ANT "forgives" FDC for fielding own candidate in Serere County by-election

Alliance of National Transformation (ANT) leadership has said it will not take personal the Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) rejection of a suggestion to host a single opposition candidate in the Sere County by-election. 

Gen (rtd) Mugisha Muntu who is also the leader of ANT said there might be genuine reasons as to why FDC declined to support their candidate, adding that its decision should not be a breeding ground of hatred between the opposition parties.

Alice Alaso who is ANT’s flag bearer in the Serere County by-election has been calling for unity and the support from other opposition political parties in her  quest to come back to Parliament.

Among the parties that heeded to her call include the National Unity Platform (NUP), Democratic Party (DP) and other like-minded members from the National Resistance Movement (NRM).

However, while unveiling their candidate, Emmanuel Eratu, FDC president Patrick Amuriat, revealed that the party would not back Alaso because ANT members left FDC under irreconcilable differences.

“At the time of the departure of (those) individuals from FDC, in their own words, (there were) irreconcilable differences and that needs to be taken into account. We still have to be accountable to our differences and, therefore, I look forward to a time when once again we can come back to work as a common front,” Amuriat said.

 Amuriat also said the party no longer believes in alliances, adding that anybody who dreams that alliances would subdue president Museveni in any election at any level, needs to do their homework again.

Although Amuriat claimed they never received any letter from ANT, Alaso told the Nile Post that they wrote to all opposition political parties asking for their support to work together as the opposition.

While appearing in a Twitter Space, Muntu also confirmed that they wrote to FDC and other parties asking them to back their candidate because they thought Alaso was a formidable candidate.

He, however, explained that FDC’s failure to support their candidate should not be an issue to bring disunity among the opposition, adding that there are very many important things that need more attention.

He said the opposition parties need to refrain from debate which might generate friction on the national scale which will at the end of the day divert them from strategic issues.

“For me I don’t have any problem with FDC for not supporting our candidate and I keep on calling our leaders in ANT not to (engage) in any cruel or any friction in regard to that. We need to focus in building our capability and see that Hon Alice Alaso go through,” he said.

He said he was very grateful to NUP for making a bold decision to support them.

“NUP is supporting us, we have no friction with them, we discuss issues, we never tell them what to do and what not to do. Anytime we meet with them we do analysis. We respect the choices they make,” he stated.

Muntu said NUP acceptance to support their candidate doesn’t mean that it will be uniform in the all general electoral exercise that will happen in the future but it something that need to be worked upon where they can agree to field a joint candidate.  

“Whenever we don’t field a joint candidate, I don’t think it should be basis for any opposition party to go to the neck of any other, it will be wrong. We have got our own problem with FDC however we must look at things from a strategic perspective,” he said.

 There has been friction between FDC and ANT following Muntu’s exit from the party in 2018.

Muntu who was the former party president said in his four-page statement, which he described as a letter to the nation that he, and a group of other members who included Alaso, had resolved to leave the party partly because of irreconcilable differences with the then party leadership under Amuriat.

The Electoral Commission (EC) scheduled February 23, 2023 for the by-elections to replace the deceased Serere County Member of Parliament, Patrick Okabe.