Uganda Prime Minister, Robinah Nabbanja
Government of Uganda has rubbished claims by both Ethiopia and Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) that Uganda is raining rebels that are tormenting the two nations.
The remarks were made by Premier Robinah Nabbanja while responding to a concern raised by Ibrahim Ssemujju (Kira Municipality) that tasked the Minister of Defence to explain complaints raised by the two nations that Uganda was training rebels to distablise its neighbors.
Ssemujju cited the first complaint by the Speaker of the DRC National Assembly who threatened to lead his Parliament in rejecting the second agreement to allow UPDF joint operation in DRC over remarks made by Commander of Land Forces Muhoozi Kainerugaba of supporting rebel group M23.
“Can Government and and specifically the Ministers of Defense and Foreign Affairs brief parliament on complaints raised by some of the leaders of DRC especially relating to events of June 13th when rebels of M23 captured Bunagana?” said Ssemujju.
He further quoted remarks by Speaker of DRC Christophe Mboso who accused Uganda of back stabbing DRC forces and warned that the National Assembly will not allow agreement to have joint operation even before these M23 troops did what they did and also hinted on Muhoozi’s close relations with Rwanda.
The protest from DRC are in response to the tweets made by Muhoozi who expressed support for Rwanda Army, saying they had no hand in helping M23 capture Bunagana as alleged by DRC.
In another scenario, Ssemujju also tasked Government to clarify on accusations from Ethiopia that Uganda was training the Tigary rebels in Karamoja sub-region.
He said the complaints followed similar tweets by Muhoozi whom he referred to as the “tweeting general” where he expressed support for the Tigary rebel group and accused the current Ethiopian government of human rights violations against the citizenry.
In response, Nabbanja said, “Government of Uganda isn’t training any rebel groups in any part of this country and neither outside this country. I want to commit that the Minister of Defense will come here with a report…”
The development comes at the time the Opposition in their minority report on the national budget estimates for 2022/2023 raised concern over the accumulated cost of the DRC operations in Eastern DRC where the UPDf are carrying out a joint operation with DRC to fight Allied Defense Forces (ADF) rebels who are accused of masterminding terror attacks in Uganda.
The Opposition cited the current UPDF operations in DRC that have cost over Shs249 million per day and with the operations having started on 30th November 2021, it means that by the time the report by Opposition was made which were 170 days, Shs42.33Bn had so far been incurred in DRC.
Another expense cited was the Shs436.25Bn that was allocated for court award pertaining case of DRC Vs Uganda under Treasury Operations and yet these funds were above the actual award of provision of USD65 million which is equivalent to Shs236.25Bn, putting the excess to Shs200Bn.
