By Mulengera Reporters
During a specially-news conference at PLU National Chairman’s new offices in the leafy neighborhood of Nakasero on Wednesday, Omutume David Kabanda, the Executive Assistant to Gen MK, publicly commended GCW Dr. Jane Ruth Aceng for using the last January elections to lead the people of Lango in rejecting and politically obliterating the Uganda People’s Congress (UPC).
Speaking for & on behalf of his Principal Gen MK, Kabanda specifically addressed himself to the Lira Woman MP race in which Aceng defeated UPC first lady Betty Amongi, who is also wife to Milton Obote’s son Jimmy Akena. Kabanda said that, by securing that win for the ruling NRM party, with which PLU has an MoU, Aceng and her voters had demystified UPC in its own cradle of Lango sub region.
He said that Amongi deserved the political humiliation she suffered because she stubbornly abandoned her safer MP seat of Oyam South and came to Lira City to destroy Aceng, who Kabanda described as a key power broker in the politics of both MK’s PLU and Gen Museveni’s NRM in that sub region.
“We that Dr. Aceng for disciplining her thoroughly in that election and PLU is prepared to ensure she is properly disciplined the next time she ever tries to antagonize Dr. Aceng in that Lira City seat,” bragged Kabanda who was surrounded by a group of PLU-affiliated MPs who were led by Eliab Naturinda at the new PLU National Chairman’s office.
Kabanda blamed Amongi and her husband Jimmy Akena of resorting to blackmailing Museveni and Gen MK instead of accepting that political defeat in good faith. He said the duo had resorted to undermining Dr. Aceng and other NRM cadres in the hope that doing so will help revive the plummeting political fortunes for their UPC party.
He also claimed that Akena was envious of Gen MK because his PLU, which is barely five years in existence, boasts of over 320 MPs yet UPC, which is one of Uganda’s oldest parties, has only 12 in the 12th Parliament.
He said that the recent inclusion of Santa Alum one of the MPs from Lango into Museveni’s Cabinet, is indicative of the fact that Gen Museveni and MK can do anything to UPC without Akena being able to do anything to stop them.
He offered to have PLU, for which he is the founding Secretary General, buy off UPC (the way Bobi Wine bought NUP) and send Akena back to his Akokoro village.
He said in its current form, UPC is worth no more than Shs4m. He castigated Akena for running down what used to once be a vibrant party and said that Milton Obote must be very disappointed in his son Akena, wherever he is.
He also said that Akena, who recently attracted the PLU wrath when he criticized Gen MK for violating the human rights of Erias Lukwago and Miria Matembe, is politically walking on a very slippery road politically speaking. “He knows how he has been ruling UPC illegally without having a proper mandate and that illegality is going to have to stop,” Kabanda said.
He added that people who have been aiding Akena to keep circumventing the law while perpetrating his coup inside UPC for all these years, are not anywhere near to the decision-making centers in PLU and this is something the beleaguered UPC President must be very worried about.
Kabanda, who also said that the PLU’s 320 MPs are solidly behind Denis Namara’s bill aimed at weakening and getting rid of LoP Joel Senyonyi, made it clear that the day PLU decides to act and stop Akena’s coup, Milton Obote’s son won’t be able to continue operating from Uganda House’s 6th floor.
He said he wasn’t prepared to rule out that possibility of PLU directly intervening into the internal affairs of UPC the way they are currently doing with NUP regarding the LoP business.
TACKLES AMONGI:
He then unleashed his war of words on Betty Amongi, whose political defeat in Lira City he said was the reason why Jimmy Akena had maintained a hostile posture towards Gen Museveni and MK.
He said that Akena hopes such utterances against MK, branding him a murderer and torturer, will blackmail the President into regretting dropping his wife from Cabinet.
Saying the war against corruption had only started with Anita Among but won’t end with her, Kabanda claimed that Betty Amongi would be next because she had engaged herself into dirty deals while serving as Minister since 2016 when she first became Minister in Museveni’s Cabinet.
She started with the Lands Ministry whereafter she was deployed to the Kampala Metropolitan Affairs Ministry and later on Gender. He claimed that at Lands, she cracked deals and accumulated lots of wealth including prime land in places like in the Nakasero neighborhood where the PLU National Chairman’s new office is currently located.
Kabanda said that the land estate Betty Among accumulated doesn’t match her earnings as Minister and MP. He said investigations were on and very soon Betty Amongi will be brought to book as part of Gen MK’s broader war against corruption. He also accused Betty Amongi of cracking many dirty deals for the period she served as Minister of Gender.
The PLU founding Secretary General, who is renowned for taking no prisoners, claimed that the PLU top leadership had received reports implicating Betty Among as someone who used her position as Minister to influence the giving of lucrative contracts to certain companies of her preference.
He made it clear that Akena should spend time praying for his wife over the Anita Among-like Tsunami that is coming as opposed to demonizing Gen MK who has never personally attacked him anywhere. We contacted Betty Amongi for her comment and referred us to her X platform where she posted her contemptuous response to Kabanda advising him to face off with her husband Akena and her alone.
In our WhatsApp exchange, Amongi also implied that she was motivated by the fact that ‘thousands’ of Ugandans had rallied behind her and were vigorously pushing back against what he uttered against her at his PLU media event. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
