Muntu to Museveni: It won’t be business as usual

Alliance for National Transformation (ANT) presidential candidate Maj Gen (Rtd) Gregg Mugisha Muntu has warned incumbent Yoweri Kaguta Tibuhaburwa Museveni the next year’s election would not be different from previous polls.

Maj Gen Muntu, who is making his first attempt at the presidency, has told the Museveni administration that the handling of the election could not only cost them power but could change the country’s trajectory.

In a statement in which he communicated the suspension of his campaigns over the arrest of fellow contestants Patrick Oboi Amuriat of main opposition Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) and Robert Kyagulanyi aka Bobi Wine of the National Unity Platform (NUP), the former army commander warned that the current electoral period would determine Uganda’s destiny.

“We have decided to pause our presidential campaign activities until our colleagues, Hon. Kyagulanyi and Hon. Patrick Amuriat Oboi are released and their freedom to campaign guaranteed,” said Muntu.

“We call upon government to recognise that this isn’t business as usual. The future of the country depends a lot on how you handle this season.”

Museveni, the candidate of the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM), is seeking to extend his rule to four decades.

Although he will, for the first time in two decades, not be competing with his main fiercest challenger Dr Kizza Besigye of the FDC, Museveni will be facing two of his former bush war comrades — Muntu and former security minister Lt Gen (Rtd) Henry Tumukunde — as well as Besigye protégé Amuriat and youthful singer-turned-politician Bobi Wine.

Arrests, detentions and election rigging allegations have characterized the polls in the Museveni era.