Mpuuga has no ideology at national level, says Kigezi don

Prof Sabiiti Makara says he has doubts Mpuuga has what it takes to even defeat NUP in Masaka, citing the Nyendo Mukungwe MP's lack of ideology at the national level

Renowned Kigezi political science scholar Sabiiti Makara has said Mathias Mpuuga has no ideology he can sell at the national level.

Last week, former Leader of the Opposition Mpuuga announced he would be unveiling the next step in his political journey in coming weeks as a rift with National Unity Platform took a turn for the worse at a funeral in Lwengo District.

But Prof Makara, a senior political analyst and a lecturer of political science at Kabale University, has told the embattled Nyendo Mukungwe legislator that he has nothing to sell to Ugandans.

Mr Mpuuga is at crosshead with his National Unity Platform (NUP) party over receiving Shs500 million service award during his term of office as Leader of the Opposition.

In a audio recording that went viral on social media last week, the soft spoken Mpuuga borrowed from scriptures, drawing his supporters to Christ’s teaching to his disciples about not losing hope, he was speaking after attending the burial of Pascal Ssekasamba, a younger brother of former democratic party secretary general Mathias Nsubuga Birakeraawo, in Lwengo.

Mr Mpuuga was last month suspended from his position as NUP deputy president for Buganda region, a decision that appears to have set his collision with the party leader Robert Kyagulanyi on a brakeless rail spin.

Prof Makara feels Mpuuga is not yet good to go as a national leader, suggesting that the legislator was probably overestimating his visibility in politics.

“I think he has that eagle that he is visible, that he is a national leader but we haven’t heard any of his ideology," Prof Makara said.

"If you are going to be a good leader at national level, you must have a certain ideology that is driving you. I think that Mpuuga hasn’t exemplified any form of unique ideology at national level.”

The political scientists noted that the rift between NUP principal Kyangulanyi and Mpuuga seems to be deepening at various levels.

"If Mpuuga is only looking at Greater Masaka, then it maybe a narrow way of looking at things because Greater Masaka alone can't be a centre of politics," he said.

“I think Mpuuga is looking inside instead of outside because for him to form a party basing on his support in his constituency in Masaka may be a narrow way of looking at things because that part of the country cannot be a business centre for the party."

Makara also said he had doubts Mpuuga could challenge an already entrenched NUP in Masaka, adding that the morality question would always follow Mpuuga like a grotesque shadow.

"Is he going to tell the voters that he did a very honourable thing to take money from Parliament?" Makara posed.

“I don’t think Mpuuga will upstage NUP or even NRM in Greater Masaka. Remember that Masaka covers many districts. How will Mpuuga go beyond his constituency?

"I don’t see him capturing the whole of Masaka with his new party because he doesn’t have any known idealogy, the many years he has been in parliament, he has not stood out as a person who speaks the truth to power so his failure to talk the truth to the Executive and being in a cohabitation with a State in some aspect, especially the Shs500 million, I think it puts out."

Mpuuga shot onto the national political milieu on the back of a morality scandal when he was shot in a Masaka lodge over allegations of having a tryst with a married woman.

At the time, he played the victim and turned the scandal into a blessing as he went on to unseat Democratic Party's John Baptist Kawanga in the race that had also attracted Francis Kiiza (NRM), and independents Susan Nakawuki and Sande Mutesasira.

He had previously cut his political teeth at Makerere University under the Uganda Young Democrats before being groomed at Bulange Mengo where he served as a youth minister.

His first real taste of the national chalice was when he became the face of the Walk to Work protest that shook the ruling NRM government in 2011.