By Mulengera Reporters
Only a few weeks to the National Conference of the Movement, Minister Haruna Kasolo’s victory chances have greatly increased to replace outgoing Godfrey Kiwanda as the Vice Chairman for Buganda region.
The raging war in his alleged home district of Kayunga, led by Aidah Nantaba against land grabbing and other injustices, has greatly diminished winning chances for tycoon Moses Karangwa.
With Nantaba leading a large faction that is out to fail him and his proxy candidates in Kayunga district politics, Karangwa can’t count on any block vote there. Nantaba has lately been very outspoken against a group of political leaders in Kayunga who recently ganged up to grab a forest, which is public land.
She says the mighty that want that forest land taken, and thereby hurting the environment, have lately intensified their efforts to the extent of recruiting all the other MPs from Kayunga including her own brother Amos Lugoloobi. Nantaba says the other two Kayunga MPs, who are NUP, have equally been recruited to serve Moses Karangwa’s personal interests. These include Bbale County’s Charles Tebandeke and Ntenjeru North’s Patrick Nsanja.
Nantaba’s outspokenness and ongoing mobilisation have cracked up the base and thereby making it hard for delegates from Kayunga to unanimously speak with one voice in Karangwa’s favour. She is speaking in way that is making it risky and politically costly for NRM delegates from Kayunga to publicly associate with Karangwa.
In contrast, Haruna Kasolo has effectively galvanized delegates and the home ground in Kyotera, and much of greater Masaka, to be solidly behind him. He is clearly their sole candidate whose acceptability even increased recently when ex-VP Edward Ssekandi (a respectable voice in NRM circles in Greater Masaka) came out and publicly blessed his bid. He and his predecessor Gilbert Bukenya escorted Kasolo for his nominations at Kyadondo from where they explained to media reporters why he was their choice to become NRM Buganda region Chairman for the moment.
Unlike Karangwa’s Kayunga, where the home base is cracked up and revolting, in Kasolo’s Kyotera there is growing consensus among NRM ranks to the extent that candidates have been rallied to stepdown in favour of stronger ones to carry the NRM flag against NUP, which in 2021 didn’t have many of its candidates win anything significant in the ballot box.
The MPs for Kyotera were Fortunate Nantongo and Paul Mpalanyi who defeated Kasolo-and were both DP, not NUP. It was only in Kakuuto where Geofrey Lutaaya, generally accepted by voters because of his personal brand, went through on the NUP ticket. The Kasolo-instigated consensus recently manifested on the LC5 slot when outgoing district chairman Kintu Kisekulo bowed out of the race in favour of a more formidable cadre and at Parliamentary level where all NRM aspirants bowed out for Kasolo.
All this consensus resulted from Kasolo’s peace-making and harmonization efforts, which Hajji Moses Kigongo (NRM’s number 2 in the country) drove to Kyotera to celebrate. During the Kyotera event, Kigongo (another strong Kasolo supporter for the CEC slot) thanked God for gifting the NRM party with a mobilizer and people-centric organic leader like Haruna Kasolo. He made it clear that the microfinance minister was created on purpose and meant for the political moment like this.
Kigongo called on other NRM chapters in other districts to emulate and bench mark on Haruna Kasolo’s Kyotera regarding how to reconcile warring party factions and once again find common ground as they prepare to fight off the opposition going into the 2026 elections.
Godfrey Kiwanda, another cadre who potentially could have stood in Kasolo’s way, recently cracked beyond repair when his own people in Mityana North rejected him and voted for Mohammed Nsegumire Kibedi to carry the NRM flag for that constituency. Kiwanda, a former area MP, was resoundingly rejected, which was a very embarrassing episode.
The Mityana North defeat also demonstrated to the country and party leadership, and cadreship elsewhere, that the former tourism Minister couldn’t be relied upon to effectively deliver for the ruling party against the NUP as the country counts down to 2026.
Kasolo’s great works as a minister also recently got validated when the President went on his PDM tours across the country and more so in Buganda (Greater Kampala inclusive) where he was able to see for himself and come face to face with Emyooga intervention beneficiaries who stepped forward to share success stories.
Such irrefutable testimonies validated the fact that, under Kasolo’s political leadership, the Emyooga intervention had positively impacted significant sections of community members for whom it was intended. Gen Salim Saleh, another irrefutable king-maker in Museveni’s Uganda, had previously acknowledged the impact Kasolo’s Emyooga and other microfinance interventions were having on low-income groups and clusters across the country.
In any case, Gen Saleh ought to be duty-bound to look forward to Haruna Kasolo’s political victory because he personally mentored and got him deeply integrated into the Musevenist political system after being marketed and introduced to him by Moses Byaruhanga.
As a key political advisor to the President, Byaruhanga cajoled Haruna Kasolo away from the NRM rebel MPs’ politics during the 9th Parliament into which fellow Muslim and inspirer Mohammed Nsereko had initially recruited him.
And indeed, with the likes of Edward Sekandi, Vincent Sempijja etc moving to the periphery because of age and other factors, Haruna Kasolo (who also holds a role in PLU) remains the biggest cadre the ruling NRM can have to command its forces in Greater Masaka, a region whose NRM cadres are now counting on him to have their first ever slot or direct presence inside the top decision-making CEC. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
