Da Dona
JF-Expert Member
- Dec 16, 2025
- 880
- 548
Upon the return to multi-party politics in 2005, lawmakers belonging to Opposition political parties, under the leadership of the Leader of the Opposition in Parliament (LoP), were handed the arduous task of checking the government in the Legislature. The LoP, who is chosen by the Opposition party with the highest number of MPs, consolidates all members from other Opposition parties to form one united front. Under the Administration of Parliament Act, the LoP works with a Shadow Cabinet composed of members with portfolios and functions that correspond to those of the government. These are responsible for studying all policy statements by the government, attending committee meetings on policy issues, giving their party’s views and opinions, and proposing alternatives.
So when the newly formed National Unity Platform (NUP) rose from obscurity to become the leading Opposition party after the 2021 General Election, it faced the challenge of leading the Opposition in the 11th Parliament to fulfil this mandate. Throughout the five years, the Opposition in Parliament has strived to keep the government in check while fighting to survive in a slippery political terrain. The legacy of the Opposition in the 11th Parliament, commentators argue, is a mixed one marked by deepening internal fissures, numerical limitations, a struggle for human rights, and a fight to maintain public trust.
📸 Whisper eye
The tenure started strongly, with the highest number of Opposition members ever recorded. The combined Opposition comprises 108 members. The NUP has 57, the highest number ever by an Opposition party, followed by Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) with 29, and the Uganda Peoples Congress (UPC) with 11, while Democratic Party (DP) has nine members. The People’s Progressive Party and Justice Forum have one member each. But in a parliamentary system ruled by a majority, the numbers, while a positive step in the history of Opposition politics, were nothing compared to the National Resistance Movement’s (NRM) dominance with 342 members. Moreover, the majority of the 74 independents are also NRM-leaning. In the course of time, the Opposition lost allegiance of some of their members to the NRM.
📸: Statehouse Uganda
Alternative policies
Ms Alice Alaso, the national coordinator for the Alliance for National Transformation (ANT), hailed the Opposition for fulfilling its mandate of offering alternative policies. “They have done a fairly good job given their operating environment. I know that they did everything possible to bring alternatives. They also did everything possible to work on the reports of the accountability committees. They did a lot of work interrogating the Auditor General’s report and raising matters of urgent public importance.” Ms Alaso says. In 2021, Mathias Mpuuga started his tenure as LoP by unveiling the Opposition legislative agenda that included electoral and constitutional reforms. In the same year, he issued a response to the State-of-the-Nation address, in which he criticised the government for human rights violations.
In the same year, the Opposition presented an alternative development approach to the government’s Parish Development Model. They called for the re-establishment of the Co-operative Bank to provide low-cost credit to cooperatives and Saccos, and the establishment of a Price Stabilisation Fund to safeguard farmers from exploitation, among others. In 2023, Mpuuga published an alternative to the government’s 2023/2024 Budget, cutting expenditure by Shs10 trillion. He also proposed the removal of tax holidays and the end of exemptions and pledged to stamp out corruption. Similarly, in 2025, the current LoP, Joel Ssenyonyi, proposed an alternative budget focused on fighting corruption and improving service delivery.
Relatedly, throughout the years, the shadow ministers for Finance, Muwanga Kivumbi (Butambala MP), and Ibrahim Ssemujju Nganda (Kira Municipality MP) have also provided minority reports that often highlighted loopholes in the budget and proposed areas for improvement. These often highlighted areas of exaggerated expenditure are aimed at re-channelling resources to more pressing or important matters. Ssenyonyi, with his team, conducted multiple oversight visits to the Lubowa International Hospital site, where he and his team were denied access, the Atiak Sugar factory, and the Dei Biopharma Limited, entities where the government has invested billions of taxpayers’ money. In his reports, he drew attention to doling out of taxpayers’ money to private entities without proper guidelines, all in an attempt to reduce loss. While reports were tabled and adopted, the government has continued the trend without acting on the proposed recommendations.
