Minister Agness Nandutu: Bobi Wine’s NUP Sent Food to Karamoja for Cheap Popularity

State Minister for Karamoja Affairs Agness Nandutu has alleged that Robert Kyagulanyi aka Bobi Wine’s National Unity Platform (NUP) sent relief to the sub region as a way of gaining cheap popularity.

Mid last month, NUP sent 2.5 tonnes of beans and 2.5 tonnes of maize flour to Karamoja as the people in the sub-region starved to death.

But Minister Nandutu, who formerly reported for NTV Uganda and is serving her first term in Parliament and cabinet, says Bobi Wine and his Kamwokya-based NUP were simply chasing cheap popularity by sending relief food to Karamoja.

“NUP taking food to Karamoja is just for cheap popularity. The government does things systematically. By the time NUP sent food, there was already food in Karamoja. NUP can’t even do 0.001 per cent of what we did in Karamoja,” Nandutu told NBS Faceoff. 

The junior minister also claimed that the press had blown the number of the people who
died because of hunger. At least 900 were recently reported to have died of hunger.

“Some people are killed by diseases, and others by cattle rustling. A few have been taken by the famine but not in the exaggerated way the media portrays it,” she claimed.

“For us who have been on the ground and moved to Karamoja, the number of people who have died of hunger in the region has been exaggerated on social media.”

Nandutu also reported that enough food has since been ferried to the sub-region and that there is no longer cause for worry.

“As I speak now, families in Karamoja have gotten food, moreover enough food. There is no longer a crisis in Karamoja because we are now in charge. We have a strategic plan to ensure that there is food security in the region.”

She also explained the cause of hunger in the sub region. “The people of Karamoja fear going to the garden because of the drought. It has been a year now. They are also scared of being killed by cattle rustlers,” she noted.

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