By Spy Uganda
The Speaker, Anita Among has tasked the Prime Minister, Robinah Nabbanja to present a report on the progress of payment of pre-medical interns.
“This report will help us as the legislature to plan better on how much money should be allocated to the health sector to cater for such matters,” said Among.
She said this during a House sitting on Wednesday, 21 June 2023.
Among urged the Prime Minister to follow-up on the remuneration of 1900 pre-medical interns who have been deployed across the country as well as 4000 others yet to be deployed.
“Much as the medical interns promised that they are going to work, they need to be facilitated,” she added.
Among also urged the Ministry of Health to present a statement to Parliament, addressing the shortage of blood in the national blood bank.
The Speaker also noted with concern, robberies of mobile-money kiosks around the country.
“We want to ask the Prime Minister to ask the relevant authorities to make a follow-up to find out what is happening and how this can be controlled because there is a lot of outcry,” she said.
In the same house sitting, parliament directed the Minister of Defence to present a statement on killings and abductions of students of Lhubirira Secondary School in Kasese District.
Suspected Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) rebels attacked the school on Friday, 16 June 2023 and killed 42 people and abducted others.
The school is located in Mpondwe at the border of Uganda and Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
The Speaker who had earlier asked the Minister for Education to present the statement changed her position following a procedural matter by Kira Municipality MP, Hon. Ibrahim Ssemujju Nganda who wondered why a security issue would be addressed by a minister in the education sector.
“Can we have a report tomorrow from the Defence Ministry? Let us not gamble but debate from an informed point,” Among directed.
Speaker Among said the killings and abduction of students of Lhubirira Secondary School have opened old wounds.
“You can imagine you wake up thinking your child is at school but you get the news that the child has been burnt. This opens afresh the pain of previous tragedies such as the 1998 incident at Kichwamba Technical institute in Kabarole District where students were burnt,” she said.
Among added that, ‘we also had the abduction of Aboke girls in Oyam District in 1996 and the 1991 incident where students of Sacred Heart School in Gulu District were abducted by the Lord’s Resistance Army rebels’.
President Yoweri Museveni ordered for increased deployment of the army in the area and to also hunt down the rebels who retreated back to the DRC through what the security has described as porous border points.
