Speaker Oulanyah should lead a mindset change
Author: Muniini K. Mulera. PHOTO/FILE
Dear Tingasiga:
My wife and I were very pleased by the news of Jacob L’okori Oulanyah’s election as Speaker of Uganda’s Parliament. We congratulate him and hope that he will offer a less combative and humbler style of leadership than his predecessor.
We also hope that Oulanyah will restrict the Speaker’s roles and public activities to those that are prescribed by law and tradition. These are to preside over all sittings of Parliament; to chair the Parliamentary Commission, the Committee on Appointments and the Business Committee; to represent Parliament in its corporate relations; and to prologue Parliament by proclamation.
Above all, we hope that Oulanyah will revive the tradition of political impartiality from the Chair, one that is at the core of the success of the mature Westminster-style parliamentary democracies. He should sever all ties with his political party and rigorously adopt a non-partisan stance in all matters, including complete avoidance of public speeches on partisan or other controversial matters.
Rebecca Kadaga, his predecessor, was a party operative with undisguised ambitions for higher office. She commented on almost all controversial issues, often adopting a populist stance with an eye on enhancing her political fortunes in the undeclared presidential succession race. Her calendar often had her meeting with various special interest groups whose issues ought to have been handled by their parliamentary and other representatives.
If he chooses a non-partisan approach, Oulanyah will enhance the power of his office without necessarily clashing with the President or the Chief Justice of the country.
Instead, he will advance the country’s uphill struggle for democratisation by according the entire Parliament, not just the ruling party MPs, the opportunity to engage in solid legislative work. To be sure, his own power will be consolidated and dignified – as it should be.
One area that his predecessor excelled at was wastage of public funds on multiple trips abroad to attend social gatherings of various Ugandan Diaspora community organisations. She was almost always accompanied by dozens of MPs, reportedly funded by the taxpayer, who contributed nothing to the deliberations or programmes of the host organisations.
More to the point, these junkets by the Speaker and her MPs added zero value to the lives of the citizens back home, the majority of whom continued to struggle at the margins. Besides enjoying the opportunities to tour the world and enjoy royal hospitality at these gatherings abroad, the Speaker used the patronage opportunities to gain and/or retain support of MPs.
I had a run-in with Speaker Rebecca Kadaga when I challenged her and the MPs to explain how their presence at the UNAA convention in Philadelphia, USA in 2012 benefitted citizens back home. As moderator of the well-attended political debate of UNAA, I also asked the MPs to justify their emoluments relative to the earnings of the majority of public servants including teachers, nurses and doctors.
Instead of a reasoned and respectful presentation of her case, Kadaga launched into a defensive lecture that many in the audience considered rude and uninformative. I recall remembering the famous line by Queen Gertrude in William Shakespeare’s Hamlet: “The lady doth protest too much, methinks.”
In the subsequent years, Kadaga and her MPs’ presence at these Diaspora community gatherings increased, costing Ugandan citizens enormous amounts of money. To this day, nobody has made a persuasive argument to justify the mass travel of Ugandan MPs to these entertainment-rich gatherings that are great opportunities for Diaspora Ugandans to network and catch up with friends and family.
Speaker Oulanyah has an opportunity to become a fiscally responsible head of the Legislature. He should decline invitations to these Diaspora gatherings. Of course, he should be free to use personal funds to attend these things in his private capacity.
He should insist on frugal husbandry of public resources, placing the interests on the people of Omoro, Rukiga, Bududa and Kyazanga above those of the MPs. A fiscally responsible parliament gains a legitimate claim to the right to supervise the executive branch’s management of the national treasury.
An area that invites Oulanyah’s leadership is the issue of parliamentarians’ emoluments and other benefits. He should remind the Legislature that the 426 MPs are no more important than any other law-abiding citizen.
Their personal and family interests are no different from those of the other 44 million Ugandans. Their health care needs, their children’s education, their transportation and their funerals are no more important than those of factory labourers, teachers, soldiers, doctors, police officers or market women.
A mindset change in Parliament is urgently needed. Equality of citizens should be at the heart of the Legislative and other considerations. The national budget should be designed to serve the majority of citizens, not a parasitic elite headed by the Legislature and the controllers of the executive branch.
This mindset change needs a champion. Speaker Oulanyah should seize the moment and lead parliament in this direction.
Few people get opportunities to wield transformative power and influence for the common good. Oulanyah can make his new office and power to be about his countrymen and women, not about him.
He can have an impact that will place his name among the true leaders of our country. And he can do this without getting into petty personal fights or political fights with the heads of the other branches of the government. We wish him great success in his new assignment.
Mulera is a medical doctor.
