GOVERNMENT | NYEGE NYEGE | RESTRICTIONS

The Government has allowed the Nyege Nyege music festival to be held next week in Jinja city, but with strict rules.

This decision was taken at a meeting convened and chaired by the Prime Minister, Robinah Nabbanja, at her office in Kampala, yesterday.

Participants included the ministers of internal affairs, tourism, ICT and national guidance, gender, and ethics, plus stakeholders who discussed ways of resolving a standoff between the Executive and the Legislature over the annual social event.

“Taking into consideration the fact that several preliminary activities have already taken place, such as the ticket and hotel bookings by participants, visa payments, and that resources have already been invested by the organizers, the event should be allowed to go on with strict compliance to the guidelines that will be issued by the government,” a statement from Nabbanja’s press team reads.

It tasked the ministers of ICT and National Guidance and Ethics and Integrity with working on the guidelines that should be followed to ensure that the event is organized “acceptably”.

Police and relevant security agencies have since been tasked with working with the organizers of the festival to enforce compliance.

Nabanja Parliament

The meeting also resolved there should be a harmonization of government position and that of Parliament over this concert.

The four-day festival that takes place every September on the banks of the River Nile in Jinja brings artists from across Africa to entertain about 10,000 revelers since it became popular in 2018.

However, on Tuesday, Parliament, led by the Speaker, Anita Among, said the event should be stopped, saying it promotes sexual immorality.

She was responding to the matter of national importance, raised by Tororo Woman MP Sarah Opendi.

“We are talking about the morality of this country; we are talking about our children. You are trying to promote tourism at the expense of our children? We are not going to allow this function to take place,” Among, who is also the Bukedea Woman MP, said during the plenary session.

Efforts by the tourism state minister, Martin Mugarra, to defend the social event as a hub of tourism met resistance from the House.

Mugarra claimed over 8,000 foreign tourists had already booked tickets for the event, but the legislators said this argument did not hold water.

When he was still ethics and Integrity state minister, the late Fr Simon Lokodo banned the festival, saying it was akin to “devil worship.”

Nyege Nyege, in Luganda, means an irresistible urge to dance, but in other local languages, it can have a sexual connotation.

MPs attack Govt 

However, following the government’s move to okay the controversial festival, MPs during a Parliament sitting in the afternoon expressed concern over the move to go public before they were brought on board.

Led by Among, the MPs argued that the move to okay the festival, which they had asked to be stopped appeared to show that Parliament conflicted with the Executive:

In response to the MPs’ concerns, Justine Kasule Lumumba, the minister in charge of general duties in the Office of the Prime Minister, apologized for government’s failure to inform Parliament before issuing a public statement on Nyege Nyege.

Lumumba appealed to Among to give the Executive time to hold a meeting and harmonize their position on the matter.