By Mulengera Reporters
Ordinarily, the typical script at the NRM retreat should have read like this. Journalists are locked out as MPs converge at Kyankwanzi under the guise of induction ahead of their swearing-in week. While there, they are cajoled and stampeded into passing resolutions cementing the ruling party’s position on contentious issues of the day in the country.
The timing of this year’s retreat coincided with the intense debate on who deserves to be Speaker of the 12th Parliament. Heavyweight Nobert Mao’s getting into the race has made what ordinarily should have looked obvious, complicated and hard to predict.
Mao has, by implication, so far, portrayed himself as someone with backing of some powerful actors in the Museveni universe. And yet the absence of overt endorsement by actors like Gen MK or even Gen Salim Saleh and First Lady Janet Museveni (she rarely gets involved in such contentious things) has caused some anxiety among would-be Anita Among supporters.
The NRM system Ugandans have been acclimatized to for all these years would ordinarily have had it MPs rally behind a resolution declaring incumbent Anita Among and her deputy Thomas Tayebwa the ruling party’s sole candidates. This never happened at this year’s Kyankwanzi retreat. Instead you had an unusually ambivalent Gen Museveni responding to concerns raised by Aringa County MP Yorke Odria Alioni by indicating readiness to have the earlier CEC position (backing the two incumbents) reviewed and reconsidered.
Naturally, this equivocation by the President who is also the national party chairman, dispirited many at the Kyankwanzi retreat. It emboldened people in the Mao universe, notwithstanding Among’s efforts to push back.
Like her supporters, Anita Among must have felt pressured by the ambivalence with which Gen Museveni spoke. There was no resolution ratifying the earlier CEC position.
Such sole candidature resolution approach was in 2015 used to effectively clamp the wings of then powerful PM and NRM Secretary General Amama Mbabazi who was mounting an internal challenge to Museveni as Ugandans counted down to 2016 elections. The same would have been used to clamp and deflate Mao at the 2026 Kyankwanzi if that is what Gen Museveni desired.
An emboldened Mao was to immediately push back against Among (who used to materially look after him in those hard days before joining Cabinet) by fearlessly branding her a bad mannered person that is synonymous with bad politics. This was posted on his X handle. Moments later, he recorded a video and launched more verbal missiles saying that the manner in which Among spoke corroborated his long held view that she is fatally unfit for the office she holds.
He also said he is an invited guest and not a refuge, in a bid to depict the fact that his opponent came from FDC and was never an original Movementist. He called her manner of speech ‘undignified,’ synonymous with ‘gutter politics.’ This indeed was hitting below the belt by Mao who is being pressured by his wife Beatrice (among other backers) not to back down.
A tough-talking Mao lost his cool in that video and went as far using crude words like ‘rubbish’ among others, in a bid to vanquish his worthy opponent. He also claimed he was supposed to make a speech at the retreat which he says was blocked by Among’s people. He added that Andrew Mwenda (Principal Advisor to Gen MK) was the other speaker whose speech was blocked at the retreat ostensibly because he has been very outspoken while disputing Among’s suitability for the job.
Renowned for his arsenal of words, Mao demanded to know how Among can claim it would be anomalous to allow him access to the bedroom, yet in actual sense he is already sitting in the Cabinet. He said not talking at Kyankwanzi doesn’t diminish him in anyway because he is an eloquent speaker who has many other speaking platforms.
M7’S DILEMMA:
This part of the story is dedicated to illustrating how Gen Museveni’s power can sometimes be constrained, contrary to what many people think. Let’s explain it this way: Gen Museveni greatly appreciates what Among has done in the last 10-15 years to strengthen his politics, including helping him to infiltrate and obliterate the threat Dr. Kizza Besigye’s FDC posed for roughly 20 years.
Also as Speaker, Anita Among has done a lot to eliminate the headache Parliament used to occasion to him especially under the leadership of the combative Rebecca Kadaga.
