‘Museveni worried’

CHRIS OBORE

Kampala

The NSSF-Temangalo scandal now in its eighth week as headline news appears to have finally gotten the full attention of President Yoweri Museveni.

Sunday Monitor has learnt that the scandal who one consequence has been to spark of a parallel contest pitting NRM’s Secretary General John Patrick Amama Mbabazi and Maj. Gen. Jim Muhwezi who is also a member of the party’s Central Executive Committee (CEC) has the President worried.

Top NRM figures like Local Government minister Kahinda Otafiire have also openly castigated Mr Mbabazi who they accused of allegedly posturing as ‘Mr Clean’.

Secondly, they also want Mr Mbabazi to swallow a bitter political pill because he allegedly has been back-stabbing colleagues before the President.

Now informed sources have tell Sunday Monitor, Mr Museveni has been quietly meeting confidants and top party cadres.

According to sources, Mr Museveni is worried that if the anti-Mbabazi group succeed, then his own political future wasn’t safe either.

This feeling, according to sources, was reportedly enhanced by the Mbabazi group who quietly impressed upon Mr Museveni that what was underway was much bigger and could end up at his (Museveni) door step.

Mr Museveni’s attention was drawn to the fact that all the senior politicians who are ranged against Mr Mbabazi had one time or the other expressed dissatisfaction with the President.

So the President decided to consult. One such consultation meeting took place on Friday from around lunch time to around 6p.m. between the President and his VP, Prof. Gilbert Bukenya at Parliament.

The VP reportedly gave cautious responses, most of the time restricting his answers to technicalities like ‘let us wait for the outcome of the probe committee’.

That answer will not have been as helpful for a President who it appears does not know how to react.

According to sources, Mr Museveni’s biggest concern is that “who is there in the party to become Secretary General if Mr Mbabazi is uprooted.”

Mr Museveni’s anxiety is reportedly fed by the fact that party chiefs like Brig. Matayo Kyaligonza, Lt. Gen. Moses Ali, Dr Crispus Kiyonga, Maj. Gen. Kahinda Otafiire, Maj Gen. Muhwezi, Mike Mukula, Prof. Bukenya who would be the likely candidates, have in the past expressed desire for change of NRM leadership.