Former Spy Chief and Military man Lt. Gen. Henry Tumukunde as of today, the 12th of August, 2020 officially launched his candidature in a move to unseat the incumbent President of the Republic of Uganda, H.E. Yoweri Kaguta Museveni in the 2021 polls. This launch took place at his office premises fin Kololo from 11AM- 12:30PM in a scientific event with a few invited guests as the retired General unveiled his road map to Presidency in addition to a pressure group only known as “A Renewed Uganda”.
In his opening remarks, Lt. Gen. Tumukunde explained why he chose the color orange as his campaign code. In this regard, he stated that Orange is a Dutch color that has gained symbolic recognition as the color of revolution worldwide and that is why he highly associates himself with this color. Kindly be reminded that this is the very color that is used by Former Prime Minister Amama Mbabazi’s “Go Forward” which suffered a landslide loss in the previous general elections and we can only pray that the General won’t suffer the same fate. He further explained that he prefers to use the slogans “A Renewed Uganda” and “Kisoboka” because he believes the NRM as a revolutionary party lost its way and he is one of those that can reshape the country’s future with the faith that he will triumph.
Lt. Gen. Tumukunde alleges that multi-party democracy has been nothing but an intense failure in Uganda as the state has constantly suffocated the growth of Opposition political parties through use of state machinery as manifested through inadequate financing and unjustified restrictions on free participation which he pledges to change once he is elected as President. Pursuant to this pledge, the General thanked other opposition political parties for always standing up against injustices orchestrated by those in power and actually bragged that NRM lost its path and he had to disassociate himself from it. He further stressed that his rule will be one that stretches up to the grass roots taking into consideration groups like women, persons living with disabilities, the poor and other marginalized groups which the NRM that he described as sinking ship has failed to attend to. His pledge to set up a government that supports the youth is not one that can be ignored as he plans to invest in human capital considering the fact that Ugandans ought to shift from subsistence to commercial farming since agriculture is statistically the back bone of the economy.
As he concluded, the General also criticized the regime for its financial indiscipline as evidenced by the unjustified and endless borrowing that has resulted into a heavy debt burden in addition to the corruption that drains up to 700M USD from the state treasury annually.
Lt. General Henry Tumukunde is s a retired senior military officer of the Uganda People’s Defence Forces, a lawyer and has served the state in various capacities.