Today, he can afford his sleep because he is assured of controlling the narrative among both NRM and opposition MPs. This has all been enabled by Anita Among who the President rings more times to harmonize things at Parliament than he calls his party’s GCW Hamson Obua. Being an experienced guerilla, Gen Museveni always seeks intel on all MPs, including on very small personal things and all this he these days gets directly from Anita Among.
Such information helps him know individual MPs’ vulnerabilities regardless of whether they are NRM or opposition. Being able to have a Speaker who easily helps out on all these is something Gen Museveni ought to be very grateful for and he is. Among, who is also number three in CEC, added a bonus by being visible and active everywhere during the campaign trail.
All these combine to make her a good likeable cadre for the President yet this isn’t a decision he can make alone anymore. There are other very powerful actors in his family, security and even among some of his historical and influential allies. A lot of these are uncomfortable with the Anita Among continuity and this is something the Bukedea Woman MP ought to be very much aware of. Some of these don’t only want Anita Among out of the Speaker’s office but even want her investigated and potentially prosecuted (Gilbert Bukenya style if not worse). Going all out to endorse and justify the Anita Among continuity at Kyankwanzi would inevitably put Gen Museveni at loggerheads with such powerful actors whose concurrence hasn’t yet been secured on preserving the status quo at Parliament.
Knowledgeable sources say that this dilemma is similar to what Gen Museveni faced on how to manage the Rebecca Kadaga question after the long-serving Kamuli Woman MP lost to Jacob Oulanyah during the May 2021 Speakership vote at Kololo. This vote preceded the unveiling of the new Cabinet into which many of Kadaga allies, like Jessica Alupo, ate big while some unrepentant ones like Sarah Opendi were dropped.
Even after Gen Museveni personally calling and gratifying individual MPs (almost all members of the NRM caucus) and staying put at Kololo to personally witness the voting, Rebecca Kadaga (who defied CEC and remained in the race as an independent) still managed to get 190 votes as Oulanyah (in whose advantage the state machinery was unleashed) won with 300 something. This was phenomenal and it made Museveni confirm the Kadaga political strength not just in her native Busoga but also among the 11th Parliament members.
He had to handle her cautiously because any fallout with her would be costly to NRM and the country as well. After sending out emissaries who successfully pleaded with Kadaga to lie low as opposed to convening a defiant news conference or political gatherings to bash the NRM, Museveni immediately engaged with the lady who he fondly calls ‘my sister.’ He offered to appoint her to Cabinet to keep her integrated into the ruling system.
Feeling terribly crashed, Kadaga was initially reluctant saying she needed time to heal but gradually opened up and accepted to play ball while working towards permanent de-escalation as opposed to working towards causing a split in the political system.
At first, Gen Museveni was willing to make her Prime Minister or Vice President onto which some other lucrative docket would be added (Specioza Kazibwe was VP and Minister of Agriculture too). Even after Kadaga had accepted and the deal was almost sealed, Gen Museveni got back to her with an apology.
He made it clear that, upon consultation, some of the powerful people in his universe had objected to this arrangement. Their argument was that giving Kadaga such powerful posting would portray the CiC as rewarding defiance similar to what the outgoing Speaker had just exhibited by standing against Jacob Oulanyah, who was the official CEC candidate.
Museveni remorsefully explained to Kadaga that many of the powerful people in his universe had been deeply hurt over the hardline stances she occasionally took over some controversial matters that came to her desk when she was Speaker. In fact, a lot of them were so angry they wanted her to just drop to mere being a back bencher after losing Speakership but because he is broad-minded, Gen Museveni understood how such demystification would hurt his long term politics as her Basoga co-ethnics would consider such persecution and this would diminish the Movement’s acceptability amongst the ordinary people in Busoga.
Gratefully, (a now optionless) Kadaga understood and accepted the lesser powerful position of Deputy Prime Minister in order to help her longtime political ally Museveni balance the contending interests among key actors in his universe. One only prays that those same powerful actors, who are anti-status quo at Parliament, do not end up sealing Anita Among’s fate in favor of Norbert Mao, who many of them prefer and consider to be a better aligned person with whom they can keep doing the business of running the country going forward. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
