Dear Kasese NRM MPs, media isn’t best forum for Mumbere’s issues  

Early this week, three NRM Members of Parliament from Kasese addressed a news conference at Parliamentary Buildings. They subtly protested the delayed court trial of Omusinga Charles Wesley Mumbere (king of Rwenzururu Kingdom).

When I was still active, what  the MPs did could attract the tag of “seeking cheap popularity” or “populism” or “attention seeking”. All these are held in contempt by the party leadership (which always advise members to pass their grievances through the right channels and address their issues in the right forum). And the media, as Kasese’s NRM MPs may need to know, has never been the right forum for internal policy debates or demands in the NRM.

The NRM MPs may have wanted to score quick wins with public perceptions back home, but if they had bothered to ask, they would have been advised that the Omusinga’s situation (I deliberately avoid to refer to it as a court case) need more brain than brawn. It needs more tact than act.

In April (during the retreat of new NRM MPs, Kasese NRM MPs are said to have issued a memorandum (I am not sure about this) to the President about the Omusinga issue. And to the best of my knowledge, there is no record of a follow up on the memorandum. Why the rush to the media?

More disturbing is the revelation that all the Kasese MPs are said to have to have agreed that issues concerning “the situation” of  the Omusinga should not be discussed in the media. Plus: there was a recent NRM parliamentary caucus in which the Kasese MPs could have raised the issue. But then…, the honourable MPs chose the camera lights.

My fear is that Mr Museveni’s handlers may (erroneously or otherwise) view the action of the Kasese NRM MPs as an open challenge to the President in a public space (on a matter he is said to be keen).

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As keen observers of national politics, some of us have come to the hard conclusion that the Omusinga ’s issues will be resolved outside court; and it is our prayer that the issues are resolved in a manner that reflects mutual respect and understanding on both sides. We may want to act smart and call for a quick court case. But some of us have been in Uganda long enough to know that Omusinga ’s “situation” is not a smart one.

I would like to take this opportunity to offer the NRM MPs unsolicited advice. They should seek an audience with the Mr Museveni. They should go with a proposal which will be the basis for debate and bargain. With the meeting, they will have created some kind of reference point on which to make follow ups.

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I have always drawn parallels of the Mumbere “situation” with the exiling of Ssekabaka Edward Mutesa from Buganda in 1952. There were the protests and demands. And there was a court case running in London. But as it were to be; with all the expectations to the contrary, Kabaka Mutesa lost the case. And then what?

Even the Crown that won the case soon realised that victory was not enough. It was the dialogue dabbed the Namirembe Conferences that resolved the impasse (not the Crown’s victory in a London Court or the protests in Buganda).

So, from the experience of Ssekabaka Edward Mutesa’s exile, can the said MPs craft a proposal for something like the Namirembe Conferences? 
But the Namirembe Conferences didn’t just happen? Someone had to make suggestions. That’s why we call on the Kasese NRM MPs to use more tact that act.

Mr Bisiika is the executive editor of the East African Flagpost. [email protected]