Nandala declines to fund FDC delegates conference

Nathan Nandala Mafabi, the Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) party secretary general has turned down a request to fund the delegate’s conference organised by the party national chairperson, Amb Wasswa Birigwa, saying it is not an official party meeting.

Birigwa wrote to the secretary general on August 24 requesting for over Shs 638.2 million to facilitate a delegates’ conference scheduled for September 19, 2023. Birigwa said 1,970 participants including 1,560 delegates and 410 other guests are expected to attend the meeting.

However, Nandala wrote back on September 2, declining the request. Nandala says that Birigwa ran a notice in the papers calling for an extraordinary delegates meeting “without knowledge of any party organ including the secretary-general who is the principal accounting officer of the party under article 28 (4) (b) (i) and secretary to the national delegates conference in accordance with article 28 (4) (b) (iii)…” 

Nandala also says that the notice was run without the knowledge of the party president Patrick Oboi Amuriat who is the chief executive officer of the party and the treasurer general who is responsible for the party finances. Nandala says that it seems Birigwa following the resolution of former FDC president Dr Kizza Besigye and 17 other party members including the party vice president in charge of Buganda region Erias Lukwago, deputy secretary general Harold Kaija, party spokesperson Ibrahim Ssemujju Nganda who have previously held press conferences at Besigye’s Katonga office and Fairway hotel respectively.

“…Katonga is not an organ or structure of FDC that the chairman has to implement its resolutions. This clearly shows that according to you, the leaders of those two press conferences are above national council, which is not the case in the FDC constitution,” wrote Nandala, adding that the party chairman who has held the position for eight years had the time to call for a delegates meeting but only chose to do so now when his term is ending.

“At this critical time, you are enhancing disharmony and implementing the roadmap of the Katonga and Fairway press conferences which contravenes article 28 (1) (b) (iii) of the FDC constitution,” said Nandala.

He says that since the summoned delegates meeting is not a party meeting, the party working committee resolved that the party cannot fund the extraordinary delegates conference, amidst financial constraints faced by the party.

He says this is so because the conference “is not budgeted for and you (Birigwa) have no authority to cause liability to the party by claims of third parties”.

It’s more than two months now and the FDC is embroiled in conflict with top party officials exchanging tantrums publicly. The origin of the pandemonium is the allegation that Nandala brought money into the party from the ruling government without proper accountability for it.

The allegation has pitted Nandala, Amuriat and their sympathizers against the party founding president Besigye, and his adherents.