prof.
Edward Rugumayo, who became chairman of UNLF's ruling council, says Nabudere
played a central part in the formation of the liberation group. When the UNLF
was established and a ruling body for it formed known as the National
Consultative Council, Nabudere was elected chairman of its political and
diplomatic committee. He became a key leader in the NCC, alongside Edward
Rugumayo, Yash Tandon, and Omony Ojok.
The first
administration of the UNLF government under President Lule lasted only six
months. In September 1979 he was ousted from power by a vote of no confidence
moved in the transitional parliament, the NCC. He was, in other words,
democratically removed, and replaced by President Binaisa. It was the Binaisa
administration that was then removed from power by the Military Commission of
the UNLF led by Obote and Museveni, and backed by Tanzania.

The 1980s and post-NRM era http://www.pambazuka.net/en/category.php/obituary/83570 http://www.newvision.co.ug/mobile/Detail.aspx?NewsID=629966&CatID=417 https://web.archive.org/web/20160304035601/http://independent.co.ug/obituary/4-obituary/4914-prof-nabudere

The Muwanga-led coup that overthrew Binaisa in 1980 found Nabudere in exile, as
it did the other three members of the 'gang of four'.
In 1982
Nabudere moved to Helsingør in Denmark, teaching at a Folk High School. This
was one of his most productive years as a scholar. He wrote the over 300-page
manuscript called 'The Rise and Fall of Money Capital', which was published in
1990 under an organization called Africa in Transition, an organization founded
by brothers Yash Tandon and Vikash Tandon. It is probably the most
comprehensive analysis of money since the early writings, among others, of
Marx, Engels, Hilferding, Rosa Luxemburg, and Keynes, all of whom came under
Nabudere's cutting edge analysis. Nabudere carried out a meticulous historical
analysis of the rise of money as money, and made the prediction that money will eventually overcome capital
and then meet its own demise as an instrument of credit. This is what in fact
happened in the first decade of the 21st century, what came to be known in our
own times as “financialization of capital”. Nabudere had already anticipated
this during his period of research and writing in Helsingør. This book is one
of the most outstanding, and relatively unknown, original contributions of
Nabudere to Marxist economics. Later, a summary of the book was published by
Fahamu, titled, The Crash of International Finance-Capital and Its Implications
for the Third World, to which Yash Tandon wrote a foreword.
Nabudere
lived in exile until 1993 when President Museveni invited him back to the
country to be part of the Constituent Assembly.
Kintu
Nyago says it needs to be noted that even as he was a persistent critic of the
NRM, Museveni's enlightened leadership, which promotes democratic pluralism
fully accommodated Nabudere. Upon Nabudere's return, he became a very outspoken
critic of Museveni. Over the course of the CA, Nabudere many times led members
of the Assembly on walkouts when they disagreed with the other CA members. He
also teamed up with Aggrey Awori to form the National Caucus for Democracy
, a CA-based pressure group.

The 2000s - The Marcus Garvey Pan-Afrikan University: http://www.pambazuka.net/en/category.php/obituary/83570

Nabudere founded the Marcus Garvey Pan-Afrikan Institute in Mbale, Uganda, the objective of which was to create a repository of knowledge on African science, philosophy, medicine and other indigenous African knowledge. MPAI was later to evolve as a university, of which he was the first Chancellor-Designate.

Academic career

Nabudere
obtained the degree of LLB in 1963 and was admitted as a
barrister at law, Lincolns
Inn, London,
in the same year.

Academic and other Occupations

  1. Advocate, High Court, Uganda ;
  2. Chairman, Board of Directors, East African Railways
  3. Corporation, East African Community, Nairobi ;
  4. Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Law, University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania; ;
  5. Associate Professor, Faculty of Law, University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, ;
  6. Minister of Culture, Community Development and Rehabilitation, Uganda Government, ;
  7. Visiting Associate Professor, University of Zimbabwe ;
  8. Visiting Scholar, Africa Study Centre, Leiden, the Netherlands ;
  9. Executive Director, Afrika Study Centre, Mbale ;
  10. Professor Emeritus, Faculty of Social Sciences, Islamic University in Uganda, Mbale ;
  11. Executive Director/Principal, Marcus-Garvey Pan-Afrikan Institute, Mbale, Uganda .
  12. Chancellor, Marcus Garvey Pan-Afrikan University, Mbale, Uganda

