By Mulengera Reporters
Having been incumbent for almost 15 years without break (counting from 2012 to date), Mohammed Muwanga Kivumbi has some explaining to do to the voters before they can agree to hire him back to serve as their MP for another 5 years.
NRM strategists see an opportunity to strike and get back the Butambala County MP Seat which their Faizal Kikulukunyu and Kaddunabi Lubega (now of Insurance Regulatory Authority) used to hold. Muwanga’s NUP comrade Aisha Kabanda Nalule faces slightly different circumstances because she has been MP for only 5 years.
The NRMs in Butambala are counting on former Daily Monitor Journalist Eriasa Mukibi Serunjogi and Lydia Mirembe, who Aisha Kabanda beat in 2021, to win back the two seats. Ironically, perhaps because they realize how hard the ruling party has become to sell to voters in especially Buganda where majority voters are young people, the two declined carrying the NRM flag. They instead preferred to stand as independents but friendly to NRM.
As of 2016, when she controversially beat Aisha Kabanda, Lydia Mirembe was on the NRM ticket but she now realizes a lot has changed, with majority voters being young people (the under 25) who are very exhausted about living in a country which has been under one President for 40 years.
Mirembe has preferred to face Kabanda head on and have voters judge her on her individual merit as their former MP, as opposed to carrying the burden of having to explain NRM’s longevity and poor service delivery record of 40 years. Being independent also lessens on her the burden of having to being compelled to market candidate YK Museveni for President in a community where the young people who are the majority demonstrably prefer someone else-namely Bobi Wine.
This strategy by Mirembe means that Aisha Kabanda, who Mirembe previously beat, has real reason to worry. It will be hard for Kabanda to make her carry the NRM burden now that she is an independent not standing on the ruling party ticket. And gratefully, voters including those from inside NRM seem to have appreciated why Mirembe is better off challenging Kabanda as an independent so that she isn’t burdened with having to account for NRM failures.
The ruling party has a candidate carrying the flag for Woman MP against Aisha Kabanda and she has been shunned by majority NRMs in favour of Mirembe who they see as having better chances at beating the incumbent.
When it comes to Muwanga Kivumbi, the man NRM gave its flag is Mafu Bavekuno who is the former LC5 Chairman. He served at a time when sex harassment and jobs-for-money were common occurrences among members of the district service commission. Bavekuno personally didn’t do any of these to anyone’s child but Butambala residents resented him for failing to be adequately outspoken against these vices yet he had power, the office and platform to lead in pushing back. Because of this and many other reasons, he is generally unpopular even among NRM supporters.
Many inside NRM are backing Eriasa Mukiibi who analysts maintain has a significant chance to beat Muwanga Kivumbi in the ballot box. He is well educated and intellectual as much as Muwanga is, if not more. He is youthful and flamboyant too. He is also an eloquent speaker of both Luganda and English.
He is also the young brother to PSST Ramathan Goobi, implying money and generally campaign financing isn’t his problem. In fact, even when he is a brother to PSST, Eriasa Mukiibi is liberal minded and can even be more eloquent than Muwanga when it comes to pointing out the weaknesses of the regime.
Many implored him to carry the NRM flag but he consistently declined from day one. He is also well grounded among Muslim clerics who Butambala has in abundant supply. Naturally, he has the blessing of Goobi through whom a lot of development and service delivery improvements have come to Butambala. In demonstrating loyalty to Bobi Wine, Muwanga Kivumbi has made many enemies and more so from among the older opposition ranks.
His relationship with old political allies like Mathias Mpuuga, Semujju Nganda, Erias Lukwago and lately Medard Segona has become strained. He has openly been clashing with Moses Kasibante, another wordsmith from Butambala, many times on CBS radio’s Wednesday program over the Kyagulanyi-related differences. All this isolation, though it may not hurt Muwanga in the immediate term for as long as Kyagulanyi remains popular, in some way, has diminished the incumbent Butambala County MP by complicating his relationship with old comrades. This too can potentially embolden his political adversaries within Butambala.
Among the NRMs, it’s mainly Moses Kigongo and a few other elderly cadres who are sticking with Mafu Bavekuno and the Woman MP Seat flag bearer-otherwise majority are solidly behind Eriasa Mukiibi and Lydia Mirembe-which naturally is bad news for both Muwanga and Kabanda.
But Mukiibi’s supporters have easily overlooked Mzee Kigongo because this won’t the first-time flag bearers he backs will have lost in the general elections to NRM-friendly independents. In 2011, Mariam Nalubega stood as an independent and defeated minister Namirembe Bitamazire who Kigongo vigorously backed simply because she is the one who had the flag.
Bitamazire was a long serving Woman MP having started out for Mpigi only to move to Butambala after the old Mpigi was split up to create Gomba and Butambala. Eriasa Mukiibi supporters are convinced that Kigongo’s hesitancy will once again be overcome and neutralized as was the case during Bitamazire’s time.
Even in 2016, Kigongo backed Aisha Kabanda (those days a very powerful private secretary to the President in State House) simply because she is the one who had the flag but the race was ultimately won by Lydia Mirembe in the general elections.
As all this is being reflected upon, Butambala political watchers are anxious that the existence of Goobi-backed Eriasa Mukiibi and Kigongo-backed Bavekuno in the same race might create an irreversible wedge between the two most powerful Musevenists in contemporary Butambala. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
