The passage of time, as I keep saying to friends on social media, sometimes changes things and people in ways that seemed unthinkable, even unimaginable.
A little more than a decade ago, I worked in a newsroom where one of my workmates was an Afghan journalist. He took interest in my first name and told me that the Afghans had a word with the same pronunciation as my first name. (I cannot remember what he said the word means.)
The journalist, who now works as a South Asia correspondent for a leading US newspaper, knew precious little about Uganda.
If I had told him that in 10 years Uganda would be home to Afghan refugees, he would have dubbed me “crazy” because refugees from Asia seldom, if ever, go to Africa.
But, as news reports have indicated, Uganda will take in 2,000 Afghan refugees.
Such is life — nearly always unpredictable. The intern who joins your company when you are already a senior manager rises through the ranks to head the company and you start calling her/him your boss.
Leicester City win the Premier League when many bookmakers and football fans are convinced that the club will never be champions.
Donald Trump becomes the President of the US when political pundits think his bid for the presidency is a sick joke; Muammar Gaddafi is dragged out of a drain like a rat and meets his inglorious end, leaving millions that thought he was too powerful and invincible flabbergasted.
Afghans who are coming will be surprised that, of all places, Africa is where they have managed to secure refuge after fleeing the Taliban, the Islamist fighters who are now in control, following their spectacularly successful offensive that saw them easily capture province after province in a country they once ruled.
Few things provide a better illustration of a senseless waste of money, life and time than the Afghanistan war. But the lesson in this debacle for leaders is that some problems just cannot be fixed by wars.
The Associated Press took a deep look at the cost of the Afghanistan war in lives and dollars. Its findings are astounding.
As of April 2021, the US had lost 2,448 people serving in the armed forces in Afghanistan. At least 1,144 allied troops, including from other Nato member states, were killed. Some 3,846 US contractors were also killed as were 66,000 Afghan police and military. Afghanistan lost 47,245 civilians while 51,191 Taliban and other opposition fighters perished; 444 aid workers and 72 journalists were killed.
The money spent on the war could fix many of the world’s major problems. The US spent $837 billion (33 times the GDP of Uganda) fighting the war, which started in 2001.
Another $145 billion was spent on rebuilding Afghanistan. About $83 billion went to building and sustaining the Afghan army and police forces.
And what was achieved in the end? The war ended with the enemy (read: the Taliban) having the last laugh.
Closer home, we could have something akin to the Afghanistan debacle in Somalia where five African countries — Uganda, Burundi, Kenya, Djibouti and Ethiopia — have troops fighting the militant group al-Shabaab.
A Somali journalist once told me that al-Shabaab had a lot of support among prominent Somalis and that the group relies on them for many things.
Al-Shabaab may not be able to launch a lightning offensive like the Taliban, but then sometimes the passage of time changes things.
Mr Namiti is a journalist and former Al Jazeera digital editor in charge of the Africa desk