Uganda: Parliament Now Wants in-House Salon

Ugandan MPs in seesion
11 April 2024

Women legislators have demanded that Parliament sets up a salon for their regular needs.

The new clamour, communicated by State Minister for Water and Environment Beatrice Anywar, say having a beauty parlour in Parliament would boost their participation in parliamentary activities.

In a morning session chaired by Speaker Anita Among, Minister Anywar - an ex-officio - thanked Parliament for setting up a gym but was quick to add that few ladies feel comfortable getting involved in it.

She said gyms are associated with vigorous exercise routines that "disorganise" the hair.

"One of them is myself; my hair and nails and whatever are part of the woman," Ms Anywar said.

"What I am really saying is that we ladies can come early, spend more time in the salon and then the house."

Ms Anywar once gained a fond moniker of 'Mama Mabira' for her fight to save Uganda's once largest natural rainforest that covers an area of 306 square kilometres in Buikwe District between Lugazi and Jinja.

At the time, the government was giving away swathes of the rainforest to sugarcane millers.

But now Anywar appears to have launched another war, that of setting in Parliament a tidy place where hairdressers and beauticians can attend to the looks of legislators.

The demand will not shock many. Parliament has made big headlines over the last two years for one bizarre demand after another, including once clamouring for a flyover to be erected connecting Bowman House to Parliament.

Bowman House on Parliament Avenue is office for several MPs and they argued at the time that they needed to be safe when crossing the avenue to Parliament Building.

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