Idi Amin
dramatic, and ruthlessly carried through, but it was also planned in advance and carried through in a rational, if also greedy, way.
Amin's actions, though more rational than commonly portrayed at the time, were undoubtedly short- sighted and implemented incompletely. The process of appropriating goods from departing Asians involved a committee set up by Amin to assess and reassign items to new owners, often army officers selected by his subordinates. However, this complex task was never completed adequately due to corruption. New Ugandan owners frequently bribed committee members with goods or cash from safes. Many lacked expertise in their new sectors, leading to farcical outcomes highlighted by Amin's critics. For instance, Henry Kyemba later alleged that certain clothing shops priced shirts based on collar size – a size fifteen shirt was sold for fifteen shillings, while a size ten was sold for ten shillings. 5 This disrupted profits and rapidly led to significant shortages when smaller shirts were sold well below their previous prices. Furthermore, some goods were sold off at a fraction of their true value to generate quick earnings. These choices displayed short-sightedness and arose from a unique combination of circumstances. The new owners perceived all sales revenue as profit since the previous Asian proprietors had managed costs. Similar short-termism in agricultural was even more dangerous. Soldiers who took over dairy farms often slaughtered their animals to make quick profits selling the meat, rather than investing in longer-term profit and growth. Finally, and in addition to all this, many of the businesses themselves were demanding to run. Since in many cases there was more money to be made by turning to business than taking an army salary, however, many officers who took advantage of the expulsion to become business owners neglected their military roles, which over the longer term had the effect of significantly weakening the Ugandan army. 6 It is similarly possible to argue that Amin might have anticipated the longer-term consequences of his Asian policy better than he did. The sudden expulsion of the Asian community, and expropriation of their wealth, prompted a significant brain drain, as lawyers, doctors and other professionals flooded out of the country, taking both their expertise and their assets with them. 7 Their numbers included both Asians who had been permitted to stay because of their expertise, and many leading Ugandans. By 1977, the turning point of Amin’s regime, the majority of trained, professional black Ugandans had moved abroad, leaving the country largely unable to provide adequate healthcare or maintain its own infrastructure. Disruptive as it may have been, however, the decision to expel Uganda’s Asians was, ultimately, neither an unstable act of despotism, nor a racist or ideologically motivated attack. It was a deliberate and considered policy, one designed principally to foster Ugandan nationalism. 8 The Asian community was being punished for being British, and, while Amin may have valued the ability to reward followers and make money, the expulsion was mainly intended to demonstrate that an explicitly Ugandan regime was now in charge, and that it would not accept an ‘ independence ’ designed to allow Britain to retain significant influence in its former colony. For Amin – but also for many other critics of late imperialism – decolonization in Uganda was part of an attempt by Britain to replace a formal with an informal empire. The Asian expulsion was part of a broader, well-planned political strategy. Amin
5 Kyemba 1977: 59-61. 6 Ibid.: 65-70.
7 Patel 1972 : 20. 8 Patel 1972: 18.
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