{UAH} Mahogany Bukenya is laughing at Karyasausage Mbabazi
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Bukenya: Mbabazi, Wife Falling On Own Swords
NRM enemies are more from within than from without; I have read with much interest the article written by Mrs Jacqueline Mbabazi, the wife of Hon Amama Mbabazi attacking the NRM for displaying what she called “fascist tendencies".
While it’s been a while now, when I last took off time to reflect on the happenings within my party NRM, the actions of the Prime Minister and his family have captured my attention of late.
I would like to right away counsel my dear sister Jacqueline that what goes around comes around. You reap what you sow.
Even the bible tells us that when you kill by the sword you will die by the same sword.
I am very happy that Jacqueline and perhaps her husband are beginning to reap from their very own dirty handworks of misusing intelligence structures to engineer and doctor maligning reports against their opponents (real and perceived) to the President.
For her to cry foul of how the President was getting doctored intelligence reports and recordings against their alleged clandestine mobilisation against him, was the most interesting of all, and it exposed their extreme hypocrisy.
Why call them doctored now, yet the same were used not many years ago, by her husband's security apparatus, to malign some of us and falsely tell of how we were mobilising Baganda army officers, Cardinal, clergy and entire Catholic flock to build power bases against the President?
At least, in their case I am made to learn (as per media reports) that the President played for them recordings with their own voices that they couldn't deny, unlike in my situation where there was absolutely nothing.
I will never forget a scenario when Hon Mbabazi and her sister in-law Hope Mwesigye unfairly and without shame, accused me before the President with purely made up stories.
That while on my prosperity for all tours in Kigezi, in my capacity as Vice President, I only visited homesteads of Catholics and that I was sleeping at the catholic bishop's residence for night political campaign meetings.
I watched in utmost disbelief, Hon Hope Mwesigye and Hon Mbabazi both boldly tell blatant and cooked up lies to the President in my presence. Fortunately, President Museveni listens and does so patiently without panic and emotion.
Otherwise, he would have sealed off my fate there and then as a treason suspect.
I challenged them to produce evidence of their allegations, but they had nothing. It was only their word against mine.
My only final response to the President was that "Your Excellency use your intelligence machinery including the PGB soldiers you gave me as guards and with whom I moved with to Kigezi, to know where I went, which families I visited and which place I stayed”.
The farmers I had visited and which had been chosen by my staff and the district NAADS leaders in Kigezi were not only catholic.
Hon Chris Baryomunsi and Hon David Bahati could bear me witness as some of the area leaders we had there.
And while in Kabale, I spent a night at a hotel called white horse inn and not the catholic bishop residence.
To the contrary, while in Kanungu I stayed at the lodge, I am told is owned by the protestant Bishop.
You can't imagine national leaders fabricating stories and feeding them to the Head of State, Fountain of Honour and Commander-in-Chief for their own selfish agenda.
I was, however, not disappointed by the conduct of Hon Mbabazi and his sister in-law given their previous consistent schemes against me right from the time I was elected Chair of the Movement Caucus in Parliament and eventual appointment as Vice President.
They did everything possible to undermine and portray me as a traitor and sell-out to the appointing authority.
They hired boys to Abuse me on the many fm radios so as to discredit my political work and profile.
I was indeed a project for them over the years. My only disappointment with the President, however, has always been, why choose to believe one group of people and fail to discern their dirty schemes against others they target to tarnish and thus edge them out of the system for them to enjoy unlimited political space and favour, as the President faces more isolation from his old time comrades?
It is, therefore, not surprising, that after having successfully maligned others and pushed them far, they are now targeting the man himself.
May be one can say; good for you Mr President. Traitors, mafias and selfish schemers have no genuine friendship.
They will always do anything; including targeting even those that built and mentored them.
They can even target and finish off their own biological parents so long as it works for their mission of the time.
Therefore, the fascism that Jacqueline Mbabazi cries of now, was and has never been a founding principle of this mass liberation party called NRM. Otherwise some of us wouldn't have left our good academic career jobs to come and serve under it.
Openness and working for public interest above self were among those great fundamental principles of the NRM that endeared some of us to join President Museveni.
It was therefore the Mbabazis and their type that slowly introduced those “fascist and mafia” like tendencies in the party for selfish political gain.
I must confess though, that my disagreement with President Museveni and the entire NRM party of late has never been on the leadership style of the leader Museveni, but rather on his and the party's failure to resist selfish schemers, who want to feel good victors all the time as others get trodden down.
Treating all members of the party equally and giving them equal attention is the issue.
I was in prison not because that I had stolen any penny. But because someone wanted me there. He schemed and worked for it using Mr Raphael Baku the former IGG to take me to luzira and thus subdue me.
This mission was well accomplished and someone was happy. This obviously was not the NRM spirit I knew of.
True to this fact, the President openly then confessed publicly that indeed I had no case and he warned those using the anti corruption agencies to fight personal wars.
He however, only talked about it and never made any body to account for it. Why was this not investigated as serious as it sounded?
That is how indeed some of us got a feeling that in NRM there are those who are "special" children while others are "ordinary" children (Abaana n’ebyaana).
