By Mulengera Reporters
One of the candidates for the NRM CEC position of Buganda region vice chairman recently campaigned in Mubende. The delegates were eager and expected a lot of money from the candidate only to be disappointed when his team gave out transport refund of just Shs50,000 to each one of them!
The delegates became angry, ranted and almost beat up the candidate who they branded ‘too mean’ to deserve their vote. They immediately contacted rich man Moses Karangwa of Kayunga who also wants the same seat. Karangwa immediately responded and gave Shs300,000 for each delegate.
These are mainly NRM chairpersons at Sub County and district levels. Flag bearers too will be delegates and this will equally apply to those seeking to carry NRM flag for MP, LC5 and Sub county level chairpersons and councilors.
Karangwa’s Shs300,000 greatly excited greater Mubende delegates who vowed to kill him with votes.
As he departed, Karangwa assured them this was just the beginning as more money was on the way. He made it clear that he would drown each one of them into even bigger money in August during the much-anticipated NRM conference at Namboole.
But earlier on, there was a gathering at Hotel Africana where one of the contenders for another CEC position summoned and hosted all newly elected NRM district (DEC) chairpersons. Other poorer contenders learnt of this gathering and came around too to take advantage of such a large presence of potential voters, to sell their respective campaign messages. One of them gave each Chairperson Shs1m as transport refund, another Shs300,000 and another Shs200,000.
The giving out of money to woo over delegates had reduced weeks ago after President Museveni used his state of the nation address to complain about fellow leaders giving out such money to win over voters. He questioned the source of such money and advised those campaigning to refrain from this sort of thing.
He clarified that whereas for him he can afford since MPs appropriate such money to enable him help out the financially distressed citizens, it wasn’t sustainable for any other political leader to have such endless funding. Yet the delegates have created such a huge dilemma as they have repeatedly made it clear that he who looks after them materially will have their vote, and not the stingy ones who like eating alone. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
