Parliament should not be extravagant

While I haven’t started with a quick research on how parliamentarians in other parts of the world are treated, I think ours is becoming an exceptional case.

Apart from its large size whereby even with the absence 100 members business goes on, the cyclic donations to members are alarming. They conveniently reaped from the car bonanza not long ago and now it is the ipads’ harvest.

A Ugandan Member of Parliament can afford an ipad if they wish to have one. I don’t think there is something special they would wish to perform with one that costs over €600. These cyclic gifts will not only make the job of MP more attractive even to the unqualified, but will also induce the current lot of representatives to suggest extension of the term of service to seven years! Many will vie to be Members of Parliament yet the incumbents will not be willing to stand down, even when their performance is poor.

Parliament and the job of representation need to be redefined. It shouldn’t be an institution for propagating social class and perpetuating gross inequality.

Julius Zaake,
jzwasswa2010@yahoo.com