{UAH} NRM To Defeated Ministers, MPs: We’ll Expel You If You Stand As Independent

 by Samuel Kamugisha - October 29, 2015

*DEFIANT: Minister Sarah Opendi vows to stand as an independent

*Deputy speaker Oulanyah to ministers: Accept defeat

*SG Lumumba: Those who flout rules will cease to be NRM members

Barely a day after a number of ministers, ex-ministers and MPs lost in Uganda's ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) party primary elections, senior party members have warned losers against standing as independents, lest they be ejected out of the party because of indiscipline.

NRM secretary general Kasule Lumumba told journalists in the capital Kampala on Tuesday that all members who insist on standing as independent candidates in next year's general polls would be forfeit their membership.

"As the Party Secretariat, there are a number of ways we handle our indisciplined members. We can caution, advise, suspend, etc. But our constitution and code of conduct is very clear. If a member decides to run against the decision of his or her constituents, that person ceases to be a member of the NRM," Lumumba warned.

DEFIANT MINISTER OPENDI

Her warning comes on the heels of an announcement by state minister for primary health care Sarah Achieng Opendi to stand as an independent after she lost in Tuesday's Tororo Woman MP flagbearer race. Opendi, who polled 42,718 lost to Jacinta Ayo who garnered 44,441 votes.

But the minister says she will petition the results and contest as an independent if the party's elections body does not accord her complaint the attention it merits. She was also pessimistic that Ayo would floor the opposition in the general polls.

On why she thought some senior ministers had lost in the primaries, Lumumba said the results were a good sign that showed that the people were exercising their rights and will.

Even when they are well facilitated, she continued, you have to know that it is not resources that win elections and if that was the case, then parliament would be filled by the wealthiest Ugandans.

ENTER OULANYAH

Jacob Oulanyah, the deputy speaker of the country's Parliament, has also advised the defeated ministers to respect the will of the people.

Oulanyah, who won the party ticket for the Omoro County seat in the northern district of Gulu, had this message for all those who have lost in the party polls: "The same people vote you; the same people throw you out. So how do you explain it? People have changed their mind."

At least one defeated minister has publicly conceded defeat and backed the victor. ICT state minister Nyombi Thembo on Wednesday told the press that he would support the candidature of Simeo Nsubuga after the former police publicist floored him to carry the flag for Kassanda County South in Mubende district.

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*A positive mind is a courageous mind, without doubts and fears, using the experience and wisdom to give the best of him/herself.

 

 We must dare invent the future!
The only way of limiting the usurpation of power by
 individuals, the military or otherwise, is to put the people in charge  - Capt. Thomas. Sankara {RIP} '1949-1987

 *"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent

revolution inevitable"**…  *J.F Kennedy

 

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