Besigye and Nandala Mafabi should do a music battle

Mr Thomas Tayebwa, the Deputy Speaker of Parmiament, “has called” for a music battle between Jose Chameleon and Bebe Cool.

However, Mr Tayebwa’s choice of battle protagonists is less exciting. Mr Speaker Sir, we need a battle between FDC’s Najja and Katonga factions. They offer a better battle prospect than the singers.

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In a structured engagement, the debate on FDC leadership crisis is about: Who or what represents the best interests of the party (heritage, agency and legacy)? But it has been reduced to Katonga Faction (Kizza Besigye) and Najja Faction (Nandala Mafabi).

Yet the initial issue was accountability. What started as a call for accountability has now gotten its own life.

It is disheartening that FDC, which once boasted of being the only political party with audited books of accounts, is being ruined by a simple question: Where did this particular sum of money come from? A mere call for accountability has now turned into a leadership crisis.

This reminds us of the run up to the 2016 presidential elections in which FDC was involved in a tussle in TDA (The Democratic Alliance).

Well,  Amama Mbabazi went to TDA with a ‘pregnant’ presidential aspiration. He came out leading UPC, DP, PPP and UFA to make a charge at the presidency.

The Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) went to TDA as a political party (complete with a duly elected party presidential candidate, party registration, party owned HQ property, secretariat, the watts etc).

But it was reduced to one person: Dr Kizza Besigye. That’s why Dr Besigye (not FDC) was savaged for TDA’s failure to come up with a consensus candidate.

Mbabazi was such a big thing that some clever writer even said Ugandans would not forgive Dr Besigye for his refusal to rally behind Mbabazi’s presidential candidature.

At that time, no one remembered (any more) that Besigye had been formally introduced to TDA as the FDC’s presidential candidate by Mugisha Muntu (FDC party president).

Commenting on the issue then, I wrote: “Mr Amama Mbabazi, behind whom Dr Besigye (actually the FDC) is supposed to surrender its presidential candidature, is like an exiled warrior prince seeking the crown of the land of his refuge on account of his prodigious battle front valour.”

And what followed was a clash between the Crown Prince (Besigye) and the refugee warrior prince (Amama Mbabazi). It was such a spectacle to countenance.

So, because of our 2016 experience, we need to redirect this debate to its original query: where did this particular sum of money come from? Is it (how is it?) reflected in FDC’s books of accounts?

Otherwise reducing the FDC leadership crisis to a Besigye-Nandala thing is not helping matters. Aloof cynics like me may even propose a music battle between the two.

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The fall out (on social media) between supporters of FDC Katonga Faction and those of FDC Najja Faction has reached alarming levels, a level where it could spill over from the computer and smart phone screens to the physical public.

It is humiliating to even imagine that very soon, the so-called junta police may be called in to save FDC from itself. Needless to say, in spite of the subtle  manifest of NRM’s sympathy for the Najja Faction, NRM’s ultimate wish is that the two factions fight themselves to total destruction.

When two elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers. But what happens when two grasses fight? The elephant, particularly if that elephant has hat on the head, just eats the grass. End of story… Maneno kwisha kabisa

Mr Asuman Bisiika is the Executive Editor of the East African Flagpost. [email protected]
Minority Report