Legislators who sit on the Committee of Legal and Parliamentary Affairs have ‘weighed in’ the proposal within the Constitutional Amendment Bill, 2019 to establish a panel of speakers saying it is unclear as it is and has potential to cause discord in the leadership of Parliament.
The bill proposes a panel of 3 speakers to assist the current Speakers of Parliament in transaction of Parliament’s business, cognizant that it gets tiresome for a speaker to chair House for six hours as it is the current practice.
“The Speaker and Deputy Speaker are human beings like any other person on earth. They get different engagements and also become exhausted, they need time to refresh up yet Parliament’s business should not be affected” said Hon Wilfred Niwagaba the mover of the bill.
Niwagaba made these remarks while presenting the Constitution (Amendment) Bill, 2019 before the Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Committee on Thursday, 23 January 2020.
He explained that the caliber of Speakers being proposed would equal that of Parliamentary committee chairpersons, and thus would not attract an extra charge on the consolidated fund. “This proposal is intended to have specified persons as members of Parliament who can be called upon to assist the speaker when need arises” said Niwagaba.
This sparked dissenting views among legislators with a section of MPs rejecting the proposal that speakers would simply be called upon to chair sessions as and when need arises.
Hon Jovah Kamateeka (Mitooma) doubted the efficacy of decisions that would be made by the non-elected speakers and asked “will the decisions of such speakers who are not facilitated financially and simply called upon to chair sessions be taken seriously?”
The committee chairperson, Jacob Oboth reiterated that it was ‘unattractive’ to have a constitutional amendment if the proposed panel is to be selected from Committee chairpersons when need arises.
However another section of MPs including the Bugweri County MP, Abdu Katuntu rejected the election of a panel of speakers saying, it would cause discord in the leadership of Parliament. “The speaker needs a panel she can closely work with, don’t bring into election, it will be another problem in the leadership of Parliament” Said Katuntu.
To allay the fears of legislators, Niwagaba said the aim of the bill is to introduce a panel of Speakers in the Constitution and have details such as qualifications of the speaker, the way they will run business debated on a later stage and enclosed in Parliament’s Rules of Procedures.
The bill also proposes expansion of the category of the citizenry that can challenge a presidential election. If the bill is passed into law, any voter who can gather signatures of 100 signatures from 2/3 of districts in Uganda is liable to challenge the presidential elections.
The bill further proposes removal of the office of the District Resident Commissioner (RDC) with the justification that the office is simply a duplication of a role being done by several other offices in districts. “In every district there is the RDC, Police Commander, Internal Security Officer, Secretary of Defense, Chief Administrative Officer for monitoring government services and elected district leaders, thus this RDC position is a duplication of services” said Niwagaba.
