Museveni invites former opponents, Mbabazi, Bukenya to party conference
Thursday January 23 2020
Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni. The president is seeking a sixth term in office in 2021 after being in power for 33 years. PHOTO | UGANDA PRESIDENCY
Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni and chairman of the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) has invited former prime minister and NRM secretary general John Patrick Amama Mbabazi as a special guest to the party’s National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting on Friday, January 24.
Mbabazi also ran against Museveni in the 2016 presidential election.
Mr Mbabazi was the president’s close and trusted confidant until 2014 when they broke ranks and he was sacked.
The NEC is highly expected to endorse President Museveni, 75, for re-election in the February 2021 polls. He has been in power since January 26, 1986.
The NRM national delegates conference will be held in Nambole stadium, before national celebrations marking NRM’s 34 years in power.
Three weeks ago, President Museveni tweeted photos of him and Mr Mbabazi meeting at his farm at Kisozi.
It later emerged Mr Mbabazi sought a meeting with his former foe to invite him to a meeting of the Brazzaville Foundation—a peace advocacy group named after the Congolese capital.
The invitation to NEC is a likely confirmation of mending of fences between the two.
Others invited for the event are former vice presidents Dr Gilbert Balibaseka Bukenya and Dr Specioza Wandera Kazibwe.