Members of Parliament from Karamoja region on Thursday called on government to immediately act and salvage the road conditions in the area or risk losing support.
The MPs were reacting to the latest worsening road conditions caused by the heavy rains. A number of bridges and culverts connecting major routes to other parts of the country have all been swept away or submerged by heavy flowing water.
The legislators say they are disappointed with an increasing failure by successive governments to develop their region, despite their overwhelming support for the establishment.
Five MPs, all subscribing to the ruling NRM party, told a joint press conference at parliament, that their roads that have been cut off due to the heavy rains within the last two months have never been tarmacked since independence.
The five legislators, Simon Peter Aleper for Moroto Municipality, John Baptist Lokii, Matheniko County, Akello Rose Lilly, woman MP Kaabong district, Rose Mary Nawut, Amudat woman and Nyomera Naome Stella, the woman MP for Napak district, said they have become disillusioned by government’s failure to pay attention to their people’s development needs.
Lokii John Baptist, the MP for Matheniko, said they had reached a point of considering whether staging an opposition was the best alternative to their demands for service delivery. He said their patience was running out because the more silence they maintain over development issues in their region the more they are being ignored.
//Cue In: “We are demanding government....”
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The Publicity Secretary for the parliamentary group, Simon Peter Aleper, said they are demanding that an inter ministerial coordination of the disaster be arranged as soon as possible before deaths result from the floods due to water borne diseases such as cholera, dysentery and diarrhea.
Aleper said that two major roads, Mbale and Soroti, have already been cut off from the Karamoja region. He said as a result drug supplies to the region are not being delivered as is usually the case.
The woman MP for Amudat, Rose Mary Nawuat, said that recently the first lady, also minister in charge of Karamoja affairs, got stuck on one of the roads as she was traveling to the region to supervise some projects.
The MPs said that much as the president’s wife is showing commitment to developing the region, she is not being supported by government with resources to implement most of the development plans for the region.
The Ministry of Works on Wednesday said that three major roads in Kotido and two in Moroto have already been cut off following the heavy rains leading to flooding.
