By Mulengera Reporters
Jenny Babirye Zaninka, the NUP and People Power founder member who also went to school and shared desk with Bobi Wine from P1 to S4, exploded on Thursday and spilled secrets indicating the extent of intrigue among NUP women who are currently laying siege around Kyagulanyi.
Zaninka, who says is the one who taught Kyagulanyi how to wear a suit to effectively transition from being a popstar into the political leader he ended up becoming from his 2017 victory in Kyadondo, exploded during her speech while launching her campaigns after being nominated for the Bukuya County MP Seat in Kasanda district. She said she had been quiet for too long and felt obliged to open up and reveal how treacherous Flavia Kalule Nabagabe, the Kasanda Woman MP who also leads the NUP Women league, has been over the years.
There has always been a rumour inside the corridors of NUP that Barbie Itungo passionately hates Zaninka because she believes she was Kyagulanyi’s teenage years sweet heart as they struggled at school together from P1 to S4 while growing up together in the ghettos of Kamwokya. Zaninka said that Nabagabe was working hard to frustrate her politically because she is a proxy who was assigned by some powerful Woman inside NUP who she didn’t name.
Those in the know construed Zaninka’s explosion to be a veiled reference to Barbie with whom she doesn’t see eye to eye. “I know Kyagulanyi very well to the extent that there are things which I know about him which none of those other people working to destroy me will ever know,” Zaninka said while cautioning Nabagabe, who she says joined NUP at City Square, to stop being used to fight other people’s wars and let her be.
Zaninka was this time round denied the NUP flag which she carried for Bukuya in 2021. She lost to NRM’s Dr. Michael Bukenya whose victory she challenged in Court on grounds of vote rigging and falsification of results.
This time round, the NUP ticket was given to someone who Zaninka claimed is a proxy Nabagabe fronted to carry the Kavule flag. She claimed that the person who was given the flag, under circumstances which Kyagulanyi didn’t like, was chosen by Nabagabe on purpose to enable NRM’s Dr. Michael Bukenya have high re-election chances simply because he (NUP flag bearer) is a political weakling.
She claimed that there is a symbiotic relationship between Nabagabe and Dr. Bukenya. That Nabagabe helps Bukenya win his race by ensuring NUP fronts a weak candidate and Bukenya reciprocates this by helping Nabagabe prevail over the NRM flag bearer in Bukuya for the position of Woman MP.
Kasanda district has three MP constituencies namely Kasanda North, Kasanda South and Bukuya. The fourth position is that of Woman MP for the district. NUP in 2021 won all of them except Bukuya which was retained by Dr. Bukenya who is one of the very few Musevenists who survived the Kyagulanyi wave in 2021.
On Thursday, Zaninka told a chanting crowd of supporters that she had been quiet about the Nabagabe intrigue for too long and felt there was need for her to vent out some anger during her Thursday rally because there was simply too much resentment inside her.
She made it clear that there is a lot of potentially damaging information she continues to sit on but the day she explodes and tells the full story, many of the women laying siege around Kyagulanyi will look for the tallest grass to hide in while cursing the day they were born.
She added Kyagulanyi is fully aware of the injustices that a group of women inside NUP have been unleashing on her and he is sympathetic which is why he didn’t de-campaign her during his Kasanda campaigns like he did against other independents in nearby Mityana district and other areas. “Kyagulanyi is fully aware of what happened and why I wasn’t given the NUP ticket for this Bukuya MP Seat. I’m grateful he couldn’t attack me while at his rally. Neither did he over promote the person Nabagabe gave the NUP flag for Bukuya.”
Zaninka also told off Nabagabe and others who go accusing her of being an NRM mole simply because she is wealthy and materially well off. “I’m not poor and I thank God for that because I’m a hard-working woman and together with my husband, we have schools from which we get money,” Zaninka said making it clear that one doesn’t have to be poverty-stricken and look poverty for them to prove their opposition credentials.
“I have been in opposition for 25 years and that is for my entire adult life. We deserve respect for that. We are not going to accept to be branded moles by people who have just left NRM and are still under their orientation phase when it comes to knowing how to oppose the NRM.” She promised to use the MP position as a platform to promote wealth creation programs at household levels and to also fight land grabbing which she accused the long serving Dr. Michael Bukenya of not doing enough to fight against.
Zaninka was flanked by journalist Kwezi Robinson who hails from Bukuya too and previously stood in the same area for the MP position before taking a decision to leave politics and concentrate on his journalism practice.
Zaninka made it clear even when envious women inside NUP ganged up to deprive her of the party ticket, she still supports Kyagulanyi who she asked people in the crowd to vote for come Monday 15th January. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
