After an NRM member, Raphael Mgyezi tabled the lifting of the presidential age limit bill in the Constitution of Uganda in the parliament, the speaker, Rebecca Kadaga forwarded the bill to the High Commission that is responsible for looking in to the issue, discuss it in details, make further interrogations as to (why and why not) from the people and announce the final decision about what happens next.
As part of the steps that the commission follows is sending the MPs back to their people, the ones they lead, and make consultations about what they feel regarding the constitution amendment and then present the people’s views to the commission.
However, before this was done, members of the National Resistance Movement (NRM), the ruling party were reported to have been offered $230,000 from the President, Yoweri museveni, to do all the needful to change people’s minds towards supporting the bill – sources revealed.
Unfortunately, a few of the members now found this too much and forced them to change their minds and chose not to support the bill anymore.
John Patrick Nambesha, Nsamba Patrick, Dr. Sam Lyomoki and Barnabas Tinkasiimire are some of the NRM members that have seen this move weird and decided to now do the right thing – they said.
The members also expressed different heart touching issues that they think such a big amount of money can do to change the lives of Ugandans, instead of just giving it out for individual benefit.
“There is a lot that that money can do for the country. Government workers like teachers, doctors and others go months unpaid. The country still needs much more to put in the hospitals,” Nsamba Patrick, an NRM member explained.
“That money can be used to build Vocational Institutes to help the youths. We don’t need that money. It is better for it to be used for better things to develop the country,” he added.
Dr. Sam Lyomoki also added that there is no sense in giving money to the MPs to carryout the consultations within their people, yet the answer is already known and obvious.
“Ugandans don’t want the Constitution changed and that is already known,” he said.
In addition to their withdrawal, the MPs also wrote a letter to the President asking him to respect the Ugandans’ decision and leave the Constitution untouched. They also advised him, in their letter, to step down for other able ones to lead the country, come 2021.
Reporter: Shamilah Namuddu
