Bukenya to take on Museveni in 2016

KAMPALA

Prof Gilbert Bukenya, the former vice president, has said he will take on President Museveni in the 2016 general election. In an exclusive interview at his Kakiri country home in Wakiso District on Wednesday, Prof Bukenya, who is the current MP for Busiro North, said the country needed change now and he had decided to step in to provide leadership for that change.

“The country must change, the country must create priorities and we stick to those priorities and for me I think that right now, the priorities must be zero corruption practically not this zero corruption by voices; it must be practical! Leadership cannot be a monopoly of one person,” Prof. Bukenya said.

Using the imagery of football, Prof. Bukenya said, “I now feel I must be in the competition [for the chair] within the party first and we see whoever wins the nomination for president. So I am going to be in the football game in 2016.”

Should Prof Bukenya carry his threat through, it will be the first time Mr Museveni is challenged at the NRM party delegates’ conference for the position of party presidential candidate. “We have always been endorsing the same person as a presidential candidate. We have had elections for secretary general before but no challenger for presidential candidate within the party. If they do cheat me, I will quit and independently contest for the presidency,” he said.

In 2005, Dokolo County MP Felix Okot Ogong announced his intention to challenge Mr Museveni for the position of party presidential candidate ahead of the 2006 general election but he never made it to the party ballot paper, having failed to get endorsement of the party’s Central Executive Committee (CEC).

Mr Museveni was subsequently chosen by unanimous acclamation. The same thing happened in 2010 when Dr Elizabeth Nabatanzi, a presidential aide, sought to challenge her boss at the Namboole delegates’ conference. Prof. Bukenya will therefore have to first get the endorsement of the CEC before he can present himself to the delegates.

Considering President Museveni’s influence in CEC, it will be a herculean task for Bukenya to overcome this stage. His second option, contesting as an independent or using another existing party, therefore looks the most likely possibility.

Courted man
Prof. Bukenya, who was previously a member of the Democratic Party (DP), has recently been courted by some political groups. In February, there were press reports that he had held some discussions with DP but he remained cagey. “When he was arrested and taken to Luzira [in October 2011] we went there and tried to convince him to run on a DP ticket [in the Busiro North by-election]. But he snubbed us and went back to NRM. But there are informal efforts [to lure Bukenya] by a few people which efforts are healthy,” said Mao then.

Prof. Bukenya’s announcement is bound to stir further an already muddled political environment for President Museveni who is facing an internal party revolt with some party leaders saying it’s time for him to go. Mr Museveni has been president since 1986.

Last month, the party expelled four MPs for indiscipline. The four – Theodore Ssekikuubo (Lwemiyaga), Barnabas Tinkasimire (Buyaga), Wilfred Niwagaba (Ndorwa East) and Mohammed Nsereko (Kampala Central) – have been engaged in shouting matches with the President, whom they accuse of tolerating corruption, nepotism and leading the country astray.

Alluding to rampant corruption in the country, Prof Bukenya said what is happening in the Office of the Prime Minister, in the Pensions Office where billions of shillings have been stolen and the state of health care is terrible.

“We must fight money hemorrhage from the government so that money is used in areas where we need to use it,” he said. “For example, if you put Shs250 million in a bag and you throw it to the youth and at the next health centre there is no medicine, then what is the use of you throwing away that money instead of giving it to that health unit so that that health unit can operate and have people who work better?” He said there must be zero tolerance to corruption and the county must focus maximally on agriculture because agriculture what will create incomes for the majority in the country.

Prof Bukenya was in 2010 charged for corruption and remanded in prison but the case was later dismissed. He says this was the work of “mafia” in government and it will not stop him from fighting for change.

How much support could he have?

Mr Bukenya is thought to be capable of mobilising a sizeable following among his ethnic constituency, Buganda, and among the Catholics. At the height of his power as the vice president, Mr Bukenya published his auto-biography, Through Intricate Corridors to Power, and hosted the Kabaka of Buganda, Ronald Muwenda Mutebi, at his Katomi Kingdom Hotel in Wakiso to launch it.

Coming at the height of a disagreement between the Kabaka and President Museveni, some viewed Mr Bukenya’s actions and the contents of the book as a stab at his then boss’ chair. Mr Bukenya had also been accused of rallying the Catholic Church behind what Mr Museveni’s sympathisers viewed as his presidential bid.

He is also thought to be capable of mobilising the rural vote in parts outside Buganda, particularly those areas where he led the drive for the growing of upland rice. He could also rally anti-Museveni forces which have been scattered by the lack of a rallying candidate.

Additional reporting by Eriasa Mukiibi Sserunjogi

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