By KT Reporter
In the weeks leading up to the most recent NRM caucus meeting, president Museveni endured immense pressure from his more than 337 MPs who subscribe to his ruling NRM political ideology.
The MPs have, as always, been pressurizing the president to organize and give them some windfall so that they are able to meaningfully participate in upcoming NRM grass root structures elections which are beginning this week.
“The demand had originally been made and pressure mounted on the H.E through the government chief whip Hamson Obua. And MPs themselves have been amplifying that pressure by using caucus meetings to make similar demands directly to the president who they think is very anxious about the forthcoming elections of 2026. They have repeatedly been extorting the H.E by saying that they have debts and they are facing strong opponents who are determined to use the grass roots structure formation processes to upstage them. They have indeed been very transactional in their approach on this issue of grass roots structure formation,” says a well briefed source.
The NRM MPs, transactional as always, had originally demanded for 50m to enable them overcome their rivals and challengers in the grass root elections and sources say that’s what they had been expecting through the weekend as they counted down to Monday when the Museveni windfall was expected to happen from state house.
When the cash was ready, government chief whip Obua was signaled to prepare to receive it for onward transmission to the intended recipients.
“To our surprise when we turned up to pick the money, it was 100m and not the mere 50m we had been expecting through the weekend. Mzee has once again surprised us with his magnanimity and generosity. It’s 100m and with that, we can make life hard for our challengers while ensuring that only our allies get to prevail in grass roots structure elections,” says one of the MPs who picked their 100m Monday evening.
The distribution of the cash went on throughout Monday night and this was done to make sure that each of the extortionist NRM MPs was logistically well facilitated as the NRM structures mobilization and elections exercise gets underway.
“The rationale to give us this money was ostensibly to enable us to mobilize and create momentum and media vibe for the grass roots exercise but we obviously use that chance to promote our own personal interests as incumbent politicians still interested in carrying the NRM flag because in many of these constituencies, being NRM flag bearer is all one needs to be assured of reelection.”
The MPs are supposed to use this 100m to facilitate fellow NRMs to engage in activities that can create vibe and positive publicity for grass roots structures elections. Those who get elected to form grass root structures at Uganda’s more than 72,000 villages qualify for inclusion into the decision-making structure at parish, sub county, constituency, district levels and beyond.
It’s through this exercise that people begin to get assured of victory in party primaries to carry the ruling party’s flag, which comes with generous financial facilitation and also backing from the RDCs and the rest of the security apparatus in the districts across Uganda.
One MP was excited that this latest windfall of 100m was given in cash as opposed to going through the banking system where it would be subjected to statutory deductions such as the Pay As You Earn tax for the benefit of Uganda revenue authority.
“Apart from being taxed, the cash would also be susceptible to being grabbed by moneylenders with whom many MPs have outstanding loan balances. The money would be attached to discharge such outstanding debt obligations,” says an MP adding that the only thing many caucus members are worried about now is the leakage of information relating to the 100m they have each received.
“Once they know that a grant of 100m has landed, voters and our agents will demand their share in which case the 100m becomes peanuts because it can get blown up by endless voter demands within just a day or two. This is why many colleagues are nervous about the public getting to know about this 100m.”
Another MP said that they are also expecting something from the speaker of parliament since she is eyeing the CEC position of being the 2nd national vice chairperson which is currently held by Rebecca Kadaga.
The idea is that facilitating MPs to make sure NRM structures in their constituencies are filled with people friendly to them and who can listen to them on who to vote for CEC, increases chances for the speaker to defeat Kadaga.
“This is why we are expecting something from her also as we go into this very important exercise. We shall need money from every corner because our opponents too are financially prepared yet voters expect much more from us because we are the incumbents.”
Contextualizing The 45bn: In total, the 11th parliament has 529 MPs of whom 337 are NRM. There are 73 independents, more than half of whom are NRM leaning and have MoUs with the ruling party. Under such cooperation, those independents too qualify for the 100m and indeed each one of them has received it. On the 337 MPs, it’s directly responsible for, the NRM earmarked to splash on them 33.7bn which has since been dished out through the chief whip’s office.
When the independents’’ allocation is factored in, plus the administrative expenses associated with operationalizing and supervising the dishing out of the same cash, the NRM big man must have parted with something like 45bn or more on MPs alone to enable them to effectively participate in the NRM grass roots structures formation exercise.
Sharing 45bn just like that is huge and almost insensitive at a time the very people those recipient MPs represent are struggling to meet life’s basics such as affording a malaria dose or even putting food on the table.
Already NRM cadres operating under such recipient MPs in the respective constituencies have demanded to be generously facilitated before doing any work relating to the structures formation exercise since they are now certain that 100m came from the party chairman to facilitate related work.
Incumbent MPs’ opponents are already inciting ruling party voters to bombard their MPs with phone calls and even storm their homes and constituency offices demanding for their share off the 100m windfall. The recipient MPs are being required to share out the money freely and as generously as possible because they too received it freely without any quid proqo-related demands being made on them. Give us feedback on this story through our email: kamwokyatimes@gmail.com
