MPs fear to censure Gen. Tumwine

By Friday, only 20 MPs had appended their signatures to the motion, out of the required 153 members of Parliament.

CENSURE             TUMWINE        PARLIAMENT

MPs pushing for the censure of security minister Gen. Elly Tumwine are stuck with their motion after majority of the legislators are reluctant to append their signatures.

Gen. Tumwine is accused of blocking the work of Parliament when the Committee on Human Rights was probing illegal detention centres or safe houses in the country in which many Ugandans have allegedly been tortured.

By Friday, only 20 MPs had appended their signatures to the motion, out of the required 153 members of Parliament.

The Parliament’s rule of procedure provides that at least one-third of the Members of Parliament should append their signatures on the list if the motion is to proceed.

After ten working days, if less than one-third of all the MPs have appended their signatures on the list, the Notice of Censure shall cease. This now means the MPs have until Tuesday next week to solicit for the required signatures.

However addressing journalists at Parliament on Friday, some of the proponents of the censure motion attributed the slow pace in signing the motion, to what their described as bribery and intimidation of MPs by the army General.

“We know he lends money to MPs in Parliament so many of them might be having loans and fear to append their signatures. But we are saying this should not scare you away,” Theodore Ssekikubo (NRM, Lwemiyaga county) said.

Ssekikubo was joined by other MPs, including John Baptist Nambeshe, Barnabas Tinkasiimire (Buyaga) Allan Ssewanyana (Makindye West) and Moses Kasibante (Rubaga North).

Citing the 2017 constitutional amendment to lift the presidential age limit, the MPs also alleged that their colleagues might have been bribed not to append their signatures.

“You all know what happened during the removal of the age limit, how money exchange hands so I’m suspicious of colleagues receiving money,” Nambeshe said.

The speaker of Parliament , Rebecca Kadaga, last year instituted an investigation into the alleged torture by Internal Security Organisation (ISO) after Latif Ssebaggala (Kawempe North), and Kassiano Wadri (Arua Municipality), alleged that ISO was running safe houses to torture people in Kalangala District and Kyengera in Wakiso.

Appearing before the Human rights committee of Parliament, Gen. Tumwine admitted that government was running safe houses for intelligence purposes but not torturing civilians. Ends