“Otafiire’s comments on the Masaka murders show that the government is punishing people for voting for the NUP.”
On September 9, during an appearance on NBS TV's Frontline Show, Otafiire reminded the people that there were no killings in Masaka when the NRM was in power.
Mathias Mpuuga, the Leader of the Opposition, has reacted angrily to comments made by the Minister of Internal Affairs, Maj Gen Kahinda Otafiire, who blamed the Bijambiya massacres in greater Masaka on the region’s rejection of the NRM candidates in the last election.
On September 9, during an appearance on NBS TV’s Frontline Show, Otafiire reminded the people that there were no killings in Masaka when the NRM was in power.
He asserted that the recent wave of homicides in the region, which have claimed the lives of over 26 individuals, is due to the NRM’s lack of political control over the region.
“You forget that there were no killings when the NRM ruled Masaka. “Politically, someone else is in charge of Masaka,” Otafiire remarked.
Masaka region overwhelmingly voted for the National Unity Platform (NUP) at all levels during the recent 2021 national elections.
Mpuuga, speaking at the funeral of Canon Mary Nabunya Senyonjo, the late wife of Bishop Christopher Senyonjo, the former Bishop of West Buganda Diocese, said that the minister’s reckless remarks could be interpreted as the government punishing Masaka residents for their voting choices in this year’s general elections.
“We will undoubtedly demand that Gen Otafiire explain who the killers are to the country, particularly the people of Greater Masaka, as his current statement is a blatant admission of knowing. Now that one of the regime’s power inebriated boosters has revealed the regime’s viewpoint, it is apparent that the killings in greater Masaka are a punishment for voting out the regime,” he said.
“We have no choice but to properly notify our citizens about this critical development. Our people will defend their land and their integrity, and they will never submit to or sacrifice their conscience to any type of deception or deviance from their chosen path.”
Mpuuga praised Nabunya, noting that the late worked with the people of greater Masaka for 24 years while Bishop Senyonjo led the Church of Uganda’s West Buganda Diocese.
On September 5, 2021, she died of renal failure. She was 81 years old at the time.
