State minister for lands Persis Namuganza (PHOTO/Courtesy).
The State Minister for Lands, Persis Namuganza has since last week been in the eye of the storm after the Parliamentary Committee on Rules, Privileges, and Discipline found her guilty of gross misconduct and misbehavior.
The ego-laden minister was last week pinned on the cross by the whole House of Parliament for making impugned statements in the media in May this year which put the institution of parliament and its leadership into disrepute contrary to the parliamentary Rules of Procedure.
Her fate was made worse by Agago North MP Amos Okot, who on December 08 notified the Clerk to Parliament of his intention to move the motion to censure her.
Typical of an estranged wife, Namugnanza has since then gone on a rampage to spew insults to fellow Honourable Members and Ministers who have tried to advise and save her from disgracing her age of 38.
Not even the Speaker of Parliament Annet Anita Among or the Deputy Speaker Thomas Tayebwa have been spared by the ill-fated minister who has a tendency of hatching uncalled conflict of vengeance with presiding officers, with the former Speaker of Parliament Rebecca Kadaga being her other punching bag.
But what befell the woman from Busoga who is not appearing before the Disciplinary committee for the first time?
It is on record that Namuganza’s woes are self-inflicted; she activated the self-destruction mode after she tainted her hands by fraudulently giving out Naguru-Nakawa land. It is this fraud that prompted the House to constitute an ad hoc committee chaired by Hon Dan Kimosho to investigate her dirty hands in controversially giving out government’s land under the guise of “Presidential Directive” which she could not avail any evidence to justify.
According to inner sources, Namuganza attempted to persuade and bulldoze the Speaker of Parliament, to dissolve the ad hoc committee and stop their investigation. This is so because she knew the evidence against her was as glaring as the clouds in the sky.
When attempts failed to persuade the speaker to protect her from her corrupt tendencies, Namuganza then resorted to blackmailing the entire institution of parliament claiming she was being witch-hunted. Her blackmail even became much evident after the adhoc committee tabled and presented their findings which indeed found her guilty of giving out government land.
Extracts of the ad hoc committee examined the process through which the land in the Nakawa-Naguru estate was allocated to the various claimants and their report implicated Minister Namuganza in gross negligence and abuse of public office.
The report revealed how Namuganza blindfolded timid officials from Uganda Land Commission (ULC) by duping them into believing that she had been directed by the President to allocate the land yet the purported presidential directive was not documented, traced or even availed to the Land commission or the committee.
It is noted that on 24th January 2020, Namuganza verbally informed ULC of the entities and persons to whom the President is purported to have issued directives for the allocation of land. These entities included Anil Damani, Seven Hills, and Princeton Children’s Medical Centre.
The Committee noted that these ‘Presidential Directives “were non-existent and Mr. Anil Damani denied ever writing the letter to the Minister and the signature appended to it.”
“It was also observed that Hon Namuganza Persis abused her office and authority by directing ULC to allocate land to entities while purporting to communicate Presidential directives which were non-existent,” the committee report reads.
As a result, the ad hoc committee recommended that Namuganza be held accountable for abuse of office for misleading ULC to allocate land to individuals and entities.
The committee also urged the appointing authority to temporarily relieve Namuganza of her ministerial duties to pave way for investigation by the relevant organs of Government
Having been wounded by the adhoc committee report, Namuganza lost common sense and strayed away like an ex-communicated buffalo in the jungle.
Her point of departure with Parliament is that she did not want to be investigated and accountable to the 40 million Ugandans for her fraudulent role in the allocation of Naguru-Nakawa estate.
It’s against such backgrounds as that the nation is now witnessing her undress her character and shamelessly try to divert the Ugandans from demanding for her resignation from public office.
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