By Mulengera Reporters
Information Minister Dr. Chris Baryomunsi says that he recently privately engaged the President and illustrated to him how and why his is the hardest and most complicated portfolio in the entire Cabinet. “I told him that not only I’m holding the hardest job but I’m also the most abused Minister in his entire government. I assured him that it’s all okay because I’m now used and I have grown a thick skin.”
Baryomunsi was appearing on the Saturday Capital Gang radio program along with Abdul Katuntu, Lydia Wanyoto and others. He admitted that the CDF Gen Muhoozi Kainerugaba’s tweets are making his job of speaking and defending the NRM government even harder and more complicated both within the government and outside the country.
He gave the example of a recent BBC interview during which a British journalist challenged his answer that Bobi Wine was a free man and no one was looking for him, yet Gen MK, in his capacity as CDF, had declared him a wanted man. It was hard for the Minister to make a convincing case and be logically believable by millions of BBC listeners, which didn’t make the GoU look good.
He added that this is something he has previously discussed with Gen YK Museveni, the President of Uganda who also happens to be the CDF’s father. He said his idea is that Ugandans should just get used to Gen MK’s tweets and learn to simply disregard them as opposed to becoming tensed up and taking them seriously. “Last year he said he was setting the date for Dr. Besigye’s hanging but did anything like that ever happen? Why then don’t we learn to just ignore and treat them as jokes?”
Other panelists objected to this and pushed back because merely ignoring such isn’t a tenable option because of the office the President’s son occupies and also because of the fact that things, like the basement, which he has previously talked about to signify torture, have turned to be true and real lived experiences. “There are people who have been to that basement and had had terrible experiences to share about what they went through while in that basement,” said one panelist.
Baryomunsi said he admits it’s a hard job but he is prepared to keep doing it for as long as the President, his appointing authority, remains pleased and ready to keep him in the position. He suggested that government takes a decision to enlighten and educate Gen MK on the legal and administrative limitations that govern the use of social media platforms like X, which he uses mostly. He said the laws that continues to be used to constrain other social media users begin to become equally applicable to Gen MK.
Baryomunsi admitted that time is going to come when it won’t be enough anymore for Gen MK to keep posting provocative stuff demeaning other powerful countries like the US, and thereafter proceed to delete the same and apologize. He agreed that there is need for the CDF to be deliberately sensitized about the dangers likely to result from his provocative use of social media platforms, but he didn’t specifically disclose who will carry out that assignment.
The other panelists also advised Dr. Baryomunsi to engage Gen MK more often so that he gradually gets to find common ground on what has to be posted, besides impressing it on him that he, as Minister, is actually his boss. That there is need for Gen MK to regularly seek guidance from Baryomunsi as the chief of all government communications each time he wants to post something on his X. Baryomunsi said he always carries out wide consultations with government agencies (such as the army, the Police, ISO, ESO, CMI etc) and the respective leaders before publicly proclaiming anything. “In fact, many times I always speak to the President to have a unanimous position before going public,” Baryomunsi explained.
He refused to respond to panelists’ claims that his powers had actually been usurped and that Gen MK’s tweets cast him, as information Minister, as inept and in very bad light. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
