By Andrew Victor Mawanda Naimanye
National Resistance Movement’s (NRM)
Vice Chairperson for Central Region, Godfrey Kiwanda Suubi, has voiced strong concerns about the erosion of the ruling party’s founding principles.
Speaking during NBS Barometer on Tuesday night, Kiwanda offered a candid reflection on the current state of Uganda’s ruling party.
“We have to understand what took us to the bush as the NRA,” Kiwanda said. “That is the foundation of our fight. And if we went wrong in these almost 40 years, how can we rectify our mistakes?”
Kiwanda expressed disappointment over what he termed as the infiltration of the party by "fraudsters and self-seekers" who, he says, have exploited systemic loopholes for personal gain, weakening the integrity of the party's internal democracy.
“It is unfortunate that many fraudsters joined the party and deteriorated its principles,” he said. “We’ve identified many of them, and some have already been exposed.”
While acknowledging the ongoing efforts of the Elections Disputes Tribunal to restore order through adjudication of grievances, Kiwanda was skeptical about its capacity to address the deeper, systemic issues plaguing the NRM.
“The issues within the NRM exceed the tribunal’s ability to combat them,” he stated.
One of the major challenges, according to Kiwanda, is the current structure that permits candidates to recruit their own election registrars, a practice he believes compromises the credibility of internal electoral processes.
“The biggest program is to allow a candidate to recruit the registrars,” he said.
The NRM Tribunal is expected to start delivering its verdicts in the coming days after wrapping up hearings of over 380 petitions filed by aggrieved members, many of whom cited irregularities, vote-rigging, and procedural violations during the party’s contentious parliamentary primaries.