Who is to blame for Musumba’s misfortunes in Kamuli elections?

Dead bodies, wounded fighters, mangled pieces of steel protruding from shells of bombed out buildings, debris and shattered glass strewn across burnt out compounds constitute some of the first pieces of evidence of the ravages of war.

Kamuli Municipality too has just emerged from a war, but it has been one of a different nature. The evidence is, therefore, different.
It is constituted of crushed pieces of essanja (dry banana leaves), empty plastic cups, and drained out plastic sachets of cheap alcohol and empty cooking oil drenched paper bags strewn over some of the streets to which supporters of the ruling NRM took on Wednesday evening to celebrate their victory over the Opposition Forum for Democratic Change (FDC).
Ms Rehema Watongola was declared winner of Wednesday’s by-elections with 8,726 votes, while the FDC candidate, Ms Salaamu Musumba, came second with 5,778 votes.
The other three candidates, all of them Independents, were Prossy Naikoba Kanakutanda who polled 169 votes, Michael Kiboome who polled 103 votes and Samuel Walujo who pulled the proverbial tail with 63 votes.
The election had been called after the High Court in Jinja annulled Ms Watongola’s February 2016 victory over lack of requisite academic qualifications. An attempt to overturn the ruling in the Court of Appeal did not succeed, which led the Electoral Commission (EC) into calling another election.
Musumba, who had led the legal challenge that led to the annulment of last year’s election was jovial and oozing with confidence for most of the campaign.
The arrival of Dr Kizza Besigye, who still commands quite a huge following in Busoga sub-region, in Kamuli on Monday, seemed to throw the ruling NRM into a panic. This was evident in initial attempts to block his entry into Kamuli.
Even when there was a rethink, the NRM still came out looking even more panicky when the police attempted to force him not to use the Jinja-Kamuli highway on grounds that it was to be used by the President’s convoy.
FDC supporters smelt blood and went for the final onslaught.
Despite the colossal sums of money spent on “mobilising” the populace to turn up for the finally rally which was to be addressed by among others the party’s chairman, President Museveni, the population seemed to prefer to attend the FDC rally.
Dr Besigye was quick to cash in on the imbalance between the two camps to urge the FDC supporters to do all in their power to overcome “the oppressors”.
“This is a peoples war, they have the machinery, money, we have the people so it is a matter of time, so we need to place our people in advance in there,” he urged.
The levels of enthusiasm exhibited by rival supporters as they left their parties’ respective rallies seemed to suggest that the NRM was headed for a defeat, but that was never to be. Why?