But with the numerical disadvantage, the Opposition faced a nearly impossible chance at blocking or advancing alternative policies. They were, at the very best, left with just speaking up against them and tabling statements whose prayers and recommendations are often ignored by the ruling party. Opposition MPs have also introduced a handful of Bills in the House, most of which remain on the shelves. The Opposition also failed to block contentious Bills like the UPDF Amendment Bill that reintroduced the trial of civilians in military courts and the National Coffee Amendment Bill that integrated the Uganda Coffee Development Authority (UCDA) back to the Ministry of Agriculture.
“I wouldn’t say I achieved all that I desired, but…the questions we asked, the statements we made, the reports we made, and the taxpayers’ money we saved in billions will remain on record as part of our legacy,” Mpuuga told Daily Monitor in a 2024 interview, shortly after he was removed as LoP. Similarly, Ssenyonyi, during a press briefing to mark one year in the office, expressed that his efforts have been frustrated, including the blocking of oversight visits and exclusion from meetings of the Parliamentary Commission that determined business to be handled, the parliamentary budget, and general administration of Parliament. He maintained the team has fulfilled its mandate by providing “numerous alternatives, through different minority reports, alternative ministerial policy statements by our shadow ministers and the alternative budget.”
A major hallmark of the 2021 General Election was the brutality and human rights abuses meted out against Ugandans by security agencies. The period was marked by illegal arrests and detentions, torture allegations, and extrajudicial killings. Some of the disappeared are still missing to date. With this background, the fight for justice took centre stage for the Opposition, who on the floor of Parliament tasked the government to deliver justice and free political prisoners.
In 2023, the Opposition staged three protests by walking out of Parliament due to what they described as indifference by the government to the gross human rights violations. But calls for debates on the abuses were often blocked, while answers by government representatives often fell short.
Disunity
The Opposition in the 11th Parliament has also been characterised by fragmentation and a lack of unity, further compounding the fault lines in the Opposition. Over the past five years, intra-party fissures in the different political parties, as well as a lack of a united front for the parties, have manifested more deeply, from the split of the FDC that divided loyalties among MPs. The fallout between NUP and the former LoP, Mpuuga, also undermined opposition unity. Mpuuga was tapped by the NUP to lead, but soon fell out of good graces with the party leadership following accusations that he received a service award of Shs500m, contrary to the party’s position. He was consequently removed from the office of the LoP, creating camps in the Opposition and thus undermining their strength.
This division, some political actors say, has played into the hands of the NRM, whose leader has repeatedly voiced plans to decimate the opposition. As fissures deepened, through charm and incentives, as well as intimidation, the House leader, Anita Among, has conducted a covert onslaught on the Opposition, enticing and successfully convincing some to join the NRM. Some MPs who were part of the Opposition in the current Parliament, including Anthony Akol and Ojara Mapenduzi, switched to NRM. And while they have put their best foot forward, the fate of their work was sealed even before it started, due to the nature of the politics in the country.
To political Analyst Yusuf Serunkuma, it is no surprise that much of the work of the Opposition is only a “show”. “For the Opposition, the drama, the excitement that we’re going to put up this campaign is entertaining. But over and above that, there’s nothing. Whoever agrees to work under an autocracy is a liar. When you tell me you’re going to Museveni’s Parliament to influence things, to have an oversight role, I think you’re lying,” the academic observes. To him, the presence of Opposition only works in democratic states, a standard that the NRM does not meet.
Mr Godber Tumushabe, executive director of Great Lakes Institute for Strategic Studies, however, argues that this is one of the fronts for Ugandans who are fighting for regime change. According to him, the Opposition in the Ugandan Parliament faces unique challenges. “When you are in Parliament, and you consider yourself an Opposition politician, you are not only opposing the ruling party called NRM, you are also opposing the government. The resources of the State, the money, the security, the intelligence, they are all deployed to actually ensure that you don’t do your work as Opposition political parties,” he says.
