Lawyer Male Mabirizi has weighed in on the ongoing debate over the shs500 million that National Unity Platform vice president for Buganda Mathias Mpuuga received from the Parliament commission.
In his comment about the money, Mabirizi said the shs500 million that Mpuuga who is also the former Leader of Opposition got is not backed by law.
“ Mpuuga Mathias Nsamba, a man I first met in 2009 at Makerere University when he abused his office as Youth Minister Buganda Kingdom to appoint Lukwago Rashid as chairperson Nkobazambogo without elections, has defended his ‘service award’ of shs500 million the first and last of its kind without citing any law,” Mabirizi said.
Mpuuga is facing pressure following a social media expose of minutes of the meeting of the Parliamentary Commission chaired by Speaker Anita Among he attended on May 6, 2022 and shared nearly shs2 billion of taxpayers’ money in form of a ‘service award.’ Which has since been questioned.
The National Unity Platform last week asked Mpuuga to resign from his position as a commissioner of parliament after he admitted taking the shs500 million ‘service award.’
However, Mpuuga would later in a statement, he said he will not resign.
“To call any such payments corruption is the highest level of spite, double standards and deliberate misrepresentation to the public and membership of the party on a purely selfish and malicious mission,” Mpuuga said.
In his comment about the matter, lawyer Mabirizi also punched holes in Mpuuga’s defence, saying that the legal provisions don’t back him up but rather leave him naked.
“Article 85(1) of the Constitution that “A member of Parliament shall be paid such emoluments, such as gratuity and pension, and shall be provided with such facilities, as may be determined by Parliament. Article 97 which states that members of Parliament that shall be entitled to such privileges as Parliament shall by law prescribe.”
“The above two articles have one component in common, Parliament must determine and reading of the two means an Act of Parliament. Article 257(1)(u) of the Constitution defines Parliament as Parliament of Uganda. Therefore, for any emolument or facility to be provided, a specific motion has to be presented, debated and passed by the entire Parliament leading to an Act of Parliament. It is such process that led to Parliamentary (Remuneration of Members) Act, 1981 and Parliamentary Pensions Act, 2007.”
He says, had it not been his busy schedule , partly attributed to backlog caused by his 18 months’ imprisonment coupled with financial and manpower deficiencies, Mpuuga and the three other parliament commissioners who received the ‘service awards’ would have been dragged to courts of law and criminal charges instituted against them.
