By Mulengera Reporters
DP President Norbert Mao on Tuesday pushed back against some of the recent FDC defectors to NRM who days earlier had castigated and written off his bid for speakership as being “dead on arrival,” simply because he is an outsider who the ruling party shouldn’t risk trusting with such a sensitive position.
Addressing reporters at DP headquarters along Balintuma Road in Mengo, Mao said those new recruits into the NRM like Yusuf Nsibambi shouldn’t pretend to be more Catholic than the Pope.
He claimed being the pioneer who paved way for the likes of Nsibambi to have guts to embrace and work with NRM openly as opposed to the past when people used to relate with Gen Museveni clandestinely while fearing retribution from the opposition political base, which compromises of militants who don’t want anything to do with Gen Museveni.
Mao explained why there is no way any of the state secrets can be at the risk of being leaked by asserting as follows: “I have been sitting in Cabinet where many of the government secrets are kept and processed from yet I have never leaked anything anywhere. What are they talking about? I’m the Minister of Justice & Constitution where I can, with certainty, say that we have the least leaks of government secrets.”
He added: “We handle a lot of such sensitive information of government yet nothing ever gets leaked. In fact, State House has the highest number of leaks and not the Justice Ministry where I’m in charge. So I’m here to array such fears that Mao becoming Speaker of Parliament will be suicidal for the sensitive government information that will be coming to his attention as Speaker.”
Mao claimed to have support of many MPs and senior cadres within the NRM who have been wanting to record videos endorsing his bid for Speakership but he has been restraining them on grounds that it’s indecent and the rules of procedure of Parliament prohibit overt campaigning for the position of Speaker. He said openly campaigning for the job would diminish the clout and reputation of the office of Speaker.
“It’s like individual cardinals recording videos declaring I’m endorsing so and so for the position of Pope. That would be madness and I’m against it,” said Mao who was flanked by a large group of DP NEC leaders who included national chairman Kiwanuka Mayambala and women league president Hon Sarah Adong.
He promised to run a decent campaign without having to engage in any demonization and name-calling against the incumbent speaker. He urged supporters in the Anita Among universe to calm down and avoid directing towards him statements of character-assassination, because such won’t be good for the country.
Mao also revealed he had written to Museveni formally soliciting for his support under the broader framework of the DP-NRM political cooperation agreement. He made it clear that with Northerners overwhelmingly voting for Museveni and Alfonse Owiny-Dollo ceasing to be Chief Justice (while the Itesos have had powerful positions like that of Speaker, Vice President, Deputy CDF, the Auditor General, Governor Bank of Uganda etc), there was no reason why the veteran leader from Rwakitura doesn’t rally his more than 350 MPs in the 12th Parliament to unanimously vote for him.
He implied that Gen Museveni was on trial of some sort regarding his Speakership bid because how the Movement treats him, in relation to other candidates, will motivate or disincentivise many potential defectors from the opposition who have finally made up their mind and want to openly begin working with the National Resistance Movement, being the country’s governing party. He said that under Article 7(e), the cooperation agreement should now get enlarged so that Speakership becomes one of the additional positions on which the ruling NRM collaborates with their partners in DP.
He indicated this would be a great way to repair the relationship which got a little bit bruised when Gen Museveni reneged on his signed commitment to give the country’s oldest party two Ministerial slots besides his. He said DP played it cool because they didn’t want chaos in government-otherwise they feel entitled to having two ministers instead of one. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
