Prime Minister Amama Mbabazi insists he is still a clean man, even amidst several calls for the man once called Mr. Clean, to step aside, over allegations that he benefited from corruption in the oil sector.
Mbabazi told journalists on Tuesday afternoon shortly after he appeared for several hours before the Oil Ad hoc committee that Ugandans are being fed on lies and that the lies would soon be exposed. He said the ad hoc committee was wasting time on investigating falsehoods and lies without the accused being subjected to the best principle of justice of being accorded a fair hearing.
Mbabazi accused parliament of subjecting him to a Kangaroo court, operating as a judge, prosecutor, investigator, accuser and executor. He said that in principle he does not oppose the work of parliament investigating any matter but would have been more comfortable being investigated by a Judicial Commission of Inquiry, which he says has better capacity to perform such duties.
The Prime Minister also took the opportunity to criticize people like UPDF MP Gen. Elly Tumwine, who have openly called for him to step aside as he is being investigated. Mbabazi said such people should be ignored because they have failed to understand well why he cannot step aside over a false accusation.
During Tuesday’s committee hearing, Mbabazi openly clashed with MPs Cecilia Ogwal and Hussein Kyanjo, who accused the Prime Minister of diverting the members to try and defend himself against accusations leveled against him on October 11 during the special parliamentary debate on oil.
An angry Mbabazi, pointing at Ogwal, said that the Dokolo woman MP must know that even if he was undergoing investigation by the MPs, they were not more important or equal to him. He said he still needed some respect despite what was going on against him.
The tensed up members looked as Ogwal and the Prime Minister exchanged for about five minutes.
Committee Chairman, Michael Werikhe later said that their investigation was not a Kangaroo court because they would not judge him but present their report to the whole house for debate, according to the Parliamentary Rules of Procedure.
Werikhe quoted rule 164 of parliamentary rules of procedure which allows the house to establish special ad hoc committees for purposes of investigating matters of national importance.
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