The National Resistance Movement (NRM) 1st National vice-chairperson Alhajji Moses Kigongo has cautioned party Members of Parliament (MPs), against greed.
“It is morally inaccurate to crave to host more than one leadership position and yet the party has many people who need to serve. Do not be too greedy, greed can cause us problems. If you are in a position do not fight for another you can’t hold five positions at ago,” Kigongo said.
He went on to task the MPs and other party leaders to be mindful of the language they use in mobilization.
“I want you to be cool and measure the people you are talking with and do not tell them lies. But show them the way you will get their support. If you don’t mind your language, you can easily destroy the Movement,” Kigongo said.
Kigongo made the remarks on Thursday at a meeting organized by the NRM party women leadership at the party secretariat in Kampala.
The meeting was part of the preparations for the forthcoming women council elections.
The current women council office bearers were elected between July and August 2018 and their terms of office are set to expire during the period of July-August 2022.
According to the recently released EC road map, the electoral process will cover the period between June-August.
Addressing the women leaders, Richard Todwong, the party secretary-general, tasked the party women Members of Parliament to mobilise for a massive victory for the party in the elections.
“We all know that these elections start from the village to the national level and we also know your importance in your districts and your constituencies. We would, therefore, like you to take the lead in mobilising to make sure that we organise our women at the village level as we progress upwards,” Todwong said.
Todwong went on to indicate that their plan is for the mobilisation of women’s elections if possible to coincide with the mobilisation for the party structure elections and the update of the party register.
“We realised that the last general elections caused the party a lot of pain because we did not have enough time to organise the party register. So we are in a conversation with the party chairman and the central executive committee (CEC) to give us that mandate to start arranging the party register in time,” he said.
The directive according to Todwong was issued by the top party leadership to audit the previous party register.
“We had done it so well and we now have over 11 million members and we now know their location, their numbers and the rest. We want to print this register and take it to the villages so that party members at the village level can update their register,” Todwong said.
Meanwhile, the Prime Minister of Uganda, Robinah Nabbanja, applauded the secretariat leadership for convening the meeting, saying, “it was nice to invite us here to put our heads together to see how best we can bring victory to the NRM once again and we shall do it because this a big team, they are able women in their constituencies, therefore, their invitation is timely.”
Responding to the women’s council petition to the President to have their term increased from four to five years as it is with other leaders, the PM indicated that though they had a point, it was too late.
“I know women councils sometimes compete with us MPs, but I request you to be above that politics and help NRM achieve 100% from the current 99% in councils. We know these women better in our constituencies, we need to help NRM come up with a resounding victory and I will do all I can to support the secretariat using my office to ensure that we come up with the victory, especially in areas where NRM did not do well in the general elections,” she said.
The Party’s director for mobilisation, Hon Rosemary Nansubuga Sseninde, said in the run-up to this exercise and for early preparation for the 2026 general elections, they target to leverage media to ensure the dominance of NRM messages.
“What we expect from you as MPs is early dissemination of information to the prospective candidates to ensure adequate preparation. We need to encourage credible women to offer themselves for leadership,” Sseninde said.
The national chairperson of the party’s Women’s League, Lydia Wanyoto, noted that their target this time around was to score 100% well above the 98% score in the 2018 elections.
“That is why we want to massively prepare and sensitise our women for these elections whose road map is already out and we are starting with immediate effect,” Wanyoto said.
The MPs pledged to work with the secretariat and asked for the party’s maximum support in their mobilisation drives for the elections.