{UAH} AYUME SON: WHY I DESERVE KOBOKO MUNICIPALITY SEAT

By Gilbert Mwesigye

Dr. Charles Ayume, an employee of State House aged 41, has defended his decision to challenge Investments Minister Evelyn Anite for the position of Koboko Municipality MP. In a Saturday interview with Mulengera News, Dr. Ayume (youngest son to the late Speaker/AG Francis Ayume) argued that his candidature is aimed at preventing the seat from falling to the resurgent Charles Yakan of FDC who he claims in 2016 nearly defeated Anite. A lecturer at Kyambogo University, Yakan is back and his FDC anticipates benefiting from the sharp divisions the Anite-Ayume fights have fermented in one of Uganda's smallest Municipalities.

Dr. Ayume says Anite has actually never faced proper competition away from youth MP politics she ascended to in 2011 and claims had the President not intervened and fast-tracked the operationalization of Koboko Municipality on the eve of 2016 campaigns, Margaret Babadiri was going to floor Anite for Koboko Woman MP post hands down. "Hon Babadiri is a great fighter with a lot of community support as the President himself realized during Hon Anite's thanksgiving after becoming Minister for the first time and fast-tracked the Municipality otherwise Babadiri was going to have her for dinner," Ayume asserts. "For the first time she is going to have to endure two very bruising political fights both in NRM and general elections of 2021 which requires a lot of emotional strength which my sister lacks. In 2016 she was unopposed for the party flag because I remained firm in telling the community members who were urging me to stand since 2011 that I'm not ready."

Ayume claims there are many indicators the incumbent is very paranoid about his bid for Koboko Municipality MP race and gives several scenarios to corroborate his claim. He says the Anite camp members have engaged in many things that portray the extent of fear and paranoia in the camp including trying to erase his father Francis Ayume very conspicuous legacy for Koboko. "The Municipality headquarters was built through his fundraising efforts but recently the Mayor [Wilson Sanya] was reluctant to put back the word Francis Ayume Hall on the building after recent renovations because they know it's something that can give me mileage as his son. He dragged his feet for four months until people confronted him reminding him how it was the late Ayume who fundraised money for that building to be put up when it was still a Town Board under Arua. They told the Mayor this attempt to rewrite history of Koboko was going to cost him his own votes leave alone Hon Anite in whose interest he was working to undermine the Ayume brand," says Dr. Ayume who has been in the working field for now 12 years since graduating from MUST where he did a degree in medicine. That a memorial monument too was supposed to be erected in the Municipality compound but that too has since been blocked largely to deprive him of the resultant political mileage.

His other evidence of panic in the Anite camp relates to events of the last week of February before the lock down was imposed all over Uganda. That he secured permission to hold a consultative meeting for all stakeholders after which he would launch his bid for the MP Seat. That during the security committee meetings, some of the security officers who he says are biased in favor of the incumbent tried to disallow his meeting on grounds it would breach POMA.

He says this was very strange because he is NRM just like Anite and other incumbent MPs whose consultative meetings had equally been permitted by the same security committee. "Eventually it was permitted but they prevented us from using the [Ayume] Hall by manipulating the Town Clerk. People had come from everywhere in Koboko and what saved us was because we had also hired the nearby High Way Inn hotel just in case as our plan B."

Dr. Ayume, who works as the Deputy Director for the State House Health Monitoring Unit through which Gen Museveni monitors service delivery in health facilities across the country, also refers to four of his key supporters and senior citizens in Koboko Town that were arrested and slapped with what he calls fabricated criminal charges including attempting to assassinate Minister Anite. He says all this shows extreme panic in the Minister's political camp.

"The four included an NRM mobilizer nicknamed Gen Baguma and Misairi, a businessman in Koboko who chairs the NRM entrepreneurs' league for West Nile. There was Hippo and one other. These formerly were key mobilizers for the Minister but they abandoned her because of unfulfilled personal pledges," he asserts. "They were arrested by the DPC who accused them of smuggling guns into the country, plotting to burn the Municipal Hall, the hospital and attempting to kill the Minister." He says they only got released and charges dropped after he petitioned the IGP Okoth Ochora who verified and had the charges dropped. "I had to keep calming down my supporters to avoid an explosion on the streets of Koboko. The district Speaker George Ambe and the RDC equally intervened to deescalate the situation." A subsequent report by PSU revealed there was no complainant on the file and no investigations were carried out.

Asked about the last weekend violent processions by his and Anite's supporters, Dr. Ayume says "it was all an outcome of prolonged provocations and abusive use of the security forces especially the DPC in the Municipality by the Minister." That "people had been patient for too long this being a volatile town and I had been pleading with people to remain calm."

He adds that the DPC, who was recently transferred from Koboko after serving for two years, exhibited extreme bias when he tried to sabotage the annual Ayume Memorial football tournament that has been on for the last 6 years towards Independence Day. It's one of the annual activities the family organizes to honor the memory of late Ayume. "We have always had 20 teams participating and it always costs us like Shs20m which I always pay but this time round the DPC tried to frustrate it by preventing the police team from participating and his lame excuse was that participating would make police seem politically biased against the Minister yet for us it's always about giving police an opportunity to deepen community policing which is their program of interacting with the people." He says the military participated as one of the teams as always. He also wonders why the incumbent always moves with the DPC each time she is in the Constituency "yet Hon James Baba was Internal Affairs Minister but never moved with the DPC each time he came to the district." Dr. Ayume rhetorically asks: "She says she is very popular but why move with the SFC and sharp shooters wherever she goes? Why do all that in your own constituency where you claim to be very popular?"