For a worthwhile legacy, however, Serunkuma opines that the Opposition must explore alternative approaches. “If they really meant business, they could do much more. The leading Opposition party, NUP, could have like 1,500 people in jail, but they’re going to swear in as if nothing happened. Imagine if 50 MPs refuse to swear in, that would dent our so-called democracy,” he concludes.
(A story by Daily Monitor)
So when the newly formed National Unity Platform (NUP) rose from obscurity to become the leading Opposition party after the 2021 General Election, it faced the challenge of leading the Opposition in the 11th Parliament to fulfil this mandate. Throughout the five years, the Opposition in Parliament has strived to keep the government in check while fighting to survive in a slippery political terrain. The legacy of the Opposition in the 11th Parliament, commentators argue, is a mixed one marked by deepening internal fissures, numerical limitations, a struggle for human rights, and a fight to maintain public trust.
The tenure started strongly, with the highest number of Opposition members ever recorded. The combined Opposition comprises 108 members. The NUP has 57, the highest number ever by an Opposition party, followed by Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) with 29, and the Uganda Peoples Congress (UPC) with 11, while Democratic Party (DP) has nine members. The People’s Progressive Party and Justice Forum have one member each. But in a parliamentary system ruled by a majority, the numbers, while a positive step in the history of Opposition politics, were nothing compared to the National Resistance Movement’s (NRM) dominance with 342 members. Moreover, the majority of the 74 independents are also NRM-leaning. In the course of time, the Opposition lost allegiance of some of their members to the NRM.
📸: Statehouse Uganda
Alternative policies
Ms Alice Alaso, the national coordinator for the Alliance for National Transformation (ANT), hailed the Opposition for fulfilling its mandate of offering alternative policies. “They have done a fairly good job given their operating environment. I know that they did everything possible to bring alternatives. They also did everything possible to work on the reports of the accountability committees. They did a lot of work interrogating the Auditor General’s report and raising matters of urgent public importance.” Ms Alaso says. In 2021, Mathias Mpuuga started his tenure as LoP by unveiling the Opposition legislative agenda that included electoral and constitutional reforms. In the same year, he issued a response to the State-of-the-Nation address, in which he criticised the government for human rights violations.
In the same year, the Opposition presented an alternative development approach to the government’s Parish Development Model. They called for the re-establishment of the Co-operative Bank to provide low-cost credit to cooperatives and Saccos, and the establishment of a Price Stabilisation Fund to safeguard farmers from exploitation, among others. In 2023, Mpuuga published an alternative to the government’s 2023/2024 Budget, cutting expenditure by Shs10 trillion. He also proposed the removal of tax holidays and the end of exemptions and pledged to stamp out corruption. Similarly, in 2025, the current LoP, Joel Ssenyonyi, proposed an alternative budget focused on fighting corruption and improving service delivery.
Relatedly, throughout the years, the shadow ministers for Finance, Muwanga Kivumbi (Butambala MP), and Ibrahim Ssemujju Nganda (Kira Municipality MP) have also provided minority reports that often highlighted loopholes in the budget and proposed areas for improvement. These often highlighted areas of exaggerated expenditure are aimed at re-channelling resources to more pressing or important matters. Ssenyonyi, with his team, conducted multiple oversight visits to the Lubowa International Hospital site, where he and his team were denied access, the Atiak Sugar factory, and the Dei Biopharma Limited, entities where the government has invested billions of taxpayers’ money. In his reports, he drew attention to doling out of taxpayers’ money to private entities without proper guidelines, all in an attempt to reduce loss. While reports were tabled and adopted, the government has continued the trend without acting on the proposed recommendations.
But with the numerical disadvantage, the Opposition faced a nearly impossible chance at blocking or advancing alternative policies. They were, at the very best, left with just speaking up against them and tabling statements whose prayers and recommendations are often ignored by the ruling party. Opposition MPs have also introduced a handful of Bills in the House, most of which remain on the shelves. The Opposition also failed to block contentious Bills like the UPDF Amendment Bill that reintroduced the trial of civilians in military courts and the National Coffee Amendment Bill that integrated the Uganda Coffee Development Authority (UCDA) back to the Ministry of Agriculture.
