The Katikkiro of Buganda, Charles Peter Mayiga has dismissed as untrue, claims that Baganda have turned the debate on whether the Uganda Coffee Development Authority (UCDA) should be merged with the mother ministry or not, into a tribal confrontation.
“They are now blaming us (Baganda) for allegedly waging a tribal confrontation battle, but sincerely speaking, who ignited the tribal issues? Is it we or themselves? They are now shifting the blame from known authors to innocent people simply to mislead the world,” Mayiga said.
The Katikkiro was on Tuesday receiving a delegation from the sub-counties of Mukungwe, Bukulula, Mumyuka-Kayunga and Ssaabaddu Katabi, who had delivered their cash contribution towards the kingdom’s development programmes, at Bulange Mengo, the kingdom’s headquarters.
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As deliberations on the merger of UCDA with MAAIF were in progress last Thursday, the Speaker of Parliament, Anita Annet Among was heard in a communication with the government chief whip Hamson Obua, asking him to mobilize NRM MPs to ensure that Baganda legislators fail to raise the required quorum to fail the bill.
Without elaborating, Mayiga disclosed that the Speaker Among had sent him a message explaining what actually transpired during the debate on the UCDA rationalization process.
He said, “On deliberations on the bill to merge UCDA in parliament, Speaker Among was heard making inexplicable utterances seemingly targeting victimization of Baganda. But why did she drag Baganda into the matter? She denied the blames levelled against her,” he told the delegation.
The Katikkiro told them that coffee does not belong to the government but to farmers, and that as concerned people, they want continued existence of UCDA, and wondered why this issue should provoke anger among politicians.
In dragging tribalism sentiments into the UCDA matter he said, “politicians are displaying treachery because they are the ones dragging politics into the issue.”
Explaining further, Mayiga inquired, “If politicians have no hidden agenda, how do they lose their cool when Buganda Kingdom, MPs from Buganda, Bugishu, Ankole and other regions, oppose scrapping of UCDA?”
Mayiga asserted that scrapping UCDA is being done in bad spirit with proponents not wishing to see Baganda making any earnings, and gave an outline of other evil deeds geared at demoralizing coffee growers.
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