A group of former NRM members of parliament has come up with a proposal to enact presidential elections reforms. According to their plan; the president will be elected by members of parliament and the local councils contrary to the current popular vote presidential elections.
A number of opposition personalities have come out to share their opinion about this matter. Former member of parliament Winnie Kiiza shared her statement of discontentment on Twitter saying; “I am so sorry, but I cannot trust Members of Parliament to decide who will be the president of our country. No, I cannot!”
Bobi Wine the leader of the top opposition party in Uganda; National Unity Platform (NUP) highlighted this proposal as a scheme by the current president of Uganda to deny Ugandans the right to choose their leader. In a tweet, this is what he had to say; “Museveni having been roundly defeated in the last election, now wants to take away the right of the people of Uganda to elect their president. Of course, he plans to do this in order to impose his drunk son on us, well knowing that he can’t even get 5% of a popular vote.”
According to Bobi Wine, this proposal is to create space for Muhoozi’s presidency without the popularity among the people of Uganda. Bobi Wine continued his rampage as follows. “I thank the people of Uganda for the pressure these past three years. You can see how much you have exposed the dictator and made him do the most shameless, unthinkable things. But we must now stop talking and act. Each one of us has an equal stake in this country.”
If the proposal passes, Uganda will be the only country that uses the parliament and local councils to appoint the president. In other countries such as Great Britain, Canada, Italy among several others, it’s the parliament that appoints the prime minister but this is without the local councils’ vote as the Ugandan proposal stands.
In order to pass the proposal into law, there will likely be a referendum. Unfortunately, the majority of the Ugandans have no hope in elections. The peasants believe that the referendum will likely run in favor of the NRM allowing them to make all the constitutional amendments as they please.
Who Benefits Most From The Proposal?
Contrary to the majority opinion, President Museveni is not the primary beneficiary of this reform. It would place him at the mercy of the members of parliament who can be bribed by anyone who has enough money to do so. With this kind of proposal, former government giants such as Amama Mbabazi and Sam Kuteesa would be the primary beneficiaries.
President Museveni would only be a beneficiary in this amendment his son is to become president. With this amendment, he will not need a popular vote, all he will need is an endorsement from a sect of parliamentarians which is actually easy to convert.
If the president has plans to run for the presidency in the next term, he will most likely oppose this amendment. He already has a script that has seen him keep in Uganda’s statehouse for decades now. If he cases his script in an attempt at something new, it is most likely that his counterparts such as Kuteesa and Mbabazi will have a leveled ground to knock him out.
Is the Amendment worth it?
The amendment would have been okay if the quality of Uganda’s members of parliament is reasonable. But Uganda’s members of parliament have proved over and over again that they do not vote in favor of the people. Case in point, the age limit bill exposed the honorable members of parliament after they voted contrary to the public opinion even after making consultations.
With such a background, it remains unclear whether the members of parliament will even represent the interests of their voters when it comes to voting for the president.