In this week’s Falament news is about Beti kamya, former opposition firebrand now prolific pro-Museveni praise-singer. So far her latest hit was “rule forever”, a remix of the Jay-Z song in which she rapped that Sevo should remain president till the end of time itself. Yes, the second coming and beyond. Those left behind on this wretched earth when the faithful ascend to Mount Zion should, in her view, vote Museveni again and again and again.
The nation was shaken to the last stitch of its underwear when it was revealed last week that this selfsame Beti Kamya was not even a proper member of her own most highly acclaimed president’s Party.
No, she had her own ka-party going on here in that quiet, neglected, shadowy corner of the kitchen where we put all the… well I was going to say all the useless parties but we have all seen, heard and suffered the consequences of Parliament and know painfully well that all the parties are useless.
Let’s say, the parties which don’t get teargassed.
Beti Kamya had her own party, man! It is called the UFA, Uganda Federal Alliance.
With me this week is the member of Falament for Ggwa South, Hon Heirich Gampisi. Falament is a fictional version of Parliament that exists mainly to facilitate satire, and because I don’t want to talk to actual MPs.
I begin by asking him about this previously-unbeknownst-to-us or unremembered-by-anyone party. “All along you had a party for Beti Kamya nga we didn’t know? How comes that ?”
I had to ask the question in Uglish because Ggwa South is one of the constituencies with the lowest scores in PLE English, even though it has the highest scores in chemistry among its dropouts and is reputed to concoct the hardest waragi in central Uganda.
Q: Member from Ggwa. You represent the people of southern Ggwa as a member of the Uganda Federal Alliance party. Are they aware of this? Because I just whatsapped the only person in Ggwa who can afford OTT and asked her what UFA is. She said it was when the waragi is so good it kills you. I said that was “ofa”. I asked what UFA is. She said they have no idea, yet that is their local MPs party.
A: It is possible that UFA is such an unremarkable, dormant, stagnant, party that even those who voted it have forgotten that it exists. Either that or maybe I told them I was NRM or FDC. I can’t be expected to keep track of what lies I told during campaigns.
Q: What are the aims of UFA?
A: Well, speaking on behalf of myself as the member of Falament from the Uganda Federal Alliance party from Ggwa South municipality, I can put it this way. My aim was to get elected.
Q: What is your response to party president Kamya being a minister and outspoken supporter of NRM party and its head President Museveni.
A: My personal response was jealousy. Eh. Even me I want to be a minister. She is minister of Kampala? If every fly-strewn, dust-ridden, cholera-filled, pothole-infested dump gets a minister, even me I want. Make me minister of Jinja.
Q: You can’t compare Jinja with Kampala, man. Jinja is a pretty nice town. But anyway, what about the response of the party at large?
A: Mwana guys were pissed. They held a meeting even and decided to remove her from the post of president. So we got on our phone to call her to inform her…
Q: How did that go?
A: First of all she delayed to pick up. We had to spend ten minutes listening to “Tubonga nawe, tubonga nawe… To copy this caller tune…”
Q: And then?
A: Then she picked up and was like, “New phone, who dis?”
Q: So what is the way forward for UFA?
A: I don’t know if you can speak of a way forward for an organ that has not made any significant moves since 2011. If the first thing you have done in eight years is fire your president, I think the way forward is to go back to where we started. Which is actually the way backward.
By the way, what happened to the normal way of doing HOuse of Falament?
Q: If parties can change presidents just like that, surely columns can change formats, too.
