By Wokorach-Oboi

THE Acholi and the northern region as a whole have not embraced the National Resistance Movement because of poor marketing, Kitgum LC5 chief Nahaman Ojwee has said.

He said the first NRM cadres to be deployed in the north to sell the Movement used force instead of applying gentler means to win them over.

Ojwee was addressing a small gathering at Boma Ground that turned up to commemorate the NRM Day, the smallest crowd to attend the celebrations in years.
He said one of the reasons people in the north hated the Movement was because of the LRA war that had lasted the 20 years the NRM has been in power.

Ojwe said the people in the north could not enjoy the peace those in other areas enjoyed and they could not use the infrastructure like schools and health centres the Government had built for them because they lived in displaced people’s camps.

He told the crowd, “The people you sent to Kampala (parliamentarians) are not good lobbyists. They have gone there with blunt hoes. Dividing the national cake is like slaughtering an elephant. You have to send a strong person with a sharp knife so that he can bring back home a huge chunk of meat in the heat of the scramble.”

He advised residents to elect able leaders who would represent their interests and not those who were seeking to satisfy personal interests.
Ojwe said differences in political ideology should not create enmity among them.