By Our Reporter
All is not well for the ruling NRM party in Butambala where its leadership is still failing to find a politician willing to risk the voters’ wrath by standing for district woman MP seat on its ticket. The party strategists had counted on incumbent woman MP Daphine Lydia Mirembe (currently independent) but she has lately been elusive and is understood to have declined the offer by the ruling party. According to her supporters and campaign agents, Mirembe has her own more than enough political problems and wouldn’t want to carry the NRM cross in a district where voters (mostly young people) are increasingly becoming hostile to it majorly protesting Museveni’s long stay in power. “The truth is that despite being home to many NRM heavy weights, people in Butambala are lately very hostile to NRM to the extent that carrying its flag would automatically make any candidate unpopular. This is why we can’t allow Madam to abandon being independent and carry the NRM cross. Its true she has her own personal problems but which are easier to explain away than the NRM fatigue,” says one of the Lydia Mirembe diehard supporters based in Kibunga village in Budde Sub County. Whereas shunning NRM might politically be good strategy for the already struggling Mirembe, her refusal to accept the ruling party ticket is something that is already making things very complicated for her to belligerent godfathers namely Hajji Moses Kigongo and Professor Badru Kateregga who State House has always considered to be the leading NRM kingmakers in the district. “There have been efforts to market her to the President as a good cadre who can even be considered for big assignments either in Parliament or Executive. But her lukewarmness towards NRM has made efforts by her godfathers like Kigongo very difficult,” says a knowledgeable source. “The ruling party might superficially seem to be unpopular in Butambala but being associated to it naturally brings on board many advantages including being sure that DPCs, RDCs and the ISO machinery won’t be coming hard against your candidature. So whereas she might consider it strategic to keep her distance, Mirembe who already has more than enough problems might someday regret declining the NRM flag.” Besides hurting her own chances to ever become a Museveni blue-eyed girl, Mirembe’s lukewarmness has also had the effect of demoralizing other would-be NRM flag bearers for the lower level positions in the district. This is something for which the Museveni system might never forgive her for.
BIGGER PICTURE
The bigger picture of things is that Mirembe, who is in her first term is already politically damaged goods making her a hard brand even for the mighty NRM party to sale to voters in Butambala who are clearly fatigued about her largely because of her political and moral failings. On the moral ground, the very beautiful MP (whose husband Richard Kalule lives in the UK having been indicted for fraudulent activities in Crane Bank where they both worked) has been associated with a number of male colleagues in Parliament and generally in the male arena. For instance, there reports that the last time Kalule visited to be with her for Christmas in their Kira residence, he acrimoniously left the home back to UK after one of her male friends unexpectedly turned up and had a physical exchange with him. Kalule, the father of her two children who was also key in her Butambala campaign in 2016, left cursing vowing never to speak to her again. A love-sick Mirembe recently flew to London for reconciliation with Kalule and the idea was to have renewal of the marriage vows. There are also a number of male colleagues in Parliament who don’t talk anymore having developed antagonistic crushes (infatuations) about her. These include Makindye West MP Allan Sewanyana, Luwero Triangle Minister and a very lustful man who works in Deputy Speaker’s office at Parliament. There are also a good number of female MPs like Rakai’s Juliet Kinyamatama who don’t talk to Lydia Mirembe simply because they are envious of the fact that she is simply one of the most sought after female legislators in the 10th Parliament. There is also a flamboyant former Kabaka Minister (later became MP) who had vowed to carpet her. Whereas she has always tried to resist them while insisting on her right to protect her space, male politicians have always been relentless in chasing after her. Many of them say that her beauty is simply hard to resist. It’s not only male politicians wanting to have a piece of her but there is also a big name lawyer at the EC who sometime back used to confess to his peers how he was nursing a big crush on Lydia Mirembe. This lawyer had the opportunity to closely observe her beautiful features during the prolonged election petition Aisha Kabanda had filed against her. There are also credible reports that Hajji Kigongo and Prof Kateregga, who used to be very close before she came into the picture, no longer talk because of her.
POLITICAL DECLINE
Politically, Mirembe (a political novice) has made so many mistakes in her short political career which have cost her significant political support. One of these has to do with Africa Muslim Agency (AMA) to which she was introduced or connected by one of her male friends close to Hajji Moses Kigongo. AMA is an international NGO which specializes in doing Islam-promoting charity including constructing Mosques in rural communities. Consequently, she has used AMA funding to deliver a Mosque in 15 of the 25 parishes that make the constituency. Good as it is, this gesture by her has greatly alienated Lydia Mirembe from her fellow protestants who wonder why she goes around boasting about Mosques’ construction when Christians at her own Kibunga Church of Uganda have for the last 10 years failed to complete the construction of a very small church. The project, to which she too has been modestly contributing, has taken 10 years and the church is not even midway. Loss of her own church support has left Mirembe politically very diluted. During the Togikwatako days, Mirembe dug her own grave when she went around soliciting for voters’ views, an undertaking that backfired and left her politically very deflated. She held meetings in all the 25 parishes and voters (mostly inspired by area male MP Muwanga Kivumbi) were unanimous in saying “Togikwatako.” Instead, Mirembe (who was facing a very frightening court petition sought to politically appease State House and ruling party bureaucrats like Kasule Lumumba and Ruth Nankabirwa in the hope that they would lobby Justice Steven Kavuma in return for a favorable judgement) went and touched it by voting yes to the Magyezi Bill which aimed at scraping age limit in the Constitution for the President. To make matters worse, Mirembe (who was speaking for the first time on the floor) told Parliament her voters had directed her to touch it whereas not. This greatly angered voters who to this day have never stopped cursing her. It has always been her strategy to buy and donate very big saucepans (used to cook for mourners) to women groups in Butambala. But to show how much they are unwilling to forgive her, voters have continued rejecting such donations, a thing that has further shrunk her political space in the district. Mirembe, whose political docility voters continue to painfully contrast with Muwanga Kivumbi’s outspokenness, has also fallen out with many former political allies who are not happy with her mistakes and political indifference. Butambala has 6 Sub Counties and apart from Budde where she comes from, voters have never embraced her in the other five. They perceive her as a vote thief because that’s the argument ex-Museveni Secretary Aisha Kabanda Nalule (aka People’s MP) persuasively made in court where she dragged her alleging vote rigging in 2016. Nalule (who was NRM flag bearer) maintains that she genuinely won but Mirembe used her connections in the EC and court to deprive her an opportunity to have a recount of the Budde Sub County votes which exceeded the registered number of voters. Indeed, Nalule recently quit State House (protesting unfairness in the Museveni system) and joined Bobi Wine’s People Power on which she is now riding to incite Butambala crowds against Mirembe who is increasingly becoming politically nervous. Some voters resent Mirembe simply because her father (Mr. Butuyu) is a typical Munyarwanda who can’t even speak intelligible Luganda. The poor old man is a retired primary school teacher who she doesn’t adequately look after, leaving him materially very crippled. Mirembe’s continued political association with Mzee Faisal Kikulukunyu (a man many voters passionately hate) has only escalated her already complicated political situation. She has become so unpopular that even Prof Kateregga who in 2016 got many of his Kampala University kids to register and boost her vote in Butambala can’t risk doing so again. Kateregga, who is now very distraught, is also very unlikely to give material gratifications to the influential Butambala Sheiks like he did in 2016 when he often would host them for luncheon at his Katambo village residence. Daphine Lydia Mirembe herself has lately scaled down on her visibility in the constituency fearing to be attacked by angry voters who say they are only waiting for 2021 to kill Aisha Kabanda Nalule with votes. For comments, call, text or whatsapp us on 0703164755.