    Academic Administrative Experience

  13. Chairman, Higher Degrees Committee, Faculty of Law, University of Dar es Salaam 1976-79;
  14. Member, Post Graduate Committee of Senate, University of Dar es Salaam 1977-79;
  15. Founder and Director, Afrika Study Centre, Mbale, Uganda
  16. Founder Marcus Garvey Pan-Afrikan Institute, Mbale, Uganda
  17. Founder Marcus Garvey Pan-Afrikan University, Mbale, Uganda
  18. Supervised three Ph.D. students in Law at the University of Dar es Salaam and University of South Africa,
  19. Supervision of students registered by Centre for African Renaissance Studies 2008-2011 at UNISA

    Professional Positions Held

  20. Member, Uganda Law Society ;
  21. President, African Association of Political Science ;
  22. Vice-President, International Political Science Association ;
  23. Member, Global Security and Cooperation Program, Social Science Research Council-SSRC, New York 2001-2003.

    Publications

Books

  1. The Political Economy of Imperialism, 1976, Tanzania Publishing House and Zed Press, London;
  2. Essays on the theory and practice of Imperialism, 1979, Onyx Press, London;
  3. Imperialism in East Africa, 1980, Zed Press, London ;
  4. Imperialism and Revolution in Uganda, 1980, Onyx Press, London;
  5. The Crash of International Finance Capital and its implications for the Third World, SAPES Trust, 1989, Harare, Zimbabwe;
  6. Democracy and the One-Party State in Africa, Institut Für Afrika Kunde, Hamburg, Germany, 1989; Co-edited with P. Meynes;
  7. The Rise and Fall of Money Capital, 1990, Afrika in Trust, Harare/London;
  8. Uganda Referendum 2000: Winners and Losers, Monitor Publications, Kampala;
  9. Globalisation and the Post-Colonial African State, AAPS, Harare, 2000, Zimbabwe, Editor.
  10. Pan-Africanism and Integration in Africa, 2002, SAPES Publications, Harare, Zimbabwe, co-edited with Ibbo Mandaza;
  11. Afrika in the New Millennium: Towards a Post-Traditional Renaissance, forthcoming, now with the University of South Africa Press, Pretoria, South Africa.-not yet printed
  12. Globalization, Pastoralism, and Transformation in Eastern Africa, MS with UNISA Press, Pretoria.-not yet printed
  13. The Global Capitalist Crisis and the Way Forward for Africa, Kampala, 2009.
  14. The Crash of International Finance Capital and its implications for the Third World, Republished by Ufahamu, London, 2009.
  15. Afrikology, Philosophy, and Wholeness: An Epistemology, Africa Institute of South Africa, PRETORIA, February 2011.

    Monographs and Other Papers

  16. The IMF-World Bank's Stabilisation and Structural Adjustment Policies and the Uganda Economy: 1981-1989; Research Reports No. 39/1990, African Studies Centre, Leiden/The Netherlands.
  17. The Impact of East-West Rapprochement on Africa, Seminar Paper Series No. 1, SAPES Trust, Harare, 1996;
  18. African Social Science Reflections: Part 2: Law, the Social Sciences and the Crisis of Relevance: A Personal Account, Heinrich Böll Foundation, Regional Office, East and the Horn of Africa, Nairobi, Kenya, 2001;
  19. The Epistemological and Methodological Foundations for an All-inclusive Research Paradigm in Search for Global Knowledge. 2002. Occasional Paper Volume 6 Number 1, African Association of Political Science, Pretoria, South Africa;
  20. Africa's First World War, Occasional Paper Series, Volume 8 Number 1, 2004. Association of African Political Science, Pretoria, South Africa;
  21. The Political Economy of Conflict and War in the Great Lakes Region, Institute for Justice and Reconciliation, Cape Town, 2004 Monograph Series;
  22. Conflict over mineral wealth: Understanding the Second Invasion of the DRC in Naidoo, S : The War Economy in the Democratic Republic of Congo, IGD Occasional Paper No. 37, September 2003, pp. 40–66;
  23. Non-formal Education in Uganda: Its Relation to Development in Education and Social Progress: Special Events at the World Summit for Social Development held at Copenhagen, published by the Association of Danish Folk High Schools, Copenhagen, Denmark, 1995
  24. Restoring Freedom and Dignity to Families and Grassroots Communities in Africa, MPAI, Mbale, 2009.

