MPs demand for research assistants

A section of MPs have proposed that government should hire research assistants for each legislator to provide effective support to perform their legislative, representation and oversight roles.

They argue that in developed countries an MP has an office well-staffed with research assistants paid by government.

Simeo Nsubuga the Kassanda County South MP said "In Uganda's case, an MP is his or her own personal assistant, research assistant and even own driver. Government should hire and pay research assistants for each legislator to support evidence based and informed decision-making,"

The proposal was mooted by over 50 MPs on the committees of gender, labour and social development and human rights affairs while attending the human rights training programs.

Current situation 

One of the research assistants at Parliament who preferred anonymity said "Parliament has a total of only 28 research assistants each has been assigned to do research work for one of the 28 Parliament committees' work.

Uganda's Parliament is composed of a total of 449 MPs with 290 directly elected constituencies MPs,  116 District Woman MPs, 10 Uganda People's Defence Forces MPs , 5 Youth MPs, 5 MPs  of Persons with Disabilities, 5 MPs of Workers, including 18 ex-officios.

The contention arose as several MPs admitted that they failed to incorporate human rights issues during legislation calling for more research assistants to interpret their work.

The MPs were trained in human rights principles by Dr. Livingstone Ssewanyana the executive director Foundation for Human Rights Initiative, recently at Sheraton Hotel in Kampala.

Referring to the Uganda's constitution Protection and Promotion of Fundamental and other Human Rights and Freedoms, Ssewanyana quoted section 4 of the Constitution "All persons are equal before and under the law in all spheres of political, economic, social and cultural life and in every other respect and shall enjoy equal human rights".

"The State shall guarantee and respect institutions which are charged by the State with responsibility for protecting and promoting human rights by providing them with adequate resources to function effectively" Ssewanyana added.

This prompted the Lubaga South MP Kato Lubwama to say "I have failed to understand who the controller of the human rights in Uganda is where some people are more important than others."

The Bukoto West MP Haji Abdu Kitatta "How shall the MPs incorporate  human rights in legislative work In Uganda where  many people are allegedly violating human rights use ‘orders from above' to interfere in Parliaments legislative roles?"

"The problem is Ugandan MPs lack research assistants to help in research evidence based information, unlike In the Congress of United States   the Senate and the House of Representatives," Ssewanyana said.

Human rights committee chairperson also Mitooma Woman MP Jova Kamateeka said "An MP is overwhelmed by committee, plenary and the constituency and hardly do we get time to do enough research, which jeopardizes MPs work."

Gender committee chairperson also Nakasongola Woman MP, Margaret Komuhangi, proposed that Parliament needs to collaborate with institutions like Uganda Bureau of Statistics, Makerere Institute of Social Research (MISR) to provide them with researched evidenced information.

The Kitagendwa County MP, Abbas Agaba, said since MPs hail from different professions they need researched information on emerging areas like climate change, energy, oil and gas, financial auditing, Information and Communication Technology, energy and globalization.

Chris Obore, Parliament's director of communication and public affairs, said that MPs are not God to know everything and that under an ideal situations in other houses like in Kenya, Parliament is able to hire research assistants, drivers, office assistants to ease work for each MP, but in Uganda's Parliament the context is different where there is a research department to do the work.