KAMPALA, Uganda—Raucous street protests here that earlier appeared to herald the arrival of a popular uprising, inspired by the calls for democracy in the Arab world, have since fizzled into angry honks from scattered car horns.
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A Ugandan military officer, left, stepped on a fallen supporter at an opposition rally in Kampala last month.
The man seen responsible for bringing about that sudden turn of events: Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni, who threatened to eat the opposition "like samosas."
Deploying police and using political nuance, Mr. Museveni appears to have fought off one of the toughest challenges to his 25-year rule of this east African nation. He has appeared to quell an opposition movement that, while fractured, had spurred thousands to protest his authoritarian rule and high food prices.
The height of protests this week came most days at 5 p.m., when several hundred protesters honked car horns and blew noise-makers. That was a dramatic shift from May 12, when thousands of protesters spoiled Mr. Museveni's inauguration ceremony by marching alongside opposition leader Kizza Besigye as he returned from Kenya, where he had been undergoing treatment for injuries sustained during a late-April arrest.
The president took a page from long-ruling African and Asian leaders, using police force that resulted in at least 10 deaths and several hundred injuries, not to mention five trips to jail for Mr. Besigye. Police fired tear gas, live ammunition and a water cannon filled with pink paint to help identify protesters.
But Mr. Museveni also reached out to opposition leaders, promising economic reforms. During his election campaign, he launched an ambitious agriculture-development initiative, released a popular rap song and tolerated a freewheeling and often-critical press. His February victory was deemed credible by some African observers, but was marred by irregularities by the European Union and other observers.
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Associated Press
Ugandan opposition leader Kizza Besigye outside his home.
Ugandan officials are now boasting of having knocked the wind out of the protest movement. "This is not Egypt. This is not Libya," said security minister Amama Mbabazi, who was recently elevated to prime minister. The opposition movement's plans to topple the government are "a daydream," he added.
Opposition leader Mr. Besigye said he didn't believe the government's outreach was genuine and said popular anger has only increased over the lack of broad economic opportunity and what he called government corruption. He said the fear that long held Ugandan discontent in check was declining as people were emboldened by the success of recent protests.
"The government has been working around the clock to give the impression that protests are dying down, that anger is receding," Mr. Besigye said in an interview in New York. "The protests are going to continue."
Uganda hasn't seen such tumult for a while. The regimes of Idi Amin in the 1970s and Milton Obote in the early 1980s were characterized by the slaughtering of suspected enemies and economic upheaval.
The son of cattle farmers, Mr. Museveni overthrew Mr. Obote in 1986, following a drawn-out guerrilla war, and brought general stability. Despite high inflation and a heavy reliance on foreign aid, the country's economy approached 6% growth in 2010 and is projected to exceed that pace this year, according to the International Monetary Fund.
Uganda is also set to become Africa's next big oil producer. Tullow Oil Plc. Total S.A., and Cnooc Ltd. have signed a nearly $3 billion deal to tap into the over 2 billion barrels in reserves in western Uganda.
Some of Mr. Museveni's strongest detractors are former supporters, who lament his moves to abolish presidential term limits and crush opposition figures. In his office, construction business owner Frank Gashumba keeps two portraits of the president—a photograph of Mr. Museveni from 1986 that hangs on the wall, and another from 2010 that is stored in a closet.
"This is my Museveni," he said of the early photo. "When you've been in power this long you lose sight of what's on the ground."
Some analysts expect Mr. Museveni to ride out the current protests. They say Uganda lacks the sizable middle class of Tunisia and Egypt, where millions of educated young urbanites became disillusioned with the government. Mr. Museveni remains popular in agrarian communities in much of Uganda. And while Uganda endures double-digit unemployment rates, many see Mr. Museveni as their best option at keeping Uganda stable.
In fact, his allies warn that political instability will undermine economic growth and set back the pace of modernization. "The president needs even more power, not less," says David Mafabi, private secretary to Mr. Museveni on political affairs.
Still, anti-government protests earlier this month quickly caught on, led by three-time presidential candidate Mr. Besigye, who was beaten, shot and jailed several times in April.
Minister of Defense Crispus Kiyonga said the opposition leader posed a threat to national security and was currently under round-the-clock surveillance.
"His plan was to get masses and masses of people to walk and remove government with some kind of action," Mr. Kiyonga said. "We cannot allow that instability."
Mr. Besigye, a medical doctor who once Mr. Museveni's personal physician, visited the U.S. this week in part to consult with toxicologists after he was sprayed by soldiers with what he said were unknown chemicals in late April. The police have said it was pepper spray.
No other leader has stepped into Mr. Besigye's shoes to lead the protest marches. Mr. Besigye, whose last return to Uganda was marked by a spike in protests, said he planned to return around June 10.
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