He also salutes the DISO and RDC Koboko for professionally refusing to be cowed by the Minister. "Why do you require them to submit monthly security reports for the entire district to you as if you are the DG? Are you the only Minister or MP Koboko has ever had? How come others never demand for such reports?" he wonders denying being the invisible hand behind recent redeployments of the security chiefs in Koboko. "It affected even officers in Yumbe. Was all that being caused by mere me?" He likens the anti-Anite sentiments in Koboko to "a bottle of coca cola that has been vigorously shaken and is all of a sudden opened paving way for an explosion of sorts."

He says the 22,000 voting NRM delegates in Koboko Municipality should save the ruling party from losing to FDC's Yakan by fronting him as their flag bearer. "There is a lot of anger against her and that's why we are seeing teargas in Koboko for the first time because people have rejected her. Anger keeps bottling up which is why all the 7 campaign billboards and posters she put everywhere in the Municipality have since been pulled down and branding me opposition won't help."

He says the opposition he is leading in Koboko is against Hon Anite as a person and not the NRM party or government. "She is very desperate because this is a fight for her political life but we are saying don't sink with our party." He demands that Anite should just reference on her service delivery track record, if she indeed has any, as opposed to biasing police. "If she has indeed worked for Koboko, why is she in a panic mode; buying helmets for boda riders, soap for households, an ambulance and fridges for all the butchers in the town? We hear she has prepared billions but our people will chew it all and vote for the right person to carry the NRM flag," asserts Dr. Ayume who studied at Kampala Parents, SMACK, Makerere College and MUST before doing his maters in public health from London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine.  He practiced medicine with Mulago Hospital and in Kyenjojo before joining the Health Monitoring Unit of State House where he has worked for the last 10 years.

Asked what he exactly has against Anite, Dr. Ayume spontaneously answers "many things including high teenage pregnancies and the poor state of education in Koboko where out of the 2,000 PLE candidates last year, only 129 got first grades." He says it's only on health indicators where Koboko has always done very well each time the MoH carries out districts-based assessment for the whole country. "In the Districts Lead Table performance conducted by the MoH, Koboko has always been among the best 10 or 20 and it's largely because we have had to be involved to compliment the efforts of the DHO and the rest of the teams." He says leveraging on his technical expertise, both as a clinical officer and policy person, he has always been available to advise the DHO and his teams to deliver on the different indicators.

Dr. Ayume says that, riding on his vast experience in the medical field, he can team up with fellow doctors in Parliament to influence policy formulation in order to advance medical services delivery for districts like Koboko and others. "All I need is the platform at the level of Parliament and all I demand now is the mandate of the people." We also asked him about the risk of being perceived as anti-Koboko because the Evelyn Anite he is seeking to oust is an influential Minister who may not be easy to replace. And this is how he answered: "I have heard that from many people but it's not true. Yes, I can't guarantee that after removing her, another son or daughter of Koboko will become Minister but what I'm sure of is that it's not true that any big person in government will be angry with us as the electors of Koboko for voting out Hon Anite. If it were true some of those big people would by now have called me to express their concern but none has called me implying it's okay for me to carry on with my campaign. I have only been cautioned by many senior people to be very careful about my personal security because the Hon Anite I'm competing against is a very strong person who can do anything to keep her MP Seat."

He says besides helping the hospitals and health centers by participating in lobbying for increased government support and funding to them, he has also personally approached MTN and lobbied 10 computers for the Municipality's public library. "The MTN Foundation under its CSR has given us that donation with internet connectivity for a whole year and that is very important for the youth trying to learn about available opportunities in Kampala," he says adding that Koboko actually has many graduates who remain jobless and angry that, despite all her connections with investors, the Hon Minister hasn't helped them enough to access job opportunities. "Yet in my personal capacity I have supported some young people from Koboko to enroll for medicine at Gulu University and one of them actually is now in 2^nd year." He also claims that some leaders from Koboko tried to frustrate the computers donation by MTN Foundation simply because they saw it as capable of giving him political mileage.

Koboko originally was a county under Arua district and legendary Francis Ayume was their MP until 2004 when he died in a car accident along with his driver and bodyguard. He was replaced by Ahmed Awongo who had been RDC Pader. Located 545kms from Kampala, Koboko borders South Sudan at a place called Oraba. The district has a total of four MPs including Babadiri (woman MP), Koboko County's James Baba, Anite of the Municipality and Koboko North's Elly Ellias Asiku. It's one community where about 50% of the population is Muslim and the rest being Christians and others. The district famously produced ex-President Idi Amin. And the clans system is very strong here implying the game changers are clan leaders more than even the clergy.
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"When a man is stung by a bee, he doesn't set off to destroy all beehives"

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