4 September 2008
opinion
The controversial NSSF land saga involving Security Minister Amama Mbabazi could be the beginning of the end of Mbabazi's otherwise illustrious public life unless he refunds the Shs11 billion he received on his personal account from the deal. Not even the 28 pages of the written statement he made before the ruling party's parliamentary caucus could save him; he still has a lot of explaining to do.
In his statement, Mbabazi concluded that he sold his land to NSSF this year at a 'fair price' in a 'straightforward' buy-and-sell transaction. Of course Shs 11b is fair, especially to the seller. I am not sure though, if it is fair to the thousands of dead employees who saved with NSSF and the more who are still saving every month, with little hope of ever benefiting from their savings before they die.
The NSSF is not just another cash cow to be put at the disposal of the regime. It is the essence of years of toil by honest employees over time. It cannot be allowed to be plundered like the Cooperative Bank was. Or just as the Uganda Commercial Bank was sold for a song to Stanbic, despite protestations by Parliament and all Ugandans who still have a grain of nationalism left in them.
Nor is NSSF another Greenland Group of Companies which was sunk along with its first indigenous bank, Greenland Bank, because its founder was suspected of harbouring presidential ambitions.
The NSSF land saga constitutes a double tragedy. Firstly, the NSSF is surely on its way down and is likely to be erased from our collective memory like the above cited banks were.
Unfortunately, nothing dramatic is likely to happen. It will be another item in the news. I have listened really hard to hear one determined voice from the workers whose savings are being plundered in dubious deals. There has been none. I had thought that NSSF's contributing workforce would hold a one-day sit-down strike in the midst of the controversy one of these days to press for a proper explanation.
As owners of the money in question, I thought they would act with some resolve. Even employers who have to pay through the nose to top up their employees' NSSF contribution have kept silent, leaving it to some well meaning politicians to make some uncoordinated noises. Nothing has happened yet. On a personal note, because of the career path I chose, I have never personally contributed to NSSF in my whole life as I have never been employed by anyone.
NSSF subscribers do not need a 28 page statement from a security minister who deals in land. They need assurance that the money that was wasted in a dubious deal by their irresponsible board of directors will be refunded. Period. If they have any sense of self worth, the workers and their employers, irrespective of their political affiliation, should act now, not later.
Secondly, in Mbabazi's recently acquired reputation, the NRM has lost its last hope. The hope of a clean, hardworking, intelligent leader who would save the party from the rot it has accumulated in the last 27 years (five years in the bush, 22 in power) as a result of "one man show politics".
If one of the probable successors to Museveni the vice president has had problems with very personal domestic issues, this one, Mbabazi, has had to write 28 pages to explain a "straightforward transaction" to his own caucus. When he appears before the real owners of the money, the workers, he will probably need another 100 pages.
Has somebody dragged Mbabazi into the mud as an act of conspiracy? I highly doubt. Mbabazi is a smooth operator who would be hard to trick. He is a calculating, methodical and strategic individual who would always have that last laugh. Yet it is possible that he could not have possibly received Shs11b entirely on his own behalf. There could be someone else involved in the deal- and only time will tell.
Just like in the case of the Gavi Funds' scandal that saw Muhwezi, Mukula, Kamugisha and Kaboyo in court, there is always another invisible beneficiary. Or, like the Odonga Otto bribery allegation we have just walked out of, involving MP Kaddunabi- someone would always die -politically- as the real beneficiary moves on untouched.
If he wants another credible day under Uganda's hot sun, Mbabazi ought to refund the poor workers' Shs11b and repossess his land. If he does, there is no reason why he should not stand for party president in the future to save his party from its endemic poor leadership.
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