Qaddafi’s Dream

3QD's own Robert P. Baird in the Boston Review:

For weeks the rumor had been going around Kampala that Libya’s Muammar Qaddafi was imminently to arrive. March 30th brought news that seemed to confirm the suspicion: Uganda, Al Arabiya reported, had offered Qaddafi asylum. A spokesperson for Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni would eventually deny the report—“How can you offer to bury someone on your plot when that person is not yet dead?” he complained—but I took the excuse to drive up to the Qaddafi National Mosque.

It was a hot afternoon when I arrived at the top of Old Kampala Hill. Rains the night before had scrubbed the sky of its usual haze, leaving a clear view of the undulating capital. Though easily the most conspicuous item in Kampala’s skyline, the Qaddafi Mosque is just one of several hilltop monuments to Uganda’s past and future devotions. Kasubi Hill features the burned tombs of the Buganda kings; Namirembe and Rubaga have the Anglican and Catholic cathedrals; Nakasero gets the unfinished Hilton, a 23-story hotel that’s been due to open “soon” for going-on five years.

More here.