Barnabas Talemwa, an in-law to Gen. Salim Saleh, the senior presidential advisor on defence and also influential brother to the head of state has urged President Museveni to identify a successor and retire from politics.
Talemwa who is known for his frankness, says, the only way for the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) party to survive is by identifying cadres that are to take on the mantle from the crop of the current leaders. Mr. Talemwa is a brother Gen. saleh’s wife, Jovia Saleh.
In his open letter that was first published by Chimpreports, Talemwa says “My view today, like it was then is that most successful political organisations all over the world covertly groom cadres for leadership to ensure sustainability and continuity when old leaders retire”
Adding “The latest developments in the country aimed at undermining the NRM and government have prompted me to once again remind you and my party that we need to do something”
Below is the letter in full
Your Excellency in 2011, I wrote a letter in my capacity as a loyal cadre of the National Resistance Movement (NRM-O) party, and as a person who shares your leadership philosophy and vision that has seen Uganda tremendously transform.
Your Excellency in that letter, I appealed to the party leadership to take deliberate efforts to groom a lineup of cadres for leadership as part of a wider succession plan to consolidate the achievements of NRM and to ensure continuity.
Your Excellency at the time I argued that it was time for the NRM party under your guidance to start vetting and grooming your successor to avoid a vacuum when you finally leave the stage.
My view today, like it was then is that most successful political organisations all over the world covertly groom cadres for leadership to ensure sustainability and continuity when old leaders retire.
The latest developments in the country aimed at undermining the NRM and government have prompted me to once again remind you and my party that we need to do something.
We must turn the clock to consolidate our position as the biggest party in Uganda and re assure our supporters that the journey ahead is clear and that our party has the best policies to move Uganda to a middle income status.
Your Excellency, like you said in your speech to the nation on Sunday (September 8), Uganda has reached the take-off stage, but enemies largely backed by foreign interests have intensified efforts to undermine your achievements and the country’s progress in general.
Internally, there have been deliberate efforts to undermine your leadership and the NRM party to make it unpopular among Ugandans.
A vivid example was the sustained efforts by opposition politicians and some elements within the NRM to frustrate the democratic process of lifting of the presidential age limit.
This was done through blackmail and intimidation by opposition elements who mobilized goons to cause chaos in different parts of the country. The blackmail and violence was taken to the floor of parliament and it took the intervention of the army to reign in on MPs who wanted to use violence to stop a democratic process.
Abiriga
Unfortunately, we also lost a loyal NRM cadre and Member of Parliament for Arua Municipality, Ibrahim Abiriga (RIP), who was instrumental in vouching for the removal of age limit. All indications showed that his murder could have been orchestrated by enemies of the NRM and its leadership.
Your Excellency, I’m one of those who don’t believe in having an age limit for presidency because it is discriminatory and unconstitutional. Age limit should not limit any Ugandan from exercising their right to seek for any political office including the presidency.
The world over examples abound that people don’t vote a leader just because of their age. In Malaysia, a 92-year-old.
Mahathir Mohamad was elected as prime minister. If Malaysia’s constitution barred citizens like the 92-year-old incumbent because of age, the country could have missed out on the leader of the people’s choice.
Therefore, age limit should not stand in the way of allowing people to make choices and giving every Ugandan a chance to lead. I’m glad Uganda scrapped the age limit through a transparent and democratic process to avoid such problems.
However, Your Excellency, going forward we need to reflect as a party on the way forward.
Despite our many achievements as a party, it is time to plan for succession to avoid dealing with a power vacuum when it is already late. The power vacuum in our party at various levels of leadership is getting out of hand. We have many cadres ‘sitting on the fence’ because of this challenge.
Rogues
Like I said earlier, I reiterate my 2011 call to my greatest party NRM to expeditiously start a nationwide vetting for cadres that ideologically identify themselves with NRM party ideals so that we fill the vacuum which has become open ended. This vacuum has allowed jokers, drug addicts, rogues, criminals and agents of foreign enemies to think they can over throw the NRM party.
This challenge has been largely created by lack of cadre identification at all levels of leadership.
This has reflected in the caliber of elements people elect today for political offices like in parliament.
The Ugandan parliament has become a circus theatre; whoever performs better at theatricals becomes a parliamentarian. Whoever uses blackmail to impress goons and petty criminals suddenly parades himself to be President of Uganda. It is unacceptable and uncouth for such elements to take us back to dark ages where the best dancer takes the bride-I find it uncultured.
When I called for dialogue on succession plan in 2011, I was misunderstood by friends and comrades thinking that I was sliding away into opposition.
However, the unfolding events over the last few months show that I had foresight and my views should have been seriously considered by the leadership of NRM.
The world over, political parties in power that have a clear policy on grooming cadres for leadership have had stable leadership without unnecessary contestation when time for succession comes.
There are many examples I can cite, but closer to home is the ruling party in Tanzania, Chama Cha Mapinduzi. The same could apply to South Africa’s African National Congress (ANC) which has been in power for 20 years because of a clear succession ideology. I would say the same for the ruling political coalition (Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front) in Ethiopia. These countries among many others have managed to change leaders without antagonizing society and taking them back to dark ages through a well-planned succession strategy within the party ranks.
Once again, I call upon the NRM party, the chairman and the entire leadership that it is about time we go nationwide for cadre identification.
The NRM revolution has done a lot but there were mistakes at the beginning which we can still fix.
NRM inherited a rotten civil service which your Excellency you again cited during your address to the nation on Sunday.
The civil service needed revamping at the time NRM took over, but instead it used a policy of all inclusive politics where by bad apples were mixed with good apples. Neglecting the civil service and leaving it in hands of relatively negative forces has failed this country tremendously.
Criminality
For example, the police was rescued from this lot by recruiting young and educated officers who have made a difference. Though police still has remnants of the bad apples, it is better than it was.
However, the cold blood murder of Muhammad Kirumira, the former District Police commander for Buyende District last week, a man who was outspoken against the rot in the Police is yet another pointer that we have rogues determined to bring down the ruling party using violence and bloodshed.
When it comes to the civil service in general –negative elements within the establishment have failed the state through engaging in corruption and poor service delivery-until these are firmly dealt with, our revolution is still incomplete.
If our liberation is to go full circle, we must turn the clock.
It has become a norm for NRM supporters to be intimidated by negative forces and their sponsors.
Recently, Bebe Cool, a renowned musician was thrown out of a musical concert because of his political beliefs, and ironically the concert continued like nothing had happened. The concert should have been called off to send a strong warning that violence against people who hold divergent political views has no place in Uganda.
But what happened instead; the concert went on and the following day, organizers were on TV to announce that the affected singer would never perform at future events until he apologizes to fans who claim he insulted a politician they follow.
I was disappointed that as a party we just looked on after this incident. What is the role of the NRM party secretariat and where was Police?
It has become a norm for indisciplined citizens to attack men in uniform, both army and police, why would one have a gun but be killed by stone throwers?
We are headed for uglier times, if people cannot be defended by the system, they will start defending themselves.
It is time to clean up our good party and separate good apples from bad apples.