KAMPALA – The secretary generals of political parties with representation in Parliament will in an effort to save the 2021 general elections meet Prime Minister Dr. Ruhakana Rugunda this Wednesday, March 4th. This meeting will be held under the auspices of the Inter-Party Organization for Dialogue (IPOD).
The Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) Secretary-General Hon. Nathan Nandala Mafabi who is the chairman of IPOD Council, will lead the delegation.
Addressing press on Monday morning, FDC party spokesman Ibrahim Ssemujju Nganda said that “This meeting which should reassert the right interpretation of the Public Order Management Act (POMA) arrived at between IPOD and Dr. Rugunda in 2015, has been necessitated by the continuing violence against the opposition ahead of the elections.”
“Last week a citizen Ritah Nabukenya was murdered by Police as she travelled to attend a consultative meeting by presidential aspirant Hon. Robert Kyagulanyi. A second citizen Daniel Kyeyune was shot dead by Local Defence Unit as he travelled with Kyagulanyi from the burial of Nabukenya,” Nganda said adding that “And for two days Police, LDU and UPDF beat up FDC members and supporters in Bugiri, Jinja and other parts of the country as they went over routine mobilization for the party.”
Nganda claims that FDC founder and the People’s President Dr. Kizza Besigye was twice violently arrested as he went to attend FDC events in Jinja.
“In fact, on the second day, Police raided the hotel where he had stayed overnight and towed him away,” he said.
“This violence and happening one month to the first batch of the general election which is due in April. The Electoral Commission is set to conduct elections for women, youth, people with disabilities and elderly next month,” he added.
Nganda said that Political parties are supposed to conduct primaries for these elections.
“The meeting with Rugunda might be the last one that the FDC is participating in. Rugunda on behalf of the government, should tell us if his government has now outlawed political competition. He should tell us if the multiparty system has now officially been overthrown,” said Nganda.
