Big Win for Mpuuga as Government Officials Eat Their Words, Committee Bosses Trash Speaker Among’s Orders

Leader of Opposition in Parliament (LoP) Mathias Mpuuga has scored a significant goal against Speaker of Parliament Anita Annet Among and government side in his push for a comprehensive report on missing persons in the ongoing boycott.

Last week, government chief whip Denis Obua said the opposition should not forget about a report that the government had promised to table in parliament.

Obua called on Speaker Among to rein on boycotting opposition MPs and compel them to return to the house, unconditionally.

“To the best of the understanding of government, we have done our part, we are respecting the decree given by the presiding officer then that we are respecting the 30 days, but to the best of my recollection, we have explained. We would like to join you to use all the mechanisms within the Rules to compel our colleagues to come to the House,” said Obua on November 23.

“The truth is they want this House on their own, now they want to be aided by ourselves to bring them back that we explain, we are going to politely decline. For how long are they going to stretch us, everything has a limit.”

GOVERNMENT TO PRESENT STATEMENT

But during plenary on November 28, Speaker Among directed Maj Gen (Rtd) Jim Muhwezi, the Minister of Security, to table a statement responding to the issues of human rights violations raised by the opposition. Among made it clear that the time the executive had request to respond has come to an end.

“The Minister of Security wrote to me and asked for an additional one week which ended yesterday. I am now directing that the Executive presents a report to this House tomorrow [November 29]. Let us be accountable to this country, let us be transparent and let us do what we have been sent to do in this House,” she said.
Third Deputy Prime Minister Rukia Nakadama assured the House that the statement will be presented on Wednesday, November 29, as the speaker had directed.

Vice President Jessica Alupo revealed that during Monday’s cabinet, President Yoweri Museveni had spoken out the matter, directing responsible ministries departments and agencies to handle Mpuuga’s issues as a matter of urgency.

SPEAKER’S ORDERS TRASHED

Meanwhile, most committee chairpersons have defied the speaker, ignoring her directives to throw boycotting opposition MPs out of meetings.

On November 28, Charles Onen, the Vice Chairperson of Parliament’s Committee on the Rules and Discipline, refused to throw opposition colleagues out of the meeting he was chairing. Onen insisted that he was yet to receive formal communication from Clerk to Parliament on the speaker’s directive barring boycotters from committee meetings.

“Our position as the Rules Committee [is that] no official communication has been forwarded to the Clerk to the Committee chairpersons to stop any MP from attending committee meeting,” said Onen.

On November 27, Fox Odoi (West Budama North East) threw Robert Ssekitoleko (Bamunanika County) out of a meeting of the Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Committee, leaving the NUP legislator wondering why he had been invited only to be embarrassed.

“I had gone for the Committee meeting and upon reaching there, I was told that there is a position that those who aren’t attending plenary, shouldn’t attend the committees. But to my dismay, I have an official communication on my phone, even in the morning, I got a reminder to go for the meeting,” said Ssekitoleko.

Mpuuga has rallied opposition MPs not to allow any committee chairperson to throw them out of meetings. He also reminded committee bosses they had no power to throw anyone out of meetings.

It should be remembered that the boycott that began last month has been so heated that at one point Mpuuga had to attack journalists for ‘taking bribes’ to write negatively about him and fellow boycotters. (See Details Here and There).