President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni who is also the National Chairman of the National Resistance Movement (NRM) has today launched the update of the party register.
The launch of the display, update and registration of all party members in all villages countrywide took place at the party headquarters at Plot 10 -Kyadondo Road, Nakasero - Kampala.
Addressing the party members, President Museveni urged the party cadres to clearly understand the four core principles of the NRM; Patriotism, Pan Africanism, socio-economic transformation and democracy, so that they are able to solve the problems of Ugandans.
“Mobilisation, holding meetings and all those other efforts will be very easy if you go back to the NRM principles. The principles of the NRM are a diagnosis of the problems of Uganda. Those principles are at first a diagnosis; what is this Uganda suffering from? And then a prescription. Therefore, as you mobilise, first of all understand these principles very clearly yourself.That is why you, the leaders, must be different from the followers. A follower doesn't have to understand the depth of the matter, he needs a summary,” President Museveni stressed.
The President further tasked the cadres to intensify mobilisation and sensitization of Ugandans in order to cause the much-desired socio-economic transformation in the country.
“Although we are now going to launch this exercise, the work of mobilisation and sensitising our people must be the leading effort of you the cadres. Tomorrow on TV, I will speak more about socio-economic transformation because this is the real issue. If all Ugandans knew how to live well, in the strategy of private sector led-growth, then NRM will have no work to do. This is our struggle as leaders to teach every adult, even the young Ugandans, how to create wealth,” he noted.
“Even the politics of identity based on tribe or religion is pushed by people who don't know anything about wealth creation because as a wealth creator, I don't think about tribes.”
President Museveni on the other hand, rallied the leaders to mobilise Ugandans to create wealth through the four sectors of the economy which include; commercial agriculture with “ekibaro”, manufacturing and artisanship, services and ICT.
“We need to emphasise that the NRM is a party which came with a principle of understanding people's needs which have got a potential solution, but it has not been either identified or if identified not implemented.”
The President also urged the party cadres to carry out a democratic exercise and warned them against the opposition's planned move to disorganise the party primaries.
“For the last-minute people, it is not wise to register them, what is wise is to allow only those whom you the villagers can confirm that have been having a positive attitude for some time,” he cautioned.
“I hear there are plans by the opposition to invade and then distort our primaries. Be careful, we are not in a rush and anybody who commits election fraud is liable to 7 years in jail because you may think this is a party matter, not government matter, the law covers everybody.”
During the same event, President Museveni registered and updated his particulars in the register as a member of the party.
The NRM 1st National Vice Chairman, Alhajj Moses Kigongo appealed to the party members to show the highest degree of discipline during the exercise.
“The people down there are very eager to see what you are going to do but if you don't have discipline, you are going to mess up things. Secondly, you are going to be approached by some people who want to stand in those areas, they can come with a list of people, and they will try to bribe you so that you include them in our register. By doing so you are going to spoil everything, and we don't want to go back to zero. Therefore, be transparent and calm.”
The NRM Secretary General, Rt. Hon. Richard Todwong, on behalf of the NRM party, thanked President Museveni for being a pillar and an icon to the African revolution and to the world.
“As a party we are committed to make sure that you continue with your legacy and good deeds and we pledge before everybody that the party is still asking for your goodwill to offer yourself in 2026. I have received quite a number of petitions from the districts. I told them that at the right time I will process them and present them to the Central Executive Committee (CEC) of the party,” he said.
Rt. Hon. Todwong also thanked the government for implementing the NRM Manifesto.
“This makes mobilisation very easy and for us as a party, we are concentrating on issues of ensuring how households are raised out of poverty. It is our roles and mandate within the structures of the party that we keep reminding our population to benefit from these programs and fight poverty.”
He further noted that the party currently has a total of 11.4 million voters in their register but many of them don't have National Identification numbers, others have been registered in many villages, so the exercise is to make sure that they clean and reorganise the register.
“Out of the 11.4 million, we have 5.8 million who are male and 5.3 million female and this represents the 151 districts, 345 constituencies, 2216 sub counties, 10747 parishes and 71512 villages and the number of villages keep increasing because the National Electoral Commission has a different number, and the local government also has a different number. In total we are operating within 72000 villages in the country,” he said.
The Chairman of the NRM Electoral Commission, Dr. Tanga Odoi presented to the President a revised copy of the roadmap for the election of the NRM structures from the village to the national level.
“On Wednesday 13th to Sunday 17th March 2024, the exercise of display and update of the NRM register will be done at every village of Uganda. On Sunday 17th March 2024, in the evening after 5pm, all villages will have what we call village baraza. The NRM Village Executive Committee, the NRM Electoral Commission Village Registrar will be called to approve before we call it a register,” he said.
“Members will have the opportunity to actually verify whether those captured belong to their villages. The village baraza will be on Sunday 17th March 2024.The importance of that date is that the Chairpersons who are seated here, the NRM Electoral Commission officials and the administrators will make sure, they monitor the whole country with the members of the Secretariat to ensure that this register is only closed after the names have been read to them.”
On 24th March 2024, Dr. Tanga added that the party will call for expression of interest and nominate candidates for party structures at village or cell level.
“Your Excellency, the importance of this is that you cannot join the system at the parish level if you want to compete, you must start at the village level. We must nominate you; we have you on record so that when you move progressively up to the district, we have your record from the village. You do not enter at the end; you must start from the village.”
In a separate meeting, President Museveni also addressed the NRM party registrars who have been undergoing training for the exercise. The meeting took place at Plot 13, Kyadondo Road.
The function was also attended by the Vice President, H.E Jessica Alupo, the First Deputy Prime Minister and 2nd National Vice chairperson of NRM, Rt. Hon. Rebecca Kadaga, other Central Executive Committee (CEC) members, NRM district chairpersons, registrars, district administrators, regional coordinators of the Office of the NRM National Chairman, among others.
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