Mbabazi set for delegates meet

KAMPALA

The NRM Secretary General, currently on forced leave, yesterday said he will be attending the highly anticipated ruling party’s delegates’ conference due in a fortnight.
Mr Amama Mbabazi, who was dropped as prime minister in September amidst claims that he is plotting against President Museveni, confirmed his attendance when a group of journalists confronted him at Parliament.
Mr Mbabazi was also asked if he is aware of a subterranean plot to make life hard for him at the venue, Mandela National Stadium, including an attempt to push him out of the party, in which until now, he has been considered the de facto second-in-command to party chairman, President Museveni.
“I will definitely attend the conference. Who would want to push me out of the party? Do I look like a person who…,” he said, before disentangling himself from the media.
This confirmation, however, comes at a time when the party is using Resident District Commissioners to accredit NRM delegates for the conference.
Deputy party spokesperson Ofwono Opondo told Daily Monitor this week they are using RDCs to counteract Mbabazi’s alleged machinations.
“We want to be sure that the right members come for the delegates conference because Mbabazi had informally replaced some delegates, so we sent a list to the district chairmen and the RDCs to do a security accreditation.
“We have information that Mbabazi people are going around telling people all NRM members are invited and that they want to bring 500,000 people and cause chaos in Namboole and so the RDCs will help us get the right people,” Mr Opondo said.
A communique sent to all RDCs on November 21 from the President’s Office informs them of the upcoming event and asks them to carry out accreditation of all eligible NRM party members.
“You are advised to give top priority to this task as it will enable the organisers of the conference to organise identification tags in good time to avoid delays…,” the letter reads in part.
However, the shadow minister for constitutional affairs, Mr Medard Ssegona, on Wednesday said including RDCs is not only wrong but also criminal because they are civil servants who are not supposed to engage in partisan politics.
“Participating in partisan politics [by public servants] is abuse of office by the President and the RDCs and is criminal. That confirms what we have been saying that the President has fused the party with the State… he [should] resign his office and concentrate on his party,” he said.
In Iganga District, delegates already trooped to the RDC’s office for accreditation. The requirements include a passport photo, information about the area you represent and a telephone contact.
But in an email to Daily Monitor, minister for Presidency Frank Tumwebaze expressed ignorance about use of the RDCs.
“Who is using the RDCs? Am not aware. But even if that was to be, it has nothing wrong or illegal with it. The RDC is the head of the security committee at the district. Police and intelligence are under the coordination of the RDC’s office. The security committee supports anybody or group on security matters irrespective of any political side they are on,” Mr Tumwebaze said.
He said even Opposition parties have benefited from their services.
“When FDC or DP is conducting its meeting, security agencies don’t just look on. They give any possible security related support whether solicited or unsolicited. So security agencies will not be watching idle as NRM convenes a gathering of over 10,000 people. It’s their constitutional mandate to plan for security arrangements,” the minister said.
Meanwhile, other sources have reported that the President lost his cool when NRM leaders from western region rejected a proposal to have an appointed secretary general during Tuesday’s meeting at State House Entebbe. However, the minister also denied this.
“All that is cooked and diversionary. Go and speak to those district leaders and councillors who attended and you hear them [instead of] depending on those deliberately cooked stories of conflicted sources,” Mr Tumwebaze said.
He said the present flurry of meetings which have been underway in Entebbe this week “are a continuation of the President’s zonal meetings on household income but this time involving district councillors and their chairmen who have been feeling left out from the previous meetings the President had mainly with MPs”.
So far, district officials from Kampala, western, central and Karamoja have attended what Mr Tumwebaze maintained were routine consultative meetings the President has always held with leaders.
Daily Monitor understands that the President urged members to remember history and that the young must be guided by NRM.
He reportedly told his audience that he had parted ways with people who are ideologically bankrupt and that it’s those people who are causing disharmony and confusion in the party. He is reported to have denounced this as a betrayal and obstructionism.
Other sources indicated that the President also told his visitors now that his family members are middle class income earners, they will not accept anyone creating a situation different from what they are living in now.

Additional reporting by Yazid Yolisingira

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