{UAH} Allan/Pojim/WBK: Rugunda reaches out to FDC
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Rugunda reaches out to FDC
The government has been reaching out to key opposition figures – pleading for calm to avoid the flaring post-election tensions descending into chaos, The Observer has learnt.
Sources familiar with the negotiations have told The Observer that Prime Minister Ruhakana Rugunda has in the last two weeks contacted some leaders of the Forum for Democratic Change.
Dr Rugunda reportedly wants them to join government in discussing a peaceful resolution to the post-election anger stemming from opposition claims that the February 18 presidential election was stolen for the NRM government.
Since results of the February 18 election were announced on February 20, Dr Kizza Besigye, President Museveni's challenger, has been locked in a standoff with police.
He has since been put under house arrest. According to government, the incarceration of Besigye is meant to stop the opposition leader, who garnered 3.5 million votes (35.61 percent) against Museveni's 5.9 million votes (60.62 percent) from inciting his supporters to violence.
"Those were preliminary meetings for him to make contact with FDC because he [Rugunda] has been keen to know who in FDC can the government formally engage and who in government is more acceptable to FDC to lead the talks," an FDC insider told us.
Rugunda, according to our sources, has also asked FDC officials for views on what the government can do to put the country back to normalcy. FDC secretary general Nathan Nandala-Mafabi confirmed to us on Friday that some party members had been contacted by Rugunda.
"It is true they government] are trying to make contact with the party but I am not part of those efforts because my preoccupation now is to gather enough evidence to prove that our victory was stolen," Mafabi said.
He referred this writer to officials such as party president Mugisha Muntu, Nakawa MP-elect Michael Kabaziguruka, or outgoing Rukiga MP Jack Sabiiti (former treasurer general) who he said are familiar with the talks.
Muntu and Kabaziguruka neither answered nor returned our repeated calls. Contacted on Friday, Sabiiti said: "I can't talk for the party because I am [not on the current executive] and much as I meet [Rugunda], I meet him as a friend. We talk, but we don't talk politics."
Rugunda did not respond to our calls and text messages. But his communication advisor, Julius Mucunguzi, denied knowledge of any meetings between his boss and the opposition.
Some in FDC suspect that the recent visits to Besigye by former presidential candidate Maj Gen Benon Biraaro, journalist Andrew Mwenda and Dr Maggie Kigozi, a member of the elders' council, which organized the presidential debates, could have been facilitated by government in its pursuit of dialogue.
Mwenda said on Saturday that his was a personal mission. For his part, Biraaro said his efforts were informed by his campaign manifesto.
"Before I came to contest, I looked at the danger posed by NRM and FDC because the two parties are antagonistic to each other. One cannot accept the other. That is why in the Farmers Party manifesto, we pledged a government of national unity," Biraaro said on Saturday.
Biraaro said he was still pushing for talks, and thought both Museveni and Besigye were open to the idea. But he warned it could be killed by FDC president Mugisha Muntu who accused Museveni of being dishonest.
Biraaro appeared to be on an impossible mission on Saturday, after Besigye issued a statement saying he was ready to take power if his party's demand for an independent audit of the presidential poll results was ignored.
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