The National Unity Platform party (NUP) has reiterated that it is not part of the Inter-party Organisation Dialogue (IPOD) arrangements and has never received any funding or support from the platform.
According to the party president Robert Kyagulanyi alias Bobi Wine, NUP is only funded by its elected Members of Parliament, donations and disbursements allocated by Parliament to all political parties with representation in the August House.
Kyagulanyi says that according to section 14 A of the political parties and Organisations Act, that the government shall contribute funds or other public resources towards the activities of the political parties or organisations represented in Parliament.
Subsection (c) states that, In respect of normal day to day activities, funding shall be based on numerical strength of each political party or organisation in Parliament. These are the funds allocated by parliament, disbursed from the consolidated fund and duty accounted for.
“The regime and its tools have always tried to cluster this funding as the IPOD money which they know is false. IPOD is a base arrangement with no basis on the laws of Uganda,” reads part of the statement.
NUP believes that president Museveni has hijacked IPOD in order to enforce his despotic will and they have decided to forego all the opportunities and resources it extends to its members for the sake of the principles and the values NUP represents.
“Gen. Museveni met the Secretaries Generals of different parties and plotted how to stop NUP from getting this funding the way he frustrated us all. Gen. Museveni stated that the law should be amended so that only political parties which are in IPOD should be entitled to public funds,” Kyagulanyi said.
Kyagulanyi adds that the increasing incidents of torture, abductions illegal detentions and other forms of repression assure the party’s decision not to join IPOD. And that if Museveni goes on to manipulate the law so as to restrict public funding to only political parties in IPOD, they will challenge it.
