2,000 sign petition against Magyezi Bill
Igara West MP Raphael Magyezi. At least 2,268 residents of Igara West have signed a petition against the Magyezi Bill. PHOTO BY ALEX ESAGALA
Bushenyi- At least 2,268 residents of Igara West, the constituency of mover of the Constitution Amendment Bill, Mr Raphael Magyezi, have signed a petition denouncing his move and said they will walk to Parliament to present their position against the Bill.
The residents started appending their signatures against the proposed amendment to remove the presidential age limit form the Constitution at the weekend.
They said Mr Magyezi did not consult them and his position on the Bill does not reflect their views.
They are led by the National Resistance Movement chairperson for Nyabubare Sub-county, Mr Naboth Kajungu, and Mr Apollo Lee Kakonge, a resident of Nkuuna parish in Nyabubare who also is the executive director of Western Ankole Civil Society Forum.
Out of 2,592 residents, 2,268 (87 per cent) said the Constitution should not be amended to remove the 75-age limit on the presidency while 328 (representing 13 per cent) said they support the amendment.
Mr Kakonge said the process of collecting the signatures was successful and transparent, and that the petition will be taken to Parliament.
He did not say how or when the petition will be presented to Parliament.
Mr Kakonge told Daily Monitor that Mr Magyezi has personalised the Constitution Amendment Bill and shunned consultations of voters in his constituency yet he was assigned and given Shs29m by Parliament to seek his people’s views.
“In the beginning, we thought it was a Bill that he is supposed to tell us about as the people he represents. He is supposed to hold meetings with us as people of Igara West so that we reaffirm this commitment that we do not want the Constitution amended,” Mr Kakonge said.
He also pressed the residents’ demand for Magyezi to account for the Shs29m he received from Parliament for consultative meetings in the constituency to collect people’s views on the Bill. Mr Kajungu, the Nyabubabare NRM chairperson, reiterated his colleague Mr Kakonge’s position and accused Mr Magyezi of subverting the will of the people he represents in Parliament.
The residents, mobilising signatures under their Igara West Power to People Taskforce, threatened to walk to Parliament in Kampala to meet Speaker Rebecca Kadaga to present their position on the Bill.
“We delegated power to him [Mr Magyezi] but he is not using it very well. We want to go to Parliament, meet the Speaker and tell her that our MP is not representing us very well and we don’t know whose views he is representing,” said Mr Savio Tumuramye, the chairperson of the task force.
When contacted by Daily Monitor on Monday, Mr Magyezi challenged the authority of the residents to do the consultations about the Bill. He said it is he, as MP, to consult people, not any other person. He said the residents’ petition cannot negate his consultations.
“What is the mandate of those people and what are their interests? What is the source of the money they are using? Before they even ask of the Shs29m, they must address the issue of who is funding civil society to go to Igara West and Bushenyi,” Mr Magyezi charged. He said he would follow up the matter, adding that he consulted the people and nobody should ask how he did it.
