By Mulengera Reporters
Led by Anna Ruyondo Lumumba, Patricia Magara, Sergeant Stephen Sekyanzi and Dr. Daniel Kangaha, children and grandchildren of fallen NRA bush war veterans and heroes used President Museveni’s 82nd birthday fete held at Kyambogo-based ONC offices on Tuesday to decry neglect and publicize the misery and economic deprivation many of their peers and counterparts continue to endure 40 years after the former NRA guerilla leader became President of the Republic.
Sekyanzi is a veteran and narrated how he used to carry Museveni’s briefcase and dirty trousers for mending but moved Prime Minister Robinah Nabbanja, the day’s chief guest, to tears when he explained the economic struggles he and others face daily to be able to feed their families.
Whereas Anna Ruyondo implored fellow orphans to direct their anger to thieving government officials and not the President who she said had done his best over the years, Patricia Magara told Nabbanja about hundreds of such NRA orphans (now grownups) who remain jobless yet they are highly educated. She said some are doing well in private sector businesses but need institutional support of the President via specifically-targeted policy interventions. They called upon Nabbanja to prevail on the President to prioritize meeting them one of these days.
That they want to explain to the President the unique challenges they face so that he intervenes and gives them a push to mitigate the challenges they face as they continue employing themselves and several others in the private sector.
Magara, whose dad Sam Magara was shot by Obote’s soldiers in the early years of the NRA war, demanded to know why those with good qualifications and high levels of exposure aren’t being aided to get lucrative MDAs jobs in the government for which their parents laid down their lives. The common complaint was that they had been excluded and forgoten yet it was because of the blood and sacrifice of their parents that NRA victored in the bush war against the UNLA.
In a subsequent speech, State Minister for Lands Harriet Ntabaazi registered her sympathies and thanked Museveni for making her great with such a lucrative deployment in Cabinet even though her parents were never part of the veterans’ universe. She bragged about the gender emancipation programs which she has exploited to become an MP representing an open constituency yet she was barely 10 years in 1986 when Museveni’s NRA captured power.
Besides engaging in plenty of flattery in favour of her boss Robinah Nabbanja who was chief guest having represented the President, Ntabaazi told the aggrieved veterans’ children that their country is blessed with plenty of opportunities, implying that Uganda is big enough for everyone to survive very happily.
She called on the fallen veterans’ children to engage in elective politics instead of leaving the political space in areas like Patricia Magara’s Luwero to be dominated by elected leaders who are from NUP and other opposition parties.
She advised them to stop being angry at government officials who dislike them and instead begin campaigning for MPs seats which they can safely occupy in 2031. She elaborated that once you become an MP, you access the platform to overcome poverty and make decisions on how the national cake has to be shared.
Robinah Nabbanja, in a subsequent speech, amplified this messaging making it clear that NRA stronghold areas like Luwero have no business being represented by opposition MPs who she said are very few and very far away from the President to ever be able to influence allocation of resources to rehabilitate such war ravaged areas.
“I have my daughter there who stood in Luwero and you the very veterans instead undermined her and voted for the NUP MP because you wanted to show your anger to Museveni. That won’t help because all those opposition MPs do is to raise questions to me during the Prime Minister’s question time yet by that time, decisions will already have been made in the NRM caucus where they don’t sit.”
Nabbanja said that even in cases where they have a good point to make, the opposition MPs can never prevail because they are too few to effectively counter NRM which has more than 350 MPs. “So, the best thing you must do is to keep voting NRM MPs so that it’s easier for the President to address your concerns because that way, you will have direct access to him.”
But some in the audience murmured about the inadequacy of Harriet Ntabaazi’s point calling on NRA veterans’ children to stand for electoral positions on grounds that the likes of Anna Ruyondo and Patricia Magara have previously tried to stand for MP seats only to be undermined by deeply entrenched mafia actors inside the political system. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
