"The following day, members of Parliament arrived to the unpleasant sight of a House surrounded by heavily armed soldiers backed by Armoured Personnel Carriers. Obote then summarised the contents of the Constitution and advised the MPs to pick their copies as they walked out of the chambers � after they had endorsed it without reading it."
The more things change, the more they remain the same!! Review report �smuggled� into House, say MPs By Henry Ochieng March 26, 2004 KAMPALA � A procedural oversight yesterday pitted government against the MPs who accused it of trying to �smuggle� the Constitutional Review Commission report into Parliament.Lawmakers arriving for the afternoon�s plenary session were surprised to find copies of the report stuffed into their pigeonholes. Rising on a point of procedure, Otuke MP Omara Atubo stirred up the House when he informed Deputy Speaker Rebecca Kadaga that he had found �something� in his pigeonhole. �I don�t know who put it there but it appears like the report of the Constitutional Review Commission,� Atubo said. �This is an important document which government should have [formally] tabled before Parliament and someone should have said something about it.�Atubo was cut off in mid-sentence by cries of �another pigeonhole Constitution� ringing around the chamber. Memories of 1966 came flooding back. In that year, then executive Prime Minister Milton Obote instructed the then Attorney General Godfrey Binaisa to write a new Constitution all by himself.This document was then stuffed in the pigeonholes of all MPs in the dead of the night. The following day, members of Parliament arrived to the unpleasant sight of a House surrounded by heavily armed soldiers backed by Armoured Personnel Carriers. Obote then summarised the contents of the Constitution and advised the MPs to pick their copies as they walked out of the chambers � after they had endorsed it without reading it. That action was later to play a key role in the 1966 Crisis that plunged the country into upheaval � with the central government mobilising against the monarchical Mengo government.The following year Obote again presided over the promulgation of what is officially known as the Republican Constitution, which abolished kingdoms. With things showing signs of running out of hand yesterday, Defence minister Amama Mbabazi quickly took the microphone on the Despatch Box and �formally� said: �I would like to submit this report to Parliament and I hereby lay it on the table.� This was unusual in itself because on the day�s Order of Business there was no indication that government would be officially introducing the CRC findings to the House. Just then, Ms Kadaga saved government more flogging by referring the report to the Legal and Parliamentary Affairs committee for scrutiny.Rubaga South MP Ken Lukyamuzi had warned that this was the beginning of a conspiracy to �ambush Parliament�.Among the many controversial issues contained in this report are the Movement government�s recommendations that Article 105(2) be scrapped to remove the existing two presidential term limits and an insertion of an article giving the President powers to dissolve Parliament. The CRC officially handed over its findings to government on March 18. Earlier on December 10, 2003, Justice and Constitutional Affairs minister Janat Mukwaya received a loose copy from the commission in what some opposition party members allege was an under-the-table exercise. \\\\\\\"Always be a first rate version of yourself instead of a second rate version of someone else.\\\\\\\\\\\\\" Njoki Paul University of Pretoria -------------------------------------------- This service is hosted on the Infocom network http://www.infocom.co.ug
