Muntu’s ANT Buganda Coordinator ‘crosses’ to Museveni’s NRM

Pauline Margaret Namagembe, the Buganda coordinator of Mugisha Muntu’s Alliance for National Transformation (ANT), has reportedly left the party for President Museveni’s NRM.

Namagembe ran for the Wakiso District Woman MP seat in the 2016 parliamentary election on the ticket of main opposition party the Forum for Democratic Change (FDC).

But she lost to Rosemary Nansubuga Seninde of the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) who garnered 186,975 votes against Namagembe’s 137,150 votes.

Namagembe later joined ANT after Muntu left FDC, where he was formerly president, to found his own party.

She became the Buganda Coordinator for the nascent party that began months after Muntu lost to Patrick Oboi Amuriat in the race for FDC party president.

But a photo of Namagembe meeting NRM vice chairperson for eastern Uganda and former minister Mike Mukula has raised questions on whether she has abandoned Muntu.  

The photo, believed to have been taken at Plot 10 Kyadondo, the seat of the NRM secretariat, shows Namagembe and Mukula in a discussion.

Namagembe’s exit, once confirmed, could be the first high profile defection from the party which got a boost of two new MPs last week.

Before joining FDC to run for district woman MP seat, and later ANT, Namagembe was a member of the Democratic Party (DP) and a councillor in Wakiso.

On July 07, Jinja Municipality East MP Paul Mwiru and his Ntungamo Municipality counterpart Gerald Karuhanga officially crossed to ANT.

 Mwiru, a former deputy spokesperson of the FDC, received criticism from party secretary general Nandala Mafabi on a live television show.

On July 12, Mwiru said his supporters had pestered him to explain why he left the FDC for Muntu’s ANT.

But he insisted discussing such reasons would cause the disintegration of FDC.

In recent weeks, reports of some MPs who had been rumoured to be on their way from FDC to ANT dragging their feet have remained a subject of political whispers.