{UAH} FAIR COPY

he Chairman of  NRM is not ceremonial like board chairpersons. He chairs Central Executive Committee, National Executive Committee and National Conference. Yet in traditional parties like UPC and DP , there is chairperson who chairs council meetings. In DP he is elected but in UPC he appointed the way the President could appoint a Speaker of Parliament.
NRM Chairperson, though, has no full executive powers like UPC President, is powerful enough to neutralize a Secretary General.
That all Natalina Political Commissars from Gyagenda Kibirango, Amanya Mushega, Kizza Besigye, Eriya Kategaya, James Wakhabulo, Chrispus Kiyonga, and now Amama Mbabazi remained loyal to the President.
In the sixties, John Kakonge, the founder Secretary General of the then ruling party, UPC, was the first political exile of post independence Uganda, and his successor Grace Ibingira, was in detention for five years.
Oscar Kambona, the founder Secretary General of the ruling TANU now CCM in Tanzania, ended up in exile in UK.
Tom Mboya, the founder Secretary General of the then ruling party, KANU in Tanzania, who was also Internal Affairs Minister, was assasinated.
In DP, Basil Bataringaya, Secretary General and Leader of Opposition in Parliament, clashed with President General, Ben Kiwanuka, and crossed to UPC where he was appointed Internal Affairs Minister and detained Kiwanuka without trial.
In 1980S, Francis Bwengye clashed with Paul Ssemogerere. The former joined the armed liberation struggle in UFM under the late Dr. Lutakome Kayiira, and the latter joined Parliament and became leader of opposition. He replaced with with Anthony Ocaya, who also broke away in 1984 with Vice President General Tiberio Atwoma Okeny and Curthbert Obwangor to form Nationalist Liberal Party, and Robert Kitariko came in deputed by Sam Kutesa.
Ssemogerere was later to clash with Maria Mutagamba who joined NRM, Mariano Drametu, who led a splinter group under Vice President General Zakariya Olum with Bwengye as a factional President General.
But NRM as a liberation and mass movement, learning from the clashes of Yusuf Lule and Edward Rugumayo in 1979 and Paul Muwanga and Godfrey Binaisa in 1980, has never allowed another power center. It even risked the President to be Speaker of Parliament for 10 years, deputized by Al Haji Moses Kigongo.
However unless these changes are explained to the masses in addition to the gombolola conferences held by MPs, things may turn nasty like the clash of Party President Milton Obote and Secretary General Felix Onama who doubled as Defence Minister, that culominated into 1971 coup.
It was the same in mid eighties when Paulo Muwanga, who was both Vice President in government and party, started UPC Buganda, the UPC JIK under the then Secretary General and Internal Affairs Dr. Luwuliza Kirunda, the UPC Science and UPC Syndicate or Bushenyi Clique in the West.
Since the NRM Historicals have been in power for almost 30 years, the young generation will not allow them to succeed one another the way Gen.Nagib, Gen.Abdu Nasser, Anwar Sadat, Hassan Mubrak, all 1952 Historicals succeeded one another in 1954, 1970, 1981 respectively, which ended in a bloody revolution in 2011. By 2021, the NRM Historicals should be handing over power to the young generation.
   

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