The Minister for the Presidency, Mr Frank Tumwebaze, has emphasised the legal mandate of Residence District Commissioners (RDCs) in ensuring that the country’s core values are passed on to Ugandans as he dismissed talk that they are partisan.
The minister in his key note address to the newly appointed RDCs and their deputies at the opening of the one-week retreat at the Kyankwanzi Leadership Institute, also warned them against bowing to intimidation from anyone.
“Do not therefore be misled by those who want to misread your mandate by claiming that engaging in ideological issues as an RDC or Deputy RDC is being and going partisan and therefore breaking the rule, now that we are in a multiparty dispensation. That is not true at all,” the minister said.
RDCs are under the law classified as top civil servants appointed by the President on recommendation of the Public Service Commission.
The RDCs are, however, being picked from the National Resistance Movement (NRM) party ranks, mostly those that have been rejected by their electorate hence being labelled partisan.
But the Minister said through championing the NRM party manifesto and mobilising the population to heed to the various policies of government as per its ideology does not make them political.
Tipping them about their expectations, Mr Tumwebaze cautioned the RDCs against arm-chair duty and directed that they relocate to those districts where they have been sent.
“You must be resident, and not visitors in your place of work,” he warned.
mnalugo@ug.nationmedia.com
SOURCE: monitor.co.ug