Statement to Parliament on the chronology of events at KCCA in regard to the impeachment of The Lord Mayor Rt.

Hon Speaker and Hon members,

Hon members allow me to brief you on the genesis of the petition, setting up of the tribunal and the release of the report including a summary of its findings, the council session of 25th November that impeached the lord mayor and also clarify to you some of the court battles that ensued thereafter. Below is the chronology of events; On 17th May 2013, a petition was presented to my office by the Councilors of Kampala Capital city Authority, seeking for the removal of the Lord Mayor on grounds of misconduct, abuse of office and incompetence. Pursuant to Sec. 12(5) of Kampala Capital City Act, 2010, I evaluated the petition in consultation with the Attorney General through letters dated 20th May 2013 and 22nd May 2013 and satisfied myself that there do exist grounds for constituting a tribunal to investigate the allegations. By a letter dated 31st May 2013, I consulted with the Chief Justice on the suitability of the persons proposed to constitute the tribunal. On the 4th June 2013 the Chief Justice gave a no objection to the constitution of the tribunal and the proposed members to sit on it. All this was in fulfillment of the requirements for the process of the removal of The Lord Mayor or Deputy Lord under section

12 of the KCCA act.

On the 5th of June 2013, the tribunal was constituted with the following terms of reference: (a) To determine its procedure, rules for its own guidance and management of the proceedings (b) To investigate the allegations against the Lord Mayor as contained in the petition (c) To determine whether there is a prima facie case for the removal of the Lord Mayor (d) To submit a report to the Minister responsible for Kampala On the request of the tribunal and for various justifiable reasons including; disruption of tribunal proceedings, court cases instituted against the tribunal , volume of evidence and the need to ensure that all the evidence required was made available to the tribunal, I was compelled to extend the time within which the tribunal was to complete its work. It is important to emphasize and note that; my decision to appoint the tribunal as well as its legality were all challenged unsuccessfully in the High Court by the Lord Mayor. In most if not all judgements court agreed with my decision and concluded that it was within the law. All these legal contests, Hon members, though tedious and time

consuming, helped to put our actions as well as the integrity of the entire work of the tribunal to full scrutiny and eventually i was vindicated. Facts about the authority meeting convened on 25 November 2013 The report of the tribunal was handed over to me by Justice Bamugemereire in the open on 14th may 2013. I forwarded copies of the same report to the Lord Mayor and to all councilors for them to read in advance and comprehend the contents. While the law gives me 14 days to convene a meeting like the one i called on 25 November, and also given the fact that i was at liberty to convene this meeting at any date and working day of my choice, including doing so immediately after the day of receipt of the tribunal report, i did not do so for justifiable reasons. I gave the Councilors and The Lord Mayor a period of one week to read the quite voluminous report not in haste, but also conscious at the same time of the 14 day time line set by the law. I also announced that this meeting would be called in the second week still within the 14 days. This is what exactly happened. I issued a notice dated 21st November 2013 inviting the Lord Mayor and Councilors for this meeting pursuant to Sec.12 (17) of the Kampala Capital City Act, 2010. The allegation therefore that this meeting was fast tracked to defeat some anticipated court cases was and is untrue. If indeed i had intended to fast track the meeting for purposes of defeating any

intended litigation, i would have convened the meeting a day or two after receipt of the tribunal report. Still that would have been within the 14 days. But I didn't do so. I gave them the 7 days. I wish also to add that The Lord Mayor was by law required to either attend the said meeting in person or to send a legal representative. He never notified me of any of his intentions; either to be absent or to be represented by a lawyer. Indeed when a motion for his removal was moved and seconded, I called on any of his legal representative to make his defense as the law says. There was none. It is therefore not true that he was not given a hearing. He willfully chose to ignore the meeting. The other falsehood i have heard and read about in the press is that while I chaired the said meeting that ended up with The Lord Mayor Elias lukwago being impeached, a one councillor ssewanyana who moved from his chair and attempted to assault me in my chair, served me with a court order that was halting the proceedings and that I ignored it and ordered him out of the chambers. That is false. That young man as most of you may have seen the video clips (we can even screen one today to see for yourself) came prepared to behave unethically, fight, engage in some drama and only work towards disrupting the meeting. He jumped from his seat and aimed at me. Fortunately I remained calm and security restrained him. He had no court as alleged. He entered the council

chambers like many other councilors much earlier before 9 am. Another yet false allegation made is that the lawyers of The Lord Mayor came with a court order to serve it on me and that they were denied entrance and that police grabbed from them a copy of the court order and burnt it to ashes. Police however can independently explain its operational details that day. From the two allegations already you can read and see a contradiction. First, if the lawyers had indeed got a court order and that they were the ones with it and bringing it to serve it, what then is the other court order alleged to have been with ssewanyana inside the council chambers? Who had what court order? The fact is; there was no court order served on me. That violent councilor in addition to attempting jumping on me shouted at the end that he had a court order. He only threw on table a bunch of mere papers so as to appear on camera. The papers were visible and had nothing to do with being court documents. He quickly grabbed the same papers and took them away. Recordings can show all this. And for arguments sake, even if the alleged court order was to be there, why would lawyers attempt to serve it on me well aware of the usual procedure of service and the party to serve on behalf of government? The person to serve on behalf of government is not any officer but always the attorney general. So I wish to categorically state that there was no court order of any sort, served on me before and during the time i chaired the said authority meeting.

I have since been informed by the learned Attorney General that the right interim order that the attorney general acknowledges to have been served on to him on that day of 25th November was the one he duly received at about past ten o'clock in the court before justice Nyanzi. The attorney General can however independently speak on this. Yet by ten o'clock the authority meeting had closed and The Lord Mayor stood impeached. The motion for his removal was voted on at 9.30am with 29 councilors for the motion and 3 against the motion. Finally its worth to note that Mr Elias Lukwago still has an opportunity to appeal. The same law which provides for his removal provides at the same time an opportunity to him to appeal within 21 days.

Finally Hon. Members, having given you the chronology of events, you can now know what i did as minister responsible for Kampala. I invite you to read section 12 of the KCCA act that provides for the whole legal requirements. As minister, I was only implementing the law. Failure of which would have been the real incompetence on my part. Kampala is the face of Uganda; it gives our country its definitive character. We must decide therefore as Ugandans whether to allow chaos and disorder to define the city environment and be our national signature mark or stand firm and define the correct line a

midst harsh judgment and criticism from those who favor by the status quo. The other legal details can be given by the attorney General. Thank you very Much Madam Speaker and Hon Colleagues for listening to me.

Frank Tumwebaze, MP MINISTER IN-CHARGE OF THE PRESIDENCY AND KAMPALA CAPITAL CITY