By John Ricardo Munyegera
Indeed, Hon Engineer Abraham James Byandala, the minister without port-folio requires a thoroughly investigation in this assaulting case of the New Vision journalist. Did he do it? Yes, he did as evidenced by the many video clips taking rounds on the internet.
That was the dissatisfaction from many Ugandans on social media, radios and indeed the many Television channels in the country. Many have as well called for an immediate apology from him and a resignation among others. What we simply fail to understand here is that resigning is not something many Ugandans especially politicians are willing to do. In all other things you expect a Ugandan minister is never to resign.
That aside; when we look at the ministerial positions; he is after all a minister without portfolio. In a functioning government where all the arms of the government function; it’s simply wastage of resources to a person like Engineer Abraham Byandala. To be precise, the moment he left the ministry of works and transport after a series of financial loss and corruption scandals as to which his facing a few of them in courts of law; he’s now near to an outcast.
I beg to move that, he’s irrelevant to the politics of the country and indeed the government as well. We need to recall a few events in the life of minister Byandala. Okay, he served in Kampala city council as an Engineer for so long but indeed there are a number of deeds you can directly blame on this minister. Back then, Kampala was elevated to a city of potholes where the people and the cars had enormous problems. Does anyone of you remember the famous potholes in each part of the city? What about the poor drainage system which was always blamed to the former lord mayors yet the technocrat wing was headed by this day’s minister.
Apart from that, let’s look at the famous Mukono – Katosi road corruption scandal. This has made many people get enraged but not me at all. If he was part of the financial losses and corruption cases KCC was involved in by then; why was he nominated as a minister and moreover in one ministry were many projects were taking place? He had to get involved! In the same perspective he has confessed of even trading deceit to the president; so why do we have to panic at that? Let’s try to know this. In March 2015, Engineer Byandala confessed to the fact that he lied to the president. Funny enough that he’s still a minister.
Byandala’s confession of deceit to the president: (on 18th March 2015) this was during the handing over the ministry of works and transport after the president’s reshuffle of ministers. He explained; “I will tell you one incident: I was called at State House. While there, one MP from Karamoja said: ‘Your Excellency, your minister here does not know what he is doing. He does not know what is in Karamoja.” “To be honest, I did not know where Muyembe Road was, but (Ssebbugga) Kimezze (former executive director of Uganda National Roads Authority) had given a brief about pulling out vehicles that were stuck.
At the same time; Byabagambi praised Byandala for working with him, especially during the turbulent times of the Katosi Road saga and the standard gauge railway turmoil. “We remained together despite the turmoil and pressure from various forces during the Katosi and standard gauge railway conflicts.” This therefore shows that these officials are the same and can do much worse than that.
Beating up the journalist: I can’t blame him about such actions. All reports on family or domestic violence stem in Uganda. It’s a shame to us as Ugandan men, therefore, don’t jump to conclusions here. That mere fact he did this doesn’t exonerate us as men. He’s ashamed but in general we’re ashamed as a society which doesn’t respect women or the vice-versa. There are many people with such scandals in our community but we let that pass for a while and it becomes a norm. Can anyone remember what Hon. Winnie Kizza did to a female beggar at Kira Road police station? She slapped the poor lady and on camera yet she was also struggling to survive in the hell-hardening Uganda. I hear she’s aspiring to become the leader of opposition but where is the difference to her character to that of Engineer Byandala.
The ‘good’ thing about we Ugandans is that we simply forget and we rush into passing judgment on others. People, these two are the same but what divides them is the ruling and opposition party. When you talk of the decaying morals in our society you find a series of things to understand. Failing to understand our society and blaming a few is simply living like the Ostriches. Yes, we can all burry our heads in the sand to the decaying morals, but the fact remains that we’re suffering as a society.
Besides that, there are these already drenched in corruption scandals ministers already. Many of them have been in corrupt scandals. Some have even been censored in the previous years. These are quite the same club of people who have the same sentiment over how they treat Ugandans. They don’t care at all; therefore I cannot blame Byandala as they are the same. One needs to learn that, Uganda is a give and take; nothing for nothing and no expectations thus, every one of us does something small expecting something in return. Even church pastors these days offer different prayers for different charges; therefore to survive here, you need to offer something. One can call this a changing society but save your energy over that; we (Ugandans) don’t care at all to our country not even the people or resources we have.