Renowned political activist Ingrid Turinawe has said the blackmail against the Kampala Lord Mayor Erias Lukwago reminds her of the similar situation she faced during the 2021 campaign period.
Turinawe said the difference is that hers was being circulated by Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) members while that of Lukwago is being circulated by his known opponents.
“Lord Mayor is lucky that his party is defending him while my party, FDC the party I founded, built, promoted, sacrificed for and defended for all the years promoted the blackmail, harassed and eventually dismissed me without even responding to my petition,” she said in a statement on her social media.
Turinawe said the biggest offense for being dismissed from the party was to reject and petition against the malpractices and vote rigging that took place during their internal party polls.
“My “Kasule Lumumba” letter to the president that was actually written by two not very clever FDC members indicated the money had been deposited to my bank account. This eventually became easy for me to disapprove of it as I walked to the bank with my inner campaign team, printed for them a bank statement which confirmed there had never been such money deposited to my account,” she said.
Turinawe explained that photos belonging to Jane Twinomugisha the current MP for Ibanda District which she took and posted on her Facebook page were also picked and edited, captioned with her names and distributed to voters in Rukungiri telling them she had crossed to NRM.
She said this was a total lie and the worst thing was the party did not stand by her side in such a difficult situation.
In the December, 31 2022 letter, Gen Salim Saleh is quoted to have said he has withdrawn his support to Lukwago’s political fights unless he comes out to apologize to him over comments he made about him in the public.
However, Lukwago described the letter as crap, saying that those were fabricated stories.
Turinawe went cold and quiet after FDC was expelled for standing as an independent in Rukungiri Municipality in the 2021 elections.
This was against the party constitution.
She had lost in the primaries to Dr. Warren Nuwagaba and efforts to talk her out of contesting fell on deaf ears.
FDC, which had held the slot for 10 years lost out to NRM after Dr. Elisa Rutahigwa defeated Nuwagaba, an outcome some blamed on Turinawe.
It was a big political setback for FDC considering that its founding, Dr. Kizza Besigye, hails from the area.
