ABSTRACT
Mahmood Mamdani is a Ugandan of Indian origin. Born in Mumbai, India, in 1946, but raised and educated in Uganda, Mamdani and his family were expelled from the country by President Idi Amin in 1972—along with all other Asians in Uganda—in what the dictator said was an attempt to nationalize the economy. Mamdani identifies one of the main problems as a disconnect between the urban and the rural, a disconnect he maintains was reproduced from the days of colonial rule when urban and rural Africa were governed differently. Mamdani's status as a scholar was secured by controversial arguments about citizenship and conflict that he put forward in Citizen and Subject. Mamdani does not look at Africa as a continent with so many intrinsic weaknesses that it is destined to fail. Rather, he sees Africa as having inherited a failed colonial system that continued to fracture the African state.
