Government warns clergy off electoral reforms

Uncomfortable that the opposition-led campaign for electoral reform has drawn in religious leaders, government has urged the Inter-Religious Council of Uganda (IRCU) to stay away from politics.

The Observer has learnt that State House has been exerting pressure on IRCU, an umbrella organisation that brings together leaders of various religious groups, warning them not to ally with opposition political actors. On May 27, IRCU Secretary General Joshua Kitakule told opposition activists during a closed-door meeting with religious leaders at the group’s offices on Namirembe hill, that the state was uncomfortable with their participation in the campaign.

“They warned us against dealing with you; they told us that they were unhappy with civil society organizations that had chosen to work with you in the push for electoral reforms,” a source familiar with the meeting quoted Kitakule as having said.

Kitakule’s confession came after some activists accused religious leaders of remaining ambivalent. In an earlier response, Metropolitan Yonah Lwanga of the Orthodox Church, who is also chairman of the IRCU council of presidents, had explained that religious leaders prefer to work behind-the–scenes and not seek media attention as the activists do.

Contacted on Saturday, Kitakule declined to discuss what he said during the closed-door meeting. But he told The Observer that IRCU is neutral.

“We are a neutral organization, and they (activists) came to ask us to be sort of referees; to mediate between them and government in pushing through the reforms, because even government is in agreement that the electoral system needs to be reformed,” Kitakule said.

The Leader of Opposition in Parliament, Wafula Oguttu, who attended the meeting, confirmed that Kitakule had indeed said religious leaders are under pressure from government.

“It is true we got that report, he (Kitakule) told us that the government, particularly President Museveni, doesn’t want to see us working directly with religious leaders,” Oguttu said on Saturday.

“They [government] wouldn’t want us (opposition) to go to religious leaders as a group but in our individual capacities,” he added.

Oguttu further revealed that religious leaders had expressed fears that their offices could be broken into, like those of the Human Rights Network (HURINET), a civil society organisation, whose computers and documents were stolen in a May 5 night break-in at Ntinda, among other groups to suffer such fate recently.

The May 27 meeting was called by the coalition on free and fair elections whose membership includes all the major opposition in conjunction with more than 24 civil society groups. Olara Otunnu, head of the campaign on free and fair elections, urged religious leaders not to abdicate their role as “custodians of our moral conscience”.

Besides Metropolitan Lwanga, the religious leaders’ team also had Gulu Archbishop John Baptist Odama, retired Bishop of Mukono Eria Paul Luzinda, and provincial secretary of the Church of Uganda, Canon Amos Magezi, who represented Archbishop Stanley Ntagali.

Many absentees

Other members of the IRCU’s council of ministers, notably Mufti Sheikh Shaban Mubajje, Pastor James Kakembo (Seventh Day Adventists Church) and Pastor Joseph Sserwadda (Pentecostal) didn’t attend. As the activists waited for religious leaders to arrive, there was internal debate as to whether the clergy should be engaged on the gifts President Museveni lavishes on them.

Norbert Mao (DP), Asuman Basalirwa (JEEMA) and Irene Ovonji-Odida (Action Aid) had wanted to raise the issue but Oguttu and Otunnu warned that it would be an undiplomatic move. Retired Bishop Zac Niringiye suggested a middle line, telling his colleagues that he knows pretty well how sensitive the matter is.

Thus during the meeting, the gifts were not discussed, but the question came up during the press conference that followed. “Religious leaders are solid enough to stand [the temptations] of the gifts from the president. If they (gifts) are in good faith, we receive them but if you detect that there is something attached to [the gift], you reject it and some have done so,” Archbishop Odama replied.

On the sidelines of the meeting, Bishop Niringiye told The Observer that the group had committed themselves to support and engage further with the activists on political reform.

sadabkk@observer.ug