“I wouldn’t say I achieved all that I desired, but…the questions we asked, the statements we made, the reports we made, and the taxpayers’ money we saved in billions will remain on record as part of our legacy,” Mpuuga told Daily Monitor in a 2024 interview, shortly after he was removed as LoP. Similarly, Ssenyonyi, during a press briefing to mark one year in the office, expressed that his efforts have been frustrated, including the blocking of oversight visits and exclusion from meetings of the Parliamentary Commission that determined business to be handled, the parliamentary budget, and general administration of Parliament. He maintained the team has fulfilled its mandate by providing “numerous alternatives, through different minority reports, alternative ministerial policy statements by our shadow ministers and the alternative budget.”
A major hallmark of the 2021 General Election was the brutality and human rights abuses meted out against Ugandans by security agencies. The period was marked by illegal arrests and detentions, torture allegations, and extrajudicial killings. Some of the disappeared are still missing to date. With this background, the fight for justice took centre stage for the Opposition, who on the floor of Parliament tasked the government to deliver justice and free political prisoners.
In 2023, the Opposition staged three protests by walking out of Parliament due to what they described as indifference by the government to the gross human rights violations. But calls for debates on the abuses were often blocked, while answers by government representatives often fell short.
Disunity
The Opposition in the 11th Parliament has also been characterised by fragmentation and a lack of unity, further compounding the fault lines in the Opposition. Over the past five years, intra-party fissures in the different political parties, as well as a lack of a united front for the parties, have manifested more deeply, from the split of the FDC that divided loyalties among MPs. The fallout between NUP and the former LoP, Mpuuga, also undermined opposition unity. Mpuuga was tapped by the NUP to lead, but soon fell out of good graces with the party leadership following accusations that he received a service award of Shs500m, contrary to the party’s position. He was consequently removed from the office of the LoP, creating camps in the Opposition and thus undermining their strength.
This division, some political actors say, has played into the hands of the NRM, whose leader has repeatedly voiced plans to decimate the opposition. As fissures deepened, through charm and incentives, as well as intimidation, the House leader, Anita Among, has conducted a covert onslaught on the Opposition, enticing and successfully convincing some to join the NRM. Some MPs who were part of the Opposition in the current Parliament, including Anthony Akol and Ojara Mapenduzi, switched to NRM. And while they have put their best foot forward, the fate of their work was sealed even before it started, due to the nature of the politics in the country.
To political Analyst Yusuf Serunkuma, it is no surprise that much of the work of the Opposition is only a “show”. “For the Opposition, the drama, the excitement that we’re going to put up this campaign is entertaining. But over and above that, there’s nothing. Whoever agrees to work under an autocracy is a liar. When you tell me you’re going to Museveni’s Parliament to influence things, to have an oversight role, I think you’re lying,” the academic observes. To him, the presence of Opposition only works in democratic states, a standard that the NRM does not meet.
Mr Godber Tumushabe, executive director of Great Lakes Institute for Strategic Studies, however, argues that this is one of the fronts for Ugandans who are fighting for regime change. According to him, the Opposition in the Ugandan Parliament faces unique challenges. “When you are in Parliament, and you consider yourself an Opposition politician, you are not only opposing the ruling party called NRM, you are also opposing the government. The resources of the State, the money, the security, the intelligence, they are all deployed to actually ensure that you don’t do your work as Opposition political parties,” he says.
For a worthwhile legacy, however, Serunkuma opines that the Opposition must explore alternative approaches. “If they really meant business, they could do much more. The leading Opposition party, NUP, could have like 1,500 people in jail, but they’re going to swear in as if nothing happened. Imagine if 50 MPs refuse to swear in, that would dent our so-called democracy,” he concludes.
(A story by Daily Monitor)
