What next for NRM after 27 years at the helm?

Man with a different approach. The National Resistance Movement is one of the longest-serving political parties not only in Uganda but across the continent. From the first bullet shot by then NRA guerillas to the most recent ballot cast in the General Election, so much water has gone under the bridge. However, scholars, activists and politicians think differently about NRM’s future. Sunday Monitor’s Eriasa Mukiibi Sserunjogi, attempts to answer the question; which way forward for NRM?

He says that is why Museveni, who was originally a communist, managed to rally people of different thinking, including monarchists, who Mr Kiwanda prefers to call federalists.

“That is why you find federalists and republicans all in NRM,” Mr Kiwanda says, alluding to his being torn between serving Buganda Kingdom and his party.

The kingdom and NRM have a historical connection, with the then Crown Prince Ronald Mutebi having been smuggled onto the battlefield to boost the morale of kingdom adherents who fought to have the kingdom restored. But relations between the two centres of power have been uneasy.

Mr Kiwanda likes to argue that differences in ideology within NRM, especially regarding monarchism, should not be a problem, but the reality is different.

President Museveni at some point attributed his fallout with former Vice President Dr Samson Kisekka to the latter’s leaning towards Mengo, Buganda’s power capital. Even the recent sacking of another Vice President, Prof Gilbert Bukenya, is thought to be related to his closeness to Mengo.

Disagreements not new in NRM

At the recent party retreat at Kyankwanzi, some members wanted Mr Kiwanda removed from the leadership of the party’s Buganda Caucus, saying that he goes against party positions.

But Mr Kiwanda tells his fellow NRM members that internal criticism is the way NRM works, not how it fails. He says when there was a change of political system from the so-called Movement system to multi-partyism in 2005, the mindset of “individual merit”, which NRM claimed to champion before then, did not die away.

In the days of “individual merit”, every Ugandan was technically a member of NRM and opposition came from within the party, which the leaders preferred to call a political system. That is how in the 6th Parliament, Mr Kiwanda says, NRM members like former Minister Kabakumba Matsiko formed the Youth Parliamentary Association that opposed many party positions. Others like Winnie Byanyima were also very critical of the party.

In the 7th Parliament, another group of critics emerged from within NRM, later consolidating itself into the Parliamentary Advocacy Forum (Pafo) that opposed the lifting of the two term ceiling on the office of the president.

Mr Kiwanda points to “very” active members of Pafo who are now serving in top government positions, including Local Government Minister Adolph Mwesigye and NRM Chief Whip Justine Lumumba.

In the 8th Parliament, Mr Kiwanda points to Rubanda MP Henry Banyenzaki, who was critical of many government positions but has since been appointed minister.
It is strange, in Mr Kiwanda’s view, that Lumumba is now the one “leading the crusade to chase people out of NRM”.
So what could happen to NRM?

The leadership question is critical, Mr Kiwanda says. “Our challenge is to find someone (a leader) who can host different beliefs.” But then, we put it to him, President Museveni seems to be growing impatient with some of the critics within NRM and has threatened to “sort them out”.

Mr Kiwanda agrees and hazards an explanation. “Probably as one grows older they tend to show their true colours,” adding, “President Museveni was a communist and it seems he is becoming intolerant of federalists.” Edward Babu, the NRM vice chairman for Kampala, says the party’s leadership is engaged in an “assessment of our weaknesses and strengths” and that by 2016 it will have come out with a way forward.

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