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Nyendo-Mukungwe legislator Mathias Mpuuga says no one will hound him out of the National Unity Platform (NUP) party he helped found in July 2020.

“Whoever thought that they were hounding me out of NUP, I’m here to inform them that whichever indiscipline, mismanagement or mischievous manoeuvres, we are going to be in the party,” he told journalists at a media briefing at Parliament on Tuesday, March 26, 2024.

He stated that he is a founder of NUP, which is led by musician-turned-politician Robert Kyagulanyi aka Bobi Wine.

“I did not join NUP, I was a part of the founding blocks of NUP where I serve as a deputy president in charge of Buganda. I’m here to reaffirm I’m not leaving NUP. I wish to reassure all comrades in the struggle for a fair Uganda that my commitment has never waned. At least nobody has moved me to the level of deserting a party that I founded. That should be understood,” he said.

Nyendo-Mukungwe legislator Mathias Mpuuga speaking during a press conference at Parliament. (Photo by Maria Wamala)

Mpuuga, also a parliamentary commission member, said he has not had a meeting with Kyagulanyi.

“I have only been hearing him speak [about our meeting] at funerals and the media, among others, trying to convince the country to believe that I’m a terrible human being but the country has refused to believe that. I would want to meet him,” he said.

He also said in the coming days, he will embark on streamlining the operations of the party. “We have to follow the party policies and rules and not instructions,” he said.

Mpuuga’s address comes after NUP wrote to Speaker of Parliament Anita Among notifying her of its decision to withdraw his nomination to the commission and replace him with Mityana Municipality MP Francis Zaake over alleged corruption and abuse of office.

Mpuuga was in May 2022 given a one-off service award of shillings 500 million by the parliamentary commission for serving as the Leader of the Opposition in Parliament from June 2021 to January 2024.

However, Kyagulanyi still claimed that “this money heist was illegal, immoral and wrong, and totally unexpected from a person we delegated to represent our values in Parliament and lead the charge against corruption and misuse of public resources”.