By Mulengera Reporters
Ofwono Opondo, the outgoing government spokesman, is already campaigning to become the MP for Older Persons for the Eastern region of Uganda.
And there are indicators that, having distinguished himself as an effective defender of the President, the race will be a walk in the park for him. It’s through the Electoral College system, which NRM always dominates. This has always been the case since the enlarged NRC elections of 1989 up to this day.
Semujju Nganda, a panelist on the Capital Gang where Opondo has been a member for more than 15 years, says all his old friend needs is becoming the NRM flag bearer for the slot and then he will be home and dry.
Semujju Nganda said during the Saturday edition of the Capital Gang, which Opondo missed because he was in the field popularizing himself with potential voters, that he has no doubt Ofwono Opondo will positively influence the quality of debate and vibrancy in the 12th Parliament.
The man from Bijaba made it clear that the Opondo he knows won’t be a lukewarm dormant representative like all the other Special Interest Group representatives that Ugandans have been used to all these years of Musevenism.
The Kira Municipality MP said that the Opondo he knows is too assertive to just sit there and be a listening post even though he will be on the NRM side.
Fellow panelist Abdul Katuntu agreed. He said he has known Opondo since their school days at Makerere. And that he will naturally be rocking the boat like no one else has done.
Katuntu predicted that the Opondo he knows won’t be accepting directives and those things of order from above. He said that the OO he knows will be exciting the public opinion by standing up to floppy Ministers and calling them out while speaking his mind as opposed to just accepting to be gagged. That Opondo won’t be seeking to appease State House in order to get a Cabinet job because he has been there and seen it all.
Abdul Katuntu said all this but Gen Museveni might predictably nip all this public anticipation in the bud by immediately making OO a Minister in some obscure docket or put him in Cabinet so that he is bound by secrecy and collective responsibility doctrines. And that way, Gen Museveni will have killed his anticipated vibrancy as a back bench MP, the way he originally did to OO’s fellow Tororo politician Sarah Opendi.
Gen Museveni only fired Opendi after she stood up to him on the choice of Speaker for the 11th Parliament.
He rang her when she was State Minister at Energy (that very position Nyamutoro currently occupies) and demanded that she abandons Rebecca Kadaga and backs Oulanyah. Opendi fearlessly said no and gave her reasons.
This greatly angered Museveni who felt disrespected by ‘this mere young girl from Tororo.’ In the end, Museveni-backed Oulanyah won but the 190 votes Kadaga got made Museveni paranoid and restless.
In the subsequent reshuffle that came weeks after the very consequential Speaker’s vote, Opendi was dropped from Cabinet and the reasons behind this knifing were obvious to whoever was privy to the combative fearless phone exchange the orator from Jap land in Bukedi sub region had had with the big man from Rwakitura.
Before going public about his resignation from Media Center, OO met Museveni for some private talks and defended his decision to quit. Museveni reluctantly agreed to let him go and was fully briefed about the man from Mulanda’s intentions to stand for the MP Seat.
BACK TO THE RADIO SHOW:
During the Capital Gang show on Saturday, Katuntu added that he envisages a fearless Ofwono Opondo who will be demanding for debate on each and everything as opposed to rushing MPs into voting on things that haven’t been thoroughly scrutinized as if their electors send them to Kampala to merely become voting machines.
The Bugweri County MP anticipates that his campus OB will be on rampage asking all the hard questions which he has always faulted MPs for not asking.
Since his days even as a journalist, OO has always been very critical of the mediocrity at Parliament. And he will be out to set a high standard on which future MPs will be measured. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
