The mighty TV10GanoMazima has exclusively landed on information showing that there is a clandestine mobilization plan to force embattled Speaker of Parliament Annet Anita Among out of office over sanctions.
Early this month, the United Kingdom announced sanctions against Among, former Karamoja affairs senior minister Marry Goretti Kitutu and her junior Agnes Nandutu over their involvement in corruption practices at the cost of vulnerable Ugandans.
A few days after the UK sanctions, the United Arab Emirates also sanctioned the said individuals. It should be remembered that United States of America was the first to put travel restriction on Speaker Among and she confirmed to parliament that they were witch haunting her for chairing the parliamentary session that passed the Anti-Homosexuality bill which was signed into a law by President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni.
Highly placed sources said that the move to force Among out of office is spearheaded by controversial Lwemiyaga county legislator Theodore Ssekikubo who was also interested in the Speakership position when Jacob Oulanyah died in 2021 but was not given the National Resistance Movement (NRM) ticket.
Ssekikubo confirmed to TV10GanoMazima that it is a shame for Among who holds the third powerful office in the government to be internationally indicted.
Ssekikuubo disclosed that something has to be done to save the country’s image internationally.
He explained that Uganda is a strong member of the Commonwealth, an organisation that unites former British colony and currently as the chairperson of the Speakers and Presiding Officers of the Commonwealth parliaments, Uganda’s speaker has to participate in the meetings including the one which is expected to take place at the end of this year in London Britain.
Unfortunately she is not going to attend that meeting on behalf of Uganda because she was sanctioned by Britain.
Ssekikubo wants the Attorney General to come out and interpret what that means on Commonwealth laws.
“When our friend Jacob Oulanyah who was the Speaker of Parliament died, the Attorney General come out and interpreted that we cannot bury him before electing the new speaker.
Now we want to know will the deputy speaker Thomas Tayebwa represent us in those international meetings because his office is very different from the office of the speaker when it comes to the laws of Uganda,” Ssekikubo said.
He insisted that Among should resign to give the international community confidence that the Ugandan government is very serious when it comes to fighting corruption.
Ssekikubo warned that if she remains in office, many donor countries and organisations including serious investors are going to stop bringing their money into the country fearing that it will be mismanaged.
He added that as an experienced legislator, he expected the sanctions against Among and it is the reason why he tried to save her by bringing to the floor of parliament the issue of the corruption allegation made against parliament leadership through the social media exhibition but instead of listening to him and taking action, the speaker herself rubbished him.
He noted that when donor countries start seeing a speaker who is in the middle of corruption allegations stopping senior legislators like him from discussing these accusation, it means that she is above the law and the only way to tame her is through sanctioning her.
He added that the country also needed a good explanation of how the speaker presided over a meeting where parliamentary commissioners including the former Leader of Opposition Mathius Nsamba awarded themselves billions of funds without proper procedures.
TV10GanoMazima has however established that anti-Among groups know very well that Museveni is likely not to force her to resign in the middle of this term but they will use the sanction as a de-campaigning weapon come 2026.
Charles Rwomushana a former State House operative related that the only thing that will save Museveni’s government from the international community is to sacrifice Among.
“I think Museveni will do what he did to Amama Mbabazi, Sam Kutesa and Gilbert Bukenya when they mismanage the 2007 Ghogm money. He may order for her arrest, charge and imprison her but at the end of the movie she will be exonerated,” he said.
When she won the Speakership race, Among told her enemies that she will be on top of the parliament leadership for 20 years. She was elected as a deputy speaker in 2021, in 2022 she was then elected the speaker of parliament after the death of Oulanyah.
State House sources claim that Museveni was not comfortable with Among’s candidature and he supported Jacob Oboth Oboth the current Defense and Veteran affairs Minister but he was overruled by members of the NRM Central Executive Committee (CEC) and NRM caucus in parliament.
