What next now for Amama Mbabazi?

Former prime minister Amama Mbabazi and his wife Jacqueline at a past function. Mr Mbabazi was dropped as premier on Friday. File photo

What you need to know:

That changes the terms of the debate. He now becomes an equal with the president and the political questions now shift to who can run Uganda better.

On Friday, Ugandans were hit by a partly expected, partly unexpected announcement that President Museveni has replaced Prime Minister Amama Mbabazi with the long-serving cabinet minister, Dr Ruhakana Rugunda.
Speculation started immediately about what this means for the country.
This is the culmination of a long year of suspense, silence, evasiveness, intrigue and overt political action within the NRM government.

Some journalists say it started in 2013 when reports reached the president that loyalists to Mbabazi were engaged in the kinds of political mobilisation that could only mean one thing: Mbabazi was nursing presidential ambitions for some time in the future.
But most of this went unnoticed to the public.

The start
It started being publicly reported by the mainstream media when at Kyankwanzi in February, with the ruling NRM party retreat focusing its attention and some might say wrath on the party’s own secretary-general Amama Mbabazi, allegations were made that he harboured presidential ambitions.

An impromptu vote of more than 200 endorsed party chairman President Museveni as the sole presidential candidate for 2016. But that was not the end of the matter.

It then moved to State House in Entebbe in early March for further meetings of the NRM caucus, at which Mbabazi was denounced over these alleged presidential ambitions.

A report was released that Mbabazi had been relieved of his roles as NRM Secretary-General. Just when the news was starting to filter through, President Museveni himself disowned it and re-affirmed that Mbabazi was still in his position.

Then an impasse set in. Mbabazi remained in place both as Prime Minister and party Secretary-General, despite continuing reports and rumours in Kampala of an undeclared presidential interest.

This unresolved situation finally came to a head on Friday, with the announcement that Mbabazi had been dropped as Prime Minister and replaced by Dr Ruhakana Rugunda.

In recent weeks, President Museveni’s Press Secretary Tamale Mirundi, during his appearances on various radio talk shows, has been sounding increasingly bitter about elements within the NRM trying to undermine the President and he mentioned by name the Mbabazi camp, giving as an example the demand for payment by Mbabazi’s daughter Nina Rukikaire.

It made me wonder what this was building up to and whose opinion Mirundi was reflecting. The sacking of Mbabazi is the answer.

Of its own, this “re-shuffle” (if the dropping of a single man can be so termed) shows that finally President Museveni has got back on top of the situation.

The mainstream media as usual was quick to miss the point. TV stations started airing highlights of Rugunda’s career, the various positions he has held and being married with a wife and five children.

The story remains as it has been all year, of course, about Mbabazi’s presidential ambitions.

Mbabazi response
What will his first public reaction be? That is what Ugandans are waiting to hear, especially those nervously watching all this from the Museveni camp.

Being Mbabazi, most likely he will say nothing, at most thank the President for the trust he put in him in by appointing him to that office.

That, in fact, came on Friday afternoon. In a brief statement, Mbabazi wrote: “I thank the President, H.E. Yoweri Kaguta Museveni for having given me the opportunity to serve my country as Prime Minister and in other capacities prior to this.”

After this, there will be deafening silence. It is that deafening silence that political pundits and those in the political news reporting business know is the loudest.
What will follow will be what followed the Kyankwanzi and State House meetings. The police might start arresting youths and operatives suspected of working for Mbabazi’s presidential bid.

There could be attempts to resurrect past alleged corruption cases against Mbabazi, but Ugandans by now have learnt how to see through politically-motivated court cases.

Way forward
As it is now, Mbabazi has only one way to go, which is to declare openly and officially a presidential bid for 2016. That changes the terms of the debate. He now becomes an equal with the president and the political questions now shift to who can run Uganda better.

Mbabazi’s supporters, many of whom have been frustrated by his ambiguity, can then relax and get ready for 2016.
It also brings relief to the Museveni camp, which for most of this year has been frustrated by Museveni’s equally ambiguous stance toward Mbabazi.

As I wrote in the Sunday Monitor of February 16, in a special analysis of the Kyankwanzi retreat, the 2016 general election will not be between the NRM and the Opposition as we currently know it, but between two factions of the NRM party, the Museveni camp and the Mbabazi camp.

These two NRM camps are specialists in political intrigue. We can be sure that by the last few weeks of the year, the media will have become the battleground between them, with each side leaking damaging information about the other to various media houses and on the Internet.

Mbabazi’s sacking at this time gives him enough time to get ready for 2016. If he were to declare his bid, it would come at a time suitable to him. During a Uganda Cranes match at Namboole stadium in 2013 or 2012, resentful crowds threw mineral water bottles at Mbabazi and insulted him.
But at recent matches, the same Mbabazi has been greeted with enthusiasm and a partial standing ovation.
What he does with this, will shape Uganda’s politics for the next one year.
What has definitely happened is that with Mbabazi’s sacking is that the 2016 general election campaign has begun.

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