ANALYSIS: Mao’s DP test

Around the same time Kezaala was appointed, another vocal DP member, Stella Kiryowa, who challenged Nakiwala Kiyingi in DP primaries for the Kampala Woman MP slot, also crossed to the NRM and picked nomination forms to contest for the East African Legislative Assembly seat on the NRM ticket.

The Independent understands that two other vocal youth of DP’s Uganda Youth Democrats (UYD) and former Guild Presidents at Makerere University in 2010/2011 and 2009/2010 academic year, Shaban Senkubuge and Robert Okware respectively joined NRM early this year and are no longer interested in DP affairs.

These movements are fueling suspicions that other top party members are secretly working with President Museveni’s regime. All this has irked party members, who are putting all blame on Mao’s leadership.

Insiders in DP say one of the sources of the problems is that Mao is micro managing the party and is undemocratic.

For instance, Mao is accused of recently supporting Dennis Mukasa Mbidde’s sole candidature for East African Legislative Assembly (EALA) on the DP ticket in total disregard of members willing to compete for the same position. Mao and his team cancelled the other candidates saying they didn’t qualify.

Party loyalists are not happy especially because they see Mbidde as a sell-out for hobnobbing with President Museveni who praised him as a good DP member at the NRM celebrations in Masindi, Western Uganda on Jan.26. Some party members suspect that Mbidde is secretly working with Museveni to weaken the party. Mibidde has dismissed those reports saying that it is weaklings that can easily cross to the NRM.

Mao is also accused of promoting the Deputy Secretary General for the party Gerald Siranda as acting full Secretary General for one year replacing the late Mathias Nsubuga without the full backing of the Party’s National Council.

Mao is also accused of reducing the National Council Meetings, which are supposed to seat twice a year to deliberate on key issues affecting the party, to ordinary meetings which he conducts at his residence in Ntinda, a Kampala suburb.

The National Council, which is comprised DP members of Parliament, District Chairpersons and DP members who stood for parliamentary seats and LCV but failed to go through, is mandated by the party constitution to fill vacant positions of the party leadership.

Sources in the party say that Mao and a few colleagues on the National Executive Committee sit and decide for the party without the full backing of the NC.

Mao has admitted the party is in trouble.

“The Democratic Party is in deep trouble and a defining moment. We are in a catch 22 or a conundrum. The days ahead will reveal what the party stands for, what it is made of and where it is destined to go,” Mao said on Jan.31.

On the resignation of the party chairman, Mao said the former informed them in a meeting in Jinja on Jan. 28 that he had decided to accept the appointment by Museveni and that he considered it a civil service position. But Mao said that they informed Kezaala that their preference and indeed that of the vast majority of party members would be that he rejects the appointment. The parties in the meeting agreed that a public service position cannot be held concurrently with the position of National Chairman of the Democratic Party.

“With deep regret, we accept his resignation,” Mao said, before adding the Deputy National Chairman Kiwanuka Mayambala would perform the duties of that office with immediate effect.

What is happening in DP is an opportunity for true believers in the values of DP and not self-seekers motivated purely by ambition for political office.

“The delegates gave me the mandate to lead this party, not to wind it up,” Mao said at another forum.

While defending Mbidde’s sole candidature for the EALA contest, Mao said that as a party, DP could not nominate a duck to race with a hen. “If we need this position,” Mao said, “we need to nominate a capable candidate.”

Gerald Siranda, the current secretary general of the party describes Mao’s leadership as a success amidst challenges.