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EALA polls: How political parties have prepared
The East African Legislative Assembly in session in July. PHOTO/FILE
What you need to know:
- Uganda will nominate nine representatives to the 5th Assembly of East African Legislative Assembly.
As the race for the election of Ugandan representatives to the East African Legislative Assembly (EALA) heats up, political parties and independents are conducting final campaigns ahead of nominations on Monday next week.
The National Resistance Movement (NRM) party caucus is set to meet today at Kololo Ceremonial Grounds to agree on their candidates.
The National Unity Platform (NUP) has, however, boycotted the process while the other parties including the Forum for Democratic Change (FDC), the Democratic Party (DP), and the Uganda Peoples Congress (UPC) are campaigning across party colours to garner support.
Uganda will nominate nine representatives to the 5th Assembly of EALA. Of these six are ring-fenced for the NRM, one for independent, and two for the Opposition parties in Parliament.
In an interview with Daily Monitor yesterday, Dr Tanga Odoi, the NRM Electoral Commission chairperson, said the July 8 decision by the Central Executive Committee (CEC) to maintain the current representatives still stands and will be communicated to the caucus.
“CEC said the current members have done very well. We are not going to have any new members,” Dr Odoi said.
“We [shall] lay strategies on how they will work in plenary to vote NRM members. I do not think caucus will change because they have always worked well with decisions of CEC,” Mr Odoi added.
The current NRM representatives are Mr Dennis Namara, Mr Paul Musamali, Mr Mary Mugyenyi, Ms Rose Akol, Mr Stephen George Odongo, and Mr James Kakooza. Their tenure ends on December 17.
Some of the disgruntled members of the NRM have elected to stand as independents.
Meanwhile, the Leader of Opposition in Parliament, Mr Mathias Mpuuga, yesterday said: “we will not have NUP candidates”.
Last month, Mr Mpuuga announced the boycott faulting the NRM for not only ring-fencing majority positions but also “meddling” in the processes of other parties.
“The unsolicited position is that we do not expect them to vote regime-leaning candidates,” Mr Mpuuga said.
For the FDC, Mr Harold Kaija, the deputy secretary general, is the party flag bearer for the election.
“I have filled the forms, and the only thing I have left is to go and pay their money. The Opposition colleagues were the first I spoke to. I will consolidate that and then try to get it from NRM,” he said.
The DP secretary general, Mr Gerald Siranda, is seeking to replace Mr Fred Mukasa Mbidde.
“We are marketing our idea of dialogue, and the EAC dream can only be achieved through dialogue,” Mr Siranda said.
He added: “DP has nine members, and to win you need over 300 so it is logic that to win we need to do everything within our means to engage those who have the numbers.”
The UPC will be represented by the party Secretary General, Mr Fred Ebil. The UPC Spokesperson, Ms Sharon Oyat, said nomination forms are ready.
The party said they are engaging individual legislators.
The law
Article 50 (1) of the Treaty for the Establishment of the EAC provides that “The National Assembly of each partner state shall elect, not from among its members, nine members of the Assembly, who shall represent as much as it is feasible, the various political parties represented in the National Assembly, shades of opinion, gender and other special interest groups in that Partner State, in accordance with such procedure as the National Assembly of each Partner state may determine,”