What went wrong
Developments like the surprise showing up of her husband, State minister for Urban Development Isaac Musumba, at her rivals’ campaign rallies had not been envisaged. One could, therefore, not have planned to mitigate its effects, but some scenarios could have been either nipped in the bud or countered.
The Basoga say, “n’omugezi awubwa” (even the wise are susceptible to occasional errors in judgement). That seems to have been Ms Musumba’s cup in this particular election. Ms Musumba and the entire FDC seemed to forget that elections in most parts of Busoga and the rest of the country are won on mostly trivialities and not issues.
Had they paid closer attention to Kamuli’s political history, they would perhaps not have made the provision of quality representation for the people of Kamuli central to their campaign message.
Despite the fact that the district has had quite a number of highly educated people occupying elective office, once in a while a not so highly educated person emerges and dominates the political scene. That was evidenced in the late 1990s when the late Kawugu Kawoya Mugaino emerged to challenge the status quo.
Despite having been duly nominated, he was disqualified from participating in the 2001 elections over lack of requisite qualifications. That allowed his lone challenger, Mr Karoli Baligeya Isabirye, to sail through unopposed.
The deceased was, however, one of those men who drew inspiration from the American Civil War General, George Armstrong Custer, who believed that, “it is not how many times you get knocked down that count, it is how many times you get back up”.
He bounced back to defeat Aggrey Bangu in 2008, but in April the same year he was sent packing after the High Court ruled that he was not qualified to lead the district.
He won back the seat during the 2011 local council elections, but was once again ejected in December 2011.
If others believe that “disability is not inability”, the late Mugaino believed that “poor education does not mean failed leadership”. That went down well with the populace, most of whom were actually never more qualified than himself.
Ms Musumba’s campaign team seemed to forget that the population has not undergone any serious transformation since the days of the late Mugaino. They are still of the same low levels of education and would, therefore, have found it easy to identify with someone like themselves. In Ms Watongola, who was not laying any claim to high levels of education, they had found such a person. An attack on her was deemed to be one on them.
“When a toothless mother resorts to abusing and beating the innocent child especially one who resembles the father, she is merely abusing or beating the husband so they are abusing you who have not gone to school, who come for my pilau and are poor to love me because of chairs, tents but this is our level and I am the one who knows your basic needs,” became Ms Watongola’s message at all campaign rallies.
One other factor that could have been misread was the Muslim card. Muslim community is quite sizeable in number. While Ms Salaamu Musumba’s husband, minister Isaac Musumba, is a Muslim, she remains a practicing Catholic.
While the Catholic leadership in the district were missing in action during her campaigns, the same could not be said of the Muslim leadership in Ms Watongola’s campaigns. They were more than visible, especially during her last campaign at Butemire Primary School.
However, it will most probably come down to a question of consistency or the lack of it. It had been known right from 2001 when Dr Besigye emerged to challenge Mr Museveni on the Reform Agenda ticket, that Ms Musumba was “in agreement” with the reformists.
It had not been until the formation of the Parliamentary Advocacy Forum (PAFO) early in the years of the 7th Parliament that Ms Musumba, jumped out of the political closet. It was, therefore, little wonder that she was one of the founder members of FDC and contested subsequent elections on the party’s ticket.
In all, Ms Musumba has contested nine different elections. Three of those elections (Constituent Assembly elections March 1994, 1996 and 2001 parliamentary elections) were under the no party Movement system, while the rest (2006 parliamentary elections, 2008 LC5 by-elections, 2011 parliamentary elections, 2012 LC5 by-elections and 2016 parliamentary elections and 2017 Kamuli Municipality parliamentary by-elections) have been under a multiparty political dispensation.
Ms Musumba won four of the nine races she participated in, winning just once in her last four elections.
She represented Bugabula South twice as MP and became LC5 chairperson in the 2012 by-election after losing in the 2011 general election.
The tone of the campaign messages have, however, been changing. In the period between 2006 and a few months before the 2008 by-elections, Ms Musumba believed that the NRM government had nothing to offer Busoga sub-region.
“When they see different sets of convoys with lead cars, one going to Bugweri County (home of Second Deputy Prime Minister Kirunda Kivejinja) and another going to Kamuli (home district of Speaker of Parliament Rebecca Kadaga), they think that Busoga is okay! No we are not okay,” she was always known to complain.
The message has, however, mellowed ever since 2012 when she warmed up to Ms Kadaga in order to win the Kamuli LC5 by-elections.
In 2014, she was part of President Museveni’s entourage to the Vatican, which sparked off rumours that she had crossed to the ruling NRM, but back home her alliance with Ms Kadaga collapsed. This compelled her to announce that she was to contest against her, which did not materialise.
Nevertheless, this had left many in her own party wondering about her principles game plan and whether she is still working for the party.
“Musumba stole the flag from me. She is confused and doesn’t know what she wants. She even failed to build FDC party structures when she was the LC5 chairperson,” Ms Prossy Naikoba says.
That, plus the conspicuous absence of the FDC president, Maj Gen Mugisha Muntu, and other top local FDC honchos like Mr Paul Mwiru and Mr Abdu Katuntu, might be a pointer at the fact that the hobnobbing with Mr Museveni and other NRM people have left her in an awkward position.
She is neither trusted at home nor yonder. What next then for Ms Salaamu Musumba?
“I will talk to myself and decide the next course of action after the Easter holiday,” she said moments after her latest defeat.
Kamuli and the nation are waiting, watching the space.

Besigye influence

The arrival of Dr Kizza Besigye, who still commands quite a huge following in Busoga sub-region, in Kamuli on Monday, seemed to throw the ruling NRM into a panic. This was evident in initial attempts to block his entry into Kamuli.
Even when there was a rethink, the NRM still came out looking even more panicky when the police attempted to force him not to use the Jinja-Kamuli highway on grounds that it was to be used by the President’s convoy.
FDC supporters smelt blood and went for the final onslaught.
Despite the colossal sums of money spent on “mobilising” the populace to turn up for the finally rally which was to be addressed by among others the party’s chairman, President Museveni, the population seemed to prefer to attend the FDC rally.
Dr Besigye was quick to cash in on the imbalance between the two camps to urge the FDC supporters to do all in their power to overcome “the oppressors”.
The levels of enthusiasm exhibited by rival supporters as they left their parties’ respective rallies seemed to suggest that the NRM was headed for a defeat, but that was never to be.