There was drama at Parliament in Kampala as journalists were thrown out of a meeting between Deputy Speaker Thomas Tayebwa and a Chinese envoy.
Tayebwa’s guest was National People’s Congress (NPC) standing committee’s Deputy Chairman Luosang Jiangcun.
The ugly diplomatic scene happened when the Uganda’s protocol team ordered journalists to exit the venue after the deputy speaker finished making his remarks.
Luosang Jiangcun protested the move to throw out reports, saying he should be first allowed to make his speech.
But the chaos that followed led to the interruption of Jiangcun’s speech. Reporters were directed to vacate the meeting hall.
Meanwhile, during the meeting Deputy Speaker Tayebwa has criticized western powers over their interfering with the internal matters of China especially regarding their criticism of China’s human rights records in Hong Kong, Tibet, saying these are internal matters that can be handled by China.
“Human rights issues have been raised by some western countries especially with regard to the special administrative region of Hong Kong, Xingtian, Tibet. However, Uganda maintains a policy of non interference in the internal matters of other sovereign countries. We thank the Chines Government for respecting this policy, these are internal matters that the Government of China can handle without foreign interference. As a government, we support and we continue supporting the one china policy,” said Tayebwa.
Tayebwa also noted that although COVID-19 has been one of the greatest challenges of our lifetime, China was one of the nations to extend support to Uganda at the time other powers were hoarding vaccines for their citizens.
“Uganda’s strategy was prevention, protect our health cares system from being overwhelmed, however, during that period when most of the vaccines were being shared among the global powers to protect their citizens, China donated 50,0000 testing kits and 600,000 doses of Covid-19. This helped us save our people,” he noted.
“China provided a fleet of 70 vehicles and accreditation equipment to Uganda to host the 3rd South Summit which was initially slated to be hosted in Kampala in April 2020, but was postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic. With the summit now confirmed for January 2024, China has once again generously provided an additional 70 vehicles to support Uganda’s success for hosting. We are very grateful for this offer.”
The Deputy Speaker Tayebwa also backed China’s plans to cause reforms at the United Nations Security Council, by ensuring that Africa has two permanent seats, in order to correct the historical injustices the continent is enduring at the global body.
“I want to assure our Chinese friends that Uganda will continue to fight for equal representation at the United Nations Security Council and will push for reforms to make sure that Africa gets 2 permanent seats on the security council as per the consensus of the African Union. We welcome and continue to appreciate the support of China in reforming the Security Council, especially during this period when the world is at the cross roads,” remarked Tayebwa.
“We support an efficient and effective United Nations that works for all state parties with equal treatment, fairness and justice. Uganda is a member of the Committee of 10 of the UN Security Council reforms which reflects Africa’s legitimately right and aspiration to rectify the historical injustices endured by the continent.”
On his part, Jiangcun noted: “We are very happy to visit the beautiful *Pearl of East Africa* (Africa) and once we arrived in this country, we felt your deep affection for the Chines people. We thank Uganda for your warm and considerate reception to me and my delegation.”
This is the second terms that Parliament’s principals are attacking journalists, the other most recent incident being an attack by Leader of Opposition Mathias Mpuuga, who told journalists should eat their bread and stop reporting about him in a manner he does not like. (Read Story Here)
Previously, journalists at Parliament were blasted for accepting money from Speaker of Parliament, whom one critic said they think is a goddess. (See Details Here).
Additional Reporting: Parliament Watch
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