The veteran politician also noted that because of the absence of civic education among communities, today voters simply vote one leader to replace another one, with nobody to ask why such a change is necessary.
Mukono veteran politician and former Deputy Minister in the Obote II government, Rev. Dr. Keefa Ssempangi has partly attributed recession of the popularity of the National Resistance Movement (NRM) and President Museveni in Mukono, to a vacuum occasioned by party structure members who rise to higher levels, leaving vacant positions.
As a result, Ssempangi noted, this leaves very porous defence lines especially during election campaigns for grassroot supporters to succumb to trivial handouts like soap, alcohol and others, which are offered by weak candidates seeking election and members of the opposition.
“President Museveni wisely thought of the 30 NRM grassroot structures at village, parish and sub-county levels to safeguard support and virtues of the party, but in a weakened situation, provisions like UPE, ‘Bonna Bagaggawale’, ‘Emyooga’, PDM and others are rendered vulnerable with nobody to explain, plead for and protect them,” Ssempangi lamented.
The former chairman of the National Council for Children (NCC) and former chairman of the Uganda People’s Congress (UPC) Presidential Policy Commission was on Monday giving a personal view of causes of the NRM’s waning support and deteriorating election performance of President Museveni especially in Greater Mukono area.
The meeting which took place at Mukono Summer Gardens in Wantoni, Mukono Central Division, was initiated by the Beautiful Uganda Developement Group, a voluntary group charged with identifying reasons for recession of the NRM popularity in Mukono, and devising ways of convincing supporters who defected to the opposition for lack of a go-between, in an operation code-named ‘Komawo Eka’ (Home coming).
Ssempangi also noted that many good government policies/programmes are rendered ineffective by lack of people to take up the responsibility of ensuring their sustainability, and cited the government release for the elderly which he noted, never gets to the targeted people.
Elaborating, he said, “There is a sh2m release for the elderly at the municipality which unfortunately, never gets to the beneficiaries, and because there is no one responsible enough, the matter dies there. This is not the government’s fault but it takes the blame”.
He also noted that while the government has fulfilled its role of stocking health units with drugs and setting up electricity and other infrastructure, there is nobody to oversee drug dispensation and record thefts, or mobilize people to install power in their premises, and any negative fall back turns to the government.
The veteran politician also noted that because of the absence of civic education among communities, today voters simply vote one leader to replace another one, with nobody to ask why such a change is necessary.
He added that in the prevailing circumstances, there is a need for restoring the individual merit criterion during elections, away from elections based on party colours.
The chairman and founder member for Beautiful Uganda Development Group, Lauben Muhwezi noted that the group is an NRM support mobilization team earmarked at reconciling and harmonizing disgruntled party supporters in a bid to restore the original support, love and popularity by addressing shortcomings responsible for the recession.
Muhwezi disclosed that the new operationalization theoretical approach dubbed ‘Komawo Eka’ is among other things aimed at awakening Ugandans to the reality that they have not paid the NRM back in the right measure for its attributes, saying this is because of absence of lack of the requisite competence for people to know where they were, where they are and where they want to go.
Explaining, Muhwezi said, “People lack the knowledge of what caused the set back and how to go about addressing it; party mobilizers go to voters without knowing who their party voters are and who are not, and in the process get into wasteful resource management system; there is need for grooming mobilizers to avoid haphazard movement’.
On voter protection and retention, the chairman advised that adequate internalization of pre-election, election and post-election situations be made to get a clue on voter protection as a means of retaining their support.
Muhwezi noted that it has not been easy for some people to realize that although President Museveni has been winning election since 1996, there is an alarming level of decline, and cited the 20o9 by-election between Betty Nambooze Bakireke who was then in the Democratic Party (DP) and Rev. Dr. Peter Bakaluba Mukasa who was then NRM for the Mukono North constituency, and noted that since Nambooze beat Bakaluba, victory has been gradually slipping away from the NRM grip in Mukono.
“Nambooze was then the only opposition MP, while today, out of the five parliamentarians in the district, none is from the NRM, while the municipality and district council leadership is characterized by opposition leaders and a majority of opposition councilors,” Muhwezi lamented.
He noted that the National Unity Platform (NUP) is thriving on borrowed capital, explaining its formation is fully a reserve of NRM youths, disgruntled NRM historicals and others who have been neglected and need reconciliation to come back to their rightful home.
In a nutshell Muhwezi noted, there is need for the training of mobilizers, to instill in them the original spirit of voluntarism that was prevalent during the NRA bush war era.
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