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Ex-Min. Mbayo Troubles: What Went Wrong?

Esther Mbayo

Three weeks ago, embattled former minister for presidency Esther Mbayo held a meeting. The meeting took place in Jinja and was baptized as Busoga Sugar Factory meeting. A line of legislators from Busoga attended and even the minister for finance. The meeting decided that a sugar factory for Busoga be set up but situated in her Luuka district which she represents in parliament.


Our Inspectors reported that the meeting much as it addressed a noble cause for the good of suffering Basoga involved in cane growing, some things weren’t clear. To begin with, not all MPs turned up and even those who attended, majority of them are allegedly not cane growing members. However, inspectors revealed these seemed to position themselves for the stewardship of the intended factory to cost over Shs130bn.


The invites to the meeting were also allegedly done selectively the reason some prominent people with influence like Daudi Migereko never attended since he got his invite on the last minute.
The president also had a line of his trusted people he expected to be in that meeting to feed him with some vital info.
“The invites were sent to some members on the last day. There was no way they could attend” an inspector said, adding that the likes of Migereko followed the proceedings on media platforms in form of news.


Inspectors revealed that this alleged selective invitation gave chance to speculation that the intended factory was being fronted to benefit some individual members’ interests.
The suspicion heightened after some farmers came out and started badmouthing the whole project claiming they were never consulted yet they are the ones in actual cane growing business.

The farmers according to a brief before Museveni complain that they cannot sell their canes because of failure to have license and yet these licenses are allegedly held by politicians who don’t even run any cane garden. This is why some sections of cane farmers immediately came out to bash Mbayo and her group over the factory.


And yet, according to security circles, Mbayo had already secured herself a ‘rotten egg’ in the eyes of the president.
Inspectors revealed that at the time of election of the speaker of Parliament, Museveni got a brief about all hitherto ‘incumbent ministers’ on their stand on the issue of Rebecca Kadaga VS Jacob Oulanyah for speakership.

Intelligence reportedly trickled in suggesting that Mbayo, Sarah Opendi, Rukia Nakadama and another female MP from Bugisu weren’t siding with Oulanyah. However, later Nakadama and the Bugisu female MP managed to secretly pass the test after they finally towed Museveni’s line at the actual time of voting leaving Opendi and Mbayo in the trap. It so happened that when it was apparent that some members were determined to vote Kadaga, Museveni and his strategists got scared and therefore, a tactical move was hatched. At first, according to inspectors, Museveni wanted to net these rebel ministers using his boys but he abandoned the idea and came up with a fresh one and done through parliament.


In the initial plan, tents were supposed to be mounted at Kololo and be used as polling stations.
In the voting tent, there was supposed to be a security person deployed secretly in the tent.
“Not that he was supposed to intimidate the voter, but the purpose was to see who was ticking who?” An inspector explained.
However, our Inspectors revealed, this idea was abandoned after it was seen as invading on the independence of the legislature.


When it flopped, another tactical move allegedly came up. Here, members were given ballot papers but they all had hidden serial numbers. Every member was tactfully spied on shortly after the election. And upon security analysis, it was discovered that four hitherto ministers allegedly voted against Museveni’s man Oulanyah.
Among these included our dear now former minister Esther Mbayo!


“Museveni is always on top of every game. He never runs out of schemes to catch someone if he wants. She refused to vote his candidate and this is where the genesis of her troubles started” an inspector revealed.

Minister Milly Babalanda


In fact, inspectors revealed that for Mbayo to have missed out on cabinet appointment, this was the mother of her troubles. It should be recalled that Museveni waited for the election of speaker before he finally released his 6th term cabinet. The Bugisu female MP who had been backing Kadaga upon a security analysis of the ballots, actually voted Oulanyah and this is how she ended up in cabinet.


To prove how disgusted he was with Mbayo, Museveni shipped in Milly Babalanda from his office at Kyambogo and placed her in Mbayo’s former office of presidency. It is now Ms Babalanda making the final assault on Mbayo. The assault began by an investigation on how funds were misused in the UPPC. She’s now a candidate for police investigation and so are some other bosses being lined up for grilling.


Back in Busoga, Kadaga and Mbayo worked together and it is believed that it’s both Luuka and Kamuli districts which greatly benefited from the pilot poultry project under the Kasolwe Stock Farm program.
And yet, inspectors revealed, Mbayo had already been placed under a ‘red banner’ following the nasty events of November 18 2020 which badly dented Museveni’s government.

Rebecca Kadaga


“Mbayo was under pressure from NUP and in the process of fighting for her survival, she looked to security forces thinking it was a small matter. The president got disappointed with this high-handedness yet she was the reigning presidency minister. In effect, her actions bordered on misuse of security forces and this affected Museveni’s election legitimacy” an inspector added.
It was reported that when the Bobi riots ended arising from the Luuka incident, Museveni kept a keen eye on Luuka to see what he will get from there on the voting day. To his dismay, Luuka just like Kamuli were among the eight districts Museveni badly lost and this loss was attributed to the November 18 actions.


To make matters worse, when elections were done and it was clear Museveni had lost Buganda and Busoga, Mbayo sat in her chair and decreed that Museveni’s loss in Buganda was because of Mengo and the Catholic church. This statement instead attracted more rhetoric against the president who was trying to find ways of letting the issue pass.

On the other hand, inspectors said the project to bring down minister Rebecca Kadaga’s influence is alive especially after the 2012 Intel that she was using her then parliamentary outreach program to market her presidential bid. Watch this space!

Tags : Daudi MigerekoEsther MbayoRebecca KadagaRukia Nakadama
HENRY MULINDWA

The author HENRY MULINDWA

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