NRM wars take centre stage today

Kampala

Today’s NRM National Executive Council meeting in Entebbe should discuss issues of intrigue and cliques that are creating rifts within the party, two senior officials have suggested.

Vice President Gilbert Bukenya and Trade Minister Kahinda Otafiire in separate interviews said it would be unwise for today’s meeting to ignore the matter, which cushions party discipline ahead of the 2011 elections. “We must discuss the issue of party management and intrigue amongst senior party members because if left unchecked it would harm our performance in the coming elections,” Prof. Bukenya told Daily Monitor on Sunday.

It is a position Maj. Gen. Otafiire backed, saying: “I agree with the Vice President. The issue of intrigue should be discussed.” It is understood that Gen. Otafiire heads one of the NRM camps, with the second headed by Prof. Bukenya. These two camps, observers say, are hostile to that headed by Mr Amama Mbabazi, the party’s secretary general and Security Minister. The two camps are said to be critical of Mr Mbabazi’s management style and are pushing for his removal from the influential party position.

In an interview on Sunday at his lakeside resort in Garuga, Entebbe, Prof Bukenya said he would endorse the performance of President Museveni as party chairman and his deputies – Hajj Moses Kigongo and Rebecca Kadaga.
“For the other posts I cannot say much,” Prof. Bukenya said, in an apparent snub of the secretary general’s performance.

Although media reports had indicated that Prof. Bukenya would take on Mr Mbabazi for the secretary general post, the Vice President over the weekend ruled out that possibility, saying he would instead defend his position of party vice chairman for central region.

Besides the top officials, fights have also emerged among middle level members—with the most prominent being in Butaleja District where Woman MP Dorothy Hyuha and Bunyole MP Emmanuel Dombo are each sponsoring a candidate against the other for the 2011 elections.
It is on this background that President Museveni is today expected to speak strongly against intrigue and cliques in his party. The programme released yesterday indicates that the President will give a one-hour keynote address to some 500 delegates who started arriving in Kampala for the conference yesterday.

The meeting
The meeting is to discuss the party’s roadmap to 2011 general elections, which is being now overshadowed by internal bickering. But some officials think the intrigue claims are just a storm in a tea cup. “First of all there is no storm and his Prof. Bukenya has said so. He says these are lies in the media. Since he has said he has enemies, it is up to him now to reveal who they are,” the party’s deputy spokesperson, Mr Ofwono Opondo, said.

Maj. Gen. Jim Muhwezi, who chairs the NRM Veterans’ League, said: “What you call wrangles are disagreements and they are healthy provided they are discussed in the right forum. It can’t cost the party. The problem is if they are covered up and not discussed.”

Reports that the differences had also spilt over to the army were yesterday dispelled by the UPDF spokesperson, Lt. Col. Felix Kulayigye, who said the military and the NRM were two different institutions. “The ruling party can afford to bicker but disagreements within the party cannot affect the cohesion of the army,” he said. “But if the two were in direct link like the UPC was when they were in government, then it would but NRM and UPDF are two different institutions.”

The other sticking issue today will be the question of whether to use universal adult suffrage during the party’s primary elections due to start in April. The decision will be taken after a report to be presented by Ms Hyuha on Thursday.

It is understood that whereas senior party officials favour the electoral colleges method on grounds that it is cheap and easy to manage, the young Turks are rooting for adult suffrage, arguing that senior officials have used electoral colleges to rig. At yesterday’s registration, Mr Opondo told Daily Monitor that Shs298 million would be spent on transport refund, feeding and stationery for the delegates.

By 2pm, over 400 delegates had been registered under the computerised registration system that is believed to check double voting during primaries. To note though was the presence of many plain clothed security agents and other uniformed army officers, some of them dishing out logistics. Security agencies are expected to be non-partisan.
Reported by Richard Wanambwa, Mercy Nalugo and Sheila Naturinda