During a stormy NRM parliamentary caucus meeting at State House Entebbe yesterday, President Museveni said he would not let parliament malign the 42 public officials who shared a Shs 6bn bonus payment.

The bonus was a reward to the officials for winning at least $700m from a capital gains tax dispute between Uganda, Heritage Oil and Tullow Oil in 2013. Museveni met the NRM MPs ahead of the resumption of parliamentary business this Wednesday.

An angry parliament speaker Rebecca Kadaga last week suspended the House indefinitely after Deputy Chief Justice Steven Kavuma heard a petition filed by Eric Sabiiti, a lawyer, and later ordered parliament not to “investigate, question or inquire” into the Shs 6bn bonus payment. That order set parliament on a collision course with the judiciary.

To resolve the standoff, the petition has since been withdrawn by the petitioner. At the meeting, a stern-talking president, according to sources, warned MPs against looking at parliament as God.

NOT GOD

“Don’t think that you are the only ones that are doing good for this country; there are a million other Ugandans…that parliament is not God,” Museveni reportedly raised his voice. “Why do you want to cause trouble? Why must you find chaos where there is no conflict?”

At this time, the loud murmurs and heckles that interrupted Government Chief Whip Ruth Nankabirwa’s speech at the beginning of the meeting had died down, replaced by whispers.

Before she invited the president to address the NRM MPs, Nankabirwa got a hostile response from MPs when  she asked Michael Tusiime (Mbarara Municipality MP) and Peter Ogwang (Usuk MP) to explain the intention of their motion to President Museveni.

Tusiime is the mover and Ogwang is the seconder. Sensing hostility, Museveni stepped up to address the MPs. He reportedly first spoke about the NRA war and the early days of his government when he was in dire need of qualified technical people.

“When we captured power in 1986, I sent a team of young geologists and scientists who came back and discovered oil; it was not done by Europeans,” Museveni said.

“This is not the first time I am giving a handshake…when oil was discovered; I took the scientists to Kololo [ceremonial grounds] and gave them a handshake in public… the highest got $20,000,” Museveni added.

He then delved into the background of the Shs 6bn bonus payment. He said the money got from the capital gains tax dispute is being used for the construction of Karuma power dam.

“These are heroes,” Museveni said. “I don’t want you to malign good people. I will defend them and you know what I mean by that,” he reportedly added.
“That idea of maligning and abusing patriotic people who stood their ground to defend the interests of the country, I reject completely and in totality because that [handshake] was in order, I am the one who gave it,” Museveni added.

But the president faulted the beneficiaries for sharing the money with people who were not meant to get a single penny. After his speech, the president asked to leave the Entebbe meeting so he could address the East African Legislative Assembly (EALA) at parliamentary buildings.

But Lwemiyaga MP Theodore Ssekikubo immediately shot up and urged him to listen to MPs. Not impressed by Ssekikubo’s antics, Museveni shot back; “Again it is Ssekikubo as usual…all the time he is fond of fighting this and that…you will get high blood pressure. Since it is Ssekikubo and I am here, let me listen to him and crash his arguments.”

Ssekikubo then told Museveni that the MPs were not opposed to the bonus payments per se because it is an international practice but to the way the money was handed out.

“That money was not appropriated in the budget; because they are technocrats, they abused their offices and took your authorisation to raid the treasury. Can they tell us which budget line they used to get this money?” Ssekikubo asked Museveni.

The fiery MP also accused Museveni of abusing the country’s institutions.

“You have referred to them as patriots who were fighting for the country’s interests but there are many others who even laid [down]their lives…they never came to State House like you,” Ssekikubo told Museveni, further reminding him of the Temangalo scandal and his spirited defence for his then political ally, John Patrick Amama Mbabazi.

“This is the same thing you did with Temangalo and in your characteristic way, you came here and defended the indefensible but at the end of the day, it turned the other way round,” Ssekikubo said.

“What is wrong with people with issues coming [to parliament] and defending themselves? Why should some face the law and you shield others?” Ssekikubo asked the president who was taking notes.

DAMAGING

Next on the floor was Ogwang. He told the president that instead of scolding NRM MPs, he should thank them for saving the day when the opposition tried to muscle through parliament a damaging motion.

“The opposition had used [Wilfred] Niwagaba [the shadow attorney general] to draft a motion with very bad resolutions against you; in fact we moved very fast and hijacked it from them because they were going to use it against the government,” Ogwang said, enlisting a smile and a nod of approval from Museveni.

Ogwang then invited Tusiime to explain further.

“Mr President, you are getting half truths. What your people are not telling you is that some of the people who were supposed to be beneficiaries were marginalised,” Tusiime said.

When Museveni asked him to explain, the Mbarara Municipality MP named some lower-ranking officials like tax assessors. Tusiime also told Museveni that the money spent on bonus payments was coyly presented as a supplementary budget request for training some URA staff.

“We did a good thing for the country and it is important that you don’t block this motion,” Tusiime told Museveni.

At this point, the president told the MPs that he met with Kadaga and Chief Justice Bart Katureebe and agreed on a way forward.

“The president told us that he had left us in the hands of the speaker because they talked and we are waiting for her to address us tomorrow,” Nankabirwa told a hastily-arranged press conference at her parliamentary office.

She said the caucus meeting was not meant to gag parliament, but to explain where the bonus money came from.

“The NRM caucus supports the handshake because its giving was not irregular,” Nankabirwa said. “The MPs’ concern was on the process, whether the due process was followed. That is why they want an investigation by a competent committee of parliament, not a special committee.”

sadabkk@observer.ug