COVID-19: Parliament to continue with business, no more visitors

The Parliamentary Commission has decided that business of the House will go on amidst President Museveni’s directives to ban public and political meetings, religious gatherings and others for one month as a way of averting the spread of the deadly coronavirus, Daily Monitor understands.

Sources from the Parliamentary Commission have told this newspaper that the decision was taken during a meeting chaired by Speaker Rebecca Kadaga.

“We have decided not to close Parliament because that will mean closure of government.
Remember, Parliament has to facilitate the budget process for Financial Year 2020/2021,” a member of the commission said on condition of anonymity.

But the sources say, among the measures put in place by Parliament, there will be no more visitors for the next one month.

Parliament has also decided to restrict the number of journalists each media house will assign to cover the proceedings of the committees and plenary every day. There are over 250 journalists accredited to Parliament with some of the major media houses having more than five reporters each.

“These are key measures we have taken. Even you journalists, we have decided, only two will be allowed from each of the media houses that cover this House. There will also be no more visitors coming in for the next 32 days,” the source said.

Another decision that has been made is that Parliament which has hundreds of workers will not send away its staff apart from the political assistants of the MPs who will be asked to work from home. The decision was that support work to the MPs can be done by their personal assistants electronically and will still be received via the iPads which were given to every member at the start of the 10th Parliament.

As the different committees of Parliament are expected to interact with Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDAs) in regard to the ministerial policy statements that were recently laid on the floor, the commission has restricted the number of officials each MDA will send, to only four people.

Priority will be given to the minister, permanent secretary and two top officials per ministry whereas for the departments and agencies, priority will be given to the executive directors or managing directors who will be accompanied by three other senior staff.

Meanwhile, the Parliamentary Commission immediately after the meeting, launched the hand wash campaign as a way of encouraging Ugandans to use ordinary soap to regularly wash their hands as a way of preventing the virus.

The hand washing exercise was launched by the Speaker in the presence of journalists in the Parliamentary lobby.

“We want to show Ugandans that they can regularly wash their hands using this ordinary soap if they cannot afford to buy the sanitisers,” Ms Kadaga said.

Such hand washing points, the commission decided, will be installed in all corners of the Parliamentary building including committee meeting rooms.