    Chapters in Books

  25. Imperialism, State, Class and Race : Globalisation and the Post-Colonial African State, AAPS, Harare, 2000, Zimbabwe,
  26. African Unity in Historical Perspective, chapter 1 in Maloka, E : A United States of Africa, Africa Institute of South Africa, Pretoria, South Africa;
  27. The African Renaissance and Globalisation: New Perspectives on African Unity and Integration, Chapter Three in Mandaza, I & Nabudere, D. W : Pan-Africanism and Integration in Africa, 2002, SAPES Publications, Harare, Zimbabwe;
  28. Regional Integration Experience: The Case of East African Community-chapter 8 in Hartzenberg, T, Ncube, P & Tekere, M : Trade Relations in the 21st Century: Focus on the Southern African Development Community, SAPES Trust, Harare, Zimbabwe.
  29. NEPAD: Historical Background and It's Prospects-chapter 2 in Anyang’ Nyong’o; Ghirmazion, A & Lamba, D : The New Partnership for Africa-NEPAD-A New Path? Heinrich Böll Foundation, Regional Office, Eastern and Horn of Africa, Nairobi, Kenya;
  30. The African Union-, New Partnership for African Development-, the Conference on Security, Stability, Development and Cooperation in Africa- and the Future of Africa-chapter 3 in Prah, K. K & Teka, T : Chasing Futures: Africa in the 21st Century-Problems and Prospects, Centre for Advanced Studies of African Society and the Organisation for Social Science Research in Eastern and Southern Africa, Book Series No. 33.
  31. How New Information Technologies Can be Used to Advance Learning in Pastoral Communities-chapter 15 in Varis, T; Utsumi, T & Klemm, W : Global Peace Through The Global University System, Global University System and Research Centre for Vocational Education, Hämeenlinna, Finland.
  32. The East African community And The New Partnership for Africa's Development-NEPAD: Are there Prospects for Synergy? Paper written for a conference on the East African Community Project to be held at Naivasha, Kenya on 26–28 August 2004 organised by the Institute for Global Dialogue, Johannesburg, South Africa to be included in a book edited by Ajulu, R & La Pere, G : The East African Community and the NEPAD, Pretoria.

    Other Book Chapters

under publication by the time of his demise

  1. Julius Kambaragwe Nyerere in Simon, D : Fifty Key Thinkers on Development, Routledge, London.
  2. Development Theory, Knowledge Production and Emancipatory Practice, Chapter in Vishnu Padayachee, ed., : The Development Decade? Economic and Social Change in South Africa, 1994-2004; Human Sciences Research Council Press, Cape Town;
  3. Research, Conflict and Knowledge Production, Chapter in Charles Hale : Activist Anthropology ;
  4. The Bush Doctrine and Democracy in Africa, Chapter in Bunting III, Josiah : Exporting Democracy, New York;
  5. Human Rights, Adult Learning and Peace-Building through Grassroots Collaboration: Six Case Studies, Chapter in Makau, Mutua : Human Rights Experience in East Africa, New York.
  6. The Role of Intellectuals in Regional Integration in the IGAD Region, MS to be published by the Heinrich Böll Foundation, Nairobi, Kenya.