I am however happy that time is slowly vindicating most of us and many others in NRM that share this frustration but without the courage to speak.
I will not end this article perhaps without mentioning a word about this so much traded issue of a Secretary General not holding another office so as to concentrate on running the party work full time.
I wonder why it's even debated now when it was long resolved by the party National executive committee (NEC) at Entebbe state house in 2010 just days to the NRM national delegates’ conference.
It's wrong to give an impression that it’s now a new subject being brought out for discussion by the NRM parliamentary caucus. Not at all.
NEC resolved that whoever becomes Secretary General shall not hold any other political job in government save for being a minister without portfolio.
It was exhaustively debated and eventually passed at that late evening state house NEC meeting of around October 2010.
Personally, I offered myself to run as Secretary General well aware that I was doing so at the risk of losing my "big job" of Vice President (as my supporters called it).
In fact I told some people who were convincing me to opt out of the race for Secretary General so as to keep my "my big number two" Job that it’s okay I was ready to become Secretary General of the party and forfeit other jobs for the sake of devoting my time and mobilization skills to the party.
There was a general concern over the way the party was being handled with party structures totally neglected and only remembered during campaigns. I felt I could cure this if elected.
All of us contenders for the Secretary General post knew that. I find it therefore once again hypocritical on the part of Hon Amama and his wife to claim that this was targeting Mbabazi as a person. That is totally false.
They even admit that they indeed moved around the country clandestinely running a quiet campaign among the unsuspecting delegates of the party to resist the idea of removing Mbabazi from one of the posts he holds.
So if that is not intrigue what then, is it? Their argument also that, how come other leaders of CEC like the President and Speaker hold other positions in the party is also misleading and its besides the point.
The resolution of NEC that we passed in 2010 never talked about other positions. It was explicit and talked about the Secretary General position and this was for a reason.
The work of the Secretary General according to the NRM party constitution is certainly not the same as that of the chairman or Vice chairman of the party. The Secretary General is indeed like the company secretary of any organization.
He/she is full time and cannot be compared to the chairperson of the board, though indeed they are all members of the board.
So why would Hon Mbabazi fully aware of all this fact send his wife (as he admits) to covertly undermine a resolution of NEC?
And why wouldn't this constitute an offense for the NRM disciplinary committee to look at?
Then there is also this issue I hear about, Hon Mbabazi and his people brag so much about that he won as Secretary General at Nambole with a land slide. It's indeed laughable.
The fact that myself as well as Hon Otafire who contested for Secretary General then with him, chose not to speak against the shameful and glaring fraud at Nambole, didn’t mean all was well or even fair. Not at all.
We chose to keep quiet, concede all that had taken place for the sake of our party and the circumstances of electioneering we were in.
We didn't want whatsoever to divide our supporters as we entered the general elections. We took a line that could unite us for a common and bigger cause than divide us at that moment.
How can Hon Amama Mbabazi without shame then brag of a land slide in an election that was organized and directly manned by his daughter?
Indeed he should have got 100% and beyond. Who would expect President Museveni or Kiiza Besigye to loose or perform poorly in an election organised by Muhoozi or Anslem respectively?
Who doesn't know that the polling register of the NRM delegates was and is still in the hands of Nina Mbabazi, the daughter of Hon Amaama Mbabazi? She accredited whoever she liked to Namboole and whose vote she was sure of. Yet again, Nina Mbabazi had and still has no legitimate position in the party.
She is neither a member of CEC, NEC nor an appointed staff of the party. At least not to my knowledge.
But she was in charge of the entire party national delegates’ conference with polling materials in her possession and control. If this is not abuse of office and outright impunity, what then is it?
In fact If Hon Amaama Mbabazi had then even wanted to stand as party chairman against President Museveni; he was also going to “win" him with a big "land slide".
It was mockery all through. It is therefore not surprising that indeed Hon Amama Mbabazi and members of his family are once again scheming and conspiring for selfish advantage within NRM.
They have been at it for long. What is only new now is that they have now targeted the person at the top that all along protected and pampered them most, as others became victims of their own actions.
The question however, many Ugandans and mostly NRM members should ask is; why allow individuals to promote selfish scheming and personal interest within a mass liberation party that has reasonable trust and following of many Ugandans.
Why not declare openly one's political ambition and thus be subjected to open competition instead of resorting to covert manoeuvres?
If Hon Mbabazi wants to contest for President, what is wrong with it? I too want to contest for President and I have made my intentions open and public.
But why disguise his ambition and only work covertly to divide the party? He openly denies his ambition in the public but yet again sponsors proxies to go around campaigning.
We all know this and we have seen it in our constituencies. What method of work is this? I find it totally alien to what NRM stood for?
Open competition is healthy because it’s based on common rules as opposed to clandestine scheming and backstabbing of perceived opponents for selfish gain.
When we decided as a country to adopt a multiparty system of political governance, we chose to play the game of group competition and interest.
It's the group (party) interest to work for and protect and not personal interest. We either stick to this principle as NRM or opt otherwise.
Prof Gilbert B. Bukenya
Member of Parliament, Busiro North Constituency
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