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KAMPALA � Col. Kizza Besigye is ready to meet
with President Yoweri Museveni, a Reform Agenda official has
said.
�If
President Museveni wants to meet Besigye, he is willing,� Mr Reagan
Okumu told journalists at the Reform Agenda offices in Kampala
yesterday.
Besigye is
the chairman of the Reform Agenda and a losing candidate in the 2001
presidential election.
He has been
exiled mainly in South Africa since he fled the country in August 2001,
citing harassment from the security services.
�Besigye
has no personal problem with Museveni; therefore such a meeting will
have to take a national dimension,� said Okumu, who is the Reform Agenda
secretary for Foreign Affairs.
�He
[Besigye] will meet him as the chairman of the Reform Agenda and he will
be accompanied by a delegation.�
Added
Okumu: �The President should not keep saying that Reform is not
interested in dialogue.�
Okumu, who
also is the MP for Aswa, claimed that Mr Museveni is �extremely
desperate to meet Besigye�.
�They have
been looking for Besigye using small people and intelligence; they
should pass through the proper channel which is the Reform
Agenda.�
Okumu said
that Besigye has welcomed the 25-member government team announced last
week to lead negotiations on the roadmap to political
pluralism.
Okumu said
Besigye has constituted a five-member team to meet with the government
side.
He did not,
however, give the names of the members. Instead, he claimed credit for
mooting the idea of the opposition having a dialogue with the
state.
�We [Reform
Agenda] met the President in May and it [the dialogue] was one of our
recommendations,� he said.
Okumu said
a neutral person should chair the talks.
He said
that the third term project and power sharing should not be the only
issues on the agenda.
He said the
escalating human rights abuses; separation of powers, independence of
police and army should be discussed too.
He also
expressed reservations about the government�s consultative team, saying
the majority of its members are hardliners.
He said
Museveni might be only interested in pleasing donors.
�If the
team is not serious, we shall walk out,� he said.
Okumu said
that the Reform Agenda will register as a political party only if
Besigye is the party leader.
Currently,
the Political Parties and Organisations Act does not allow people living
abroad to lead parties.
�We are not
going to register under any law that denies Besigye to be our leader,�
he said.
The Reform
man said that his group is interested in teaming up with other
opposition groups to defeat the Movement.
Okumu said
a team has been constituted to consult with other opposition
groups.
At the same
news conference, the Reform Agenda announced a new committee to do the
pressure group�s work in Kampala.
It is
chaired by Mr Fred Salongo Ssaka, with Mr Livingstone Kizito as his
deputy.
�The struggle is gaining momentum,� Okumu said.
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