By Mulengera Reporters
Emboldened by the viciousness with which the Ugandan security agents have so far moved to crack the whip on former Speaker Anita Among while simultaneously dismantling any semblance of any power structures associated with people in her universe, a group of land-deprived Kira residents a few days ago stormed the office of Prime Minister Robinah Nabbanja.
They demanded that the PM causes the hitherto cowed and indifferent security and investigative agencies of the country to, as a matter of priority, inquire into the circumstances under which people who derived shadowy power from being closely associated to those close to the former Speaker Anita Among, ended up depriving them of large tracts of land which they claim to have lawfully acquired, settled and operated on for decades prior.
The office of Prime Minister Nabbanja has since made it clear they aren’t mandated to investigate but express instructions have been issued, with the original petition being attached, directing the authorities at CID to urgently carry out comprehensive investigations into the grievances of Kira residents so that the government can determine the best way forward to expeditiously intervene and atone the misery the deprived residents are claiming to have endured at the hands of mighty from the Anita Among universe.
RELATED DEV’T:
In a related development, the hypertensive former Speaker Anita Among has continued to live under understandable anxiety and growing uncertainty especially after the IGG intensified inquiry and investigations into what exactly went wrong. There are growing credible fears that the new IGG Aisha Batala Naluzze intends to leverage the soon-to-be enacted Anti-Corruption (Confiscation & Recovery Orders) Rules to justify the impending confiscation of a large portion of the Anita Among private estate should the ongoing investigations establish culpability on her part.
The IGG teams have, as instigated by the President, continued summoning and interacting with several senior staffers and managers at Parliament in a bid to establish the extent of criminal culpability on part of Anita Among, the Parliamentary Commission members she has been leading with and those senior technocrats themselves.
Many are being interrogated regarding the billions of the Legislature’s money that would be wired to their private personal bank accounts from which the same would be withdrawn ostensibly to facilitate some obscure CSR and political work designated for implementation under the Speaker’s office.
In those private interrogation sessions, many such senior staffers have denied wrongdoing and instead implicated the former Speaker. Some have gone as far as signaling readiness to become state witnesses to aid the government of Uganda’s efforts to secure criminal conviction against her.
Ironically, the former Speaker who is supposed to be “a giant in decline” has reportedly continued to maintain an effective network for her personal information gathering purposes to the extent that she promptly gets to know who has been summoned, who has appeared before the IG investigators and the exact information that particular senior official from Parliament has volunteered implicating her in her capacity as the woman who was the overall head of the Legislature, technically serving up to 25th May when Oboth-Oboth took office as the new Speaker for the 12th Parliament.
Hurting over the apparent betrayal, Anita Among (who curiously manages to know all the details within just hours after such implicating confessions have been made to IG investigators) has once in a time had guts to ring such treacherous senior Parliament officials (uses different phones/numbers of people around her every now and then) to register her consternation at such betrayal.
She allegedly has quarreled to some of them in those very belligerent phone calls while making it clear that there will be a huge price each of those blackmailing, betraying and throwing her under the bus to pay at the opportune moment.
The incumbent Clerk to Parliament and Leonard Okema (previously serving as Executive Secretary to the Speaker & was recently promoted to Director of Clerks under Oboth-Oboth) are some of those who have had to interact with the IG investigators who are clearly out to build a water tight case which can be used to build a successful prosecution case against the rapidly-shrinking Bukedea Woman MP, whose eventual conviction and sentencing the Museveni government is determined to use to demonstrate strong deterrence as part of the broader renewed war against corruption in the public sector.
Having become privy to what each one of these told the IG investigators, the former Speaker has had the opportunity to ring and quarrel to one of these two claiming deliberate blackmail and betrayal. This has made some of the senior Parliament staffers to become even more stressed as they find themselves faced with growing dilemma.
“Clearly, telling those investigators the truth regarding what happened to those billions of shillings we were used as conduits to access, would be the best way out of the situation but even telling the truth has turned out risky because we don’t know and can’t tell the tactics our former bosses is using to become privy of the information we privately disclose to those IGG investigators about her. You will be called immediately after and confronted about what you have just confided in the investigators and we can’t tell how she gets to know within such a short time,” said one of the senior managers at Parliament who continues to have ongoing such interactions with investigators from the Inspectorate.
Meanwhile the mood among staff at Parliament remains uncertain because none of them can certainly predict what tomorrow is going to look like-regarding who the state chooses to prosecute along with the former Speaker or to use as a witness against her.
With speculation being rife that the top political leadership of the country has decreed that the IGG should proceed with prosecution while applying the law of the land as is, without sparing anyone regarding the scandals that happened at Parliament over the past couple of years, many senior technocrats at Parliament have become demoralized and prefer not to come to office often these days; fearing they could be picked anytime.
Many are fearful of the humiliation that comes with being picked up from the office and captured on media cameras being carried away like a newly-harvested grasshopper. This is all not good because it simply means people are not being productive at work and many are now merely sitting and keeping onto the job but without actually doing the job. There is also growing curiosity as to why even salaries, not just allowances, are these days getting delayed every now and then. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