    Online Publications

  7. African international relations after the events of September 11, Paper is written for the Social Science Research Council, New York, 2003;
  8. African forms of democracy versus Universal Democracy; Paper is written for the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation, New York, 2003;
  9. Democratic elections and governance in East Africa, 2003;
  10. Epistemological and Methodological Issues in Education and Development, Paper is written for Regional Research Workshop on Graduate Training and Research: Millennium Tools for Regional Development, at the Makerere University Senate House, Conference Hall on 29–30 July 2004.
  11. The historical and structural impediments to the implementation of the New Partnership for Africa's development-NEPAD; Paper is written for a book edited by Venter, D & Neuland, E : NEPAD and the African Renaissance, Richard Havenga & Associates, Johannesburg.
  12. Imperialism, Knowledge production and its use in Africa, Paper is written for a conference on “Empire and Dissent” by the Social Science Research Council, Paris, July 2004 and published in the GSC Quarterly 14 2005;
  13. Racism, Pan-Africanism, and Resistance; Paper is written for the CASAS/NGO Forum Panel at the World Conference Against Racism, Xenophobia, and Other Forms of Intolerance, Durban, South Africa, 29–31 August 2001.
  14. Religion, power, Ethnicity, and conflicts in Uganda and Sudan; Paper is written for a Conference on Religion and Conflict organized by the Institute for Justice and Reconciliation, Cape Town, 2003;
  15. The Role of the United States in the global system after September 11; Paper is written for the Social Science Research Council, New York, 2003;
  16. Towards a New Model of Production- A paper was written as a response to the New Partnership for African Development-NEPAD, 2002;

    Unpublished Academic Papers

  17. The Lords Resistance Movement/Army and the War in Uganda, January 2005.
  18. The Uganda Economy: 1979-1989, Harare, 1979 ;
  19. The Political Economy of Social Imperialism, Copenhagen, 1992. Afrikology, Philosophy, and Wholeness, MPAU, Mbale, 2010.
  20. Hermeneutics, Transdisciplinarity, and Afrikology, MPAU, Mbale, 2010.

    Research Activity (since 1995)

  21. Traditional Techniques of Conflict Resolution leading to an international conference organized by Afrika Study Centre, local collaborators and UNESCO Country Office in Uganda;
  22. The Transformation of Conflict and Violence in Agro-pastoral Communities in North-Eastern Uganda funded by the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation, New York, which led to the formation by pastoral women of the Mandela African Peoples’ College now based in Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania and New Sudan;
  23. Field Building Research on security and cooperation in East Africa, research funded jointly by the Social Science Research Council-SSRC, New York and the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation, New York;
  24. The Hidden War-The Forgotten People, research carried out on behalf of the Human Rights and Peace Centre-HURIPEC, of the Faculty of Law, Makerere University and the Liu Institute, British Columbia, Canada;
  25. The Lords Resistance Army and the War in Northern Uganda, research carried out for a book chapter for Social Science Research Council, Washington, USA;
  26. Historical Memory and Reconciliation in Uganda, research carried out for the Historical Memory Commission, now underway and coordinated by the Centre for Basic Research, Kampala;
  27. Reclaiming the Future: A Two-pronged research activity with the themes: Locating African Sites of Knowledge and Wisdom; and Towards a New Agenda for the 21st Century and Africa's Role in it being Joint and Collaborative Research Project of the Marcus-Garvey Pan-African Institute and the Department of Philosophy and Political Science, Pretoria, South Africa.
  28. Three-Year Research Programme under the Marcus-Garvey Pan-Afrikan Institute on developing a new epistemology “Afrikology” for research into African knowledge and wisdom;
  29. Chairing: research Working Group of African Scholars and Practitioners on Building Institutional Effectiveness in Africa: A study of institutions in Kenya, Ghana and Senegal in conjunction with the implementation of the Africa Commission Report, 2005.
  30. People to People Reconciliation Process in Uganda for the Historical Memory Reconciliation Council, 2003-2006.
  31. Food Security and Indigenous Food Crops in collaboration with DENIVA, Kampala, Uganda, 2005-2006.
  32. Restorative Justice and its Relation to International Humanitarian Law, MPAI, 2006-2008.

    Academic Linkages and Collaborations

  33. Senior Fellow, UNISA DST/NRF Chair in Development Education, University of South Africa, PRETORIA 2008 until his demise.
  34. Professor Extraordinary, Institute for African Renaissance Studies, University of South Africa, PRETORIA 2010-2013.

    Selected writings

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