I won’t handover office – MUASA boss Kamunyu

By Francis Otucu

Suspended Makerere University Staff Association (MUASA) Chairman Dr. Deus Kamunyu Muhwezi has said he will not handover office as directed by the Vice Chancellor Prof. Barnabas Nawangwe.

Dr. Kamunyu, who was suspended on January 17, 2019 Dr. Kamunyu was suspended last week on allegations of indiscipline and inciting staff, made the revelation yesterday evening while appearing on Radio One’s political talk show, The Spectrum.

“The letter that sacked me as a lecturer doesn’t relate to my tenure of service as Chairman MUASA but possibly they relate to my activities. But in the circumstances the VC deems it fit to mix the two because my tenure as a teacher is protected by law,” he said.

He added: “My tenure as MUASA Chairman is protected by law and it doesn’t only extend my tenure as MUASA Chairman but also as a worker. Even if I wasn’t a Chairman of MUASA for as long as it stampedes on my work, it provides for seeking ways of resolving grievances, some of them (ways) may include industrial action. The law protects us to air our grievances and the steps that follow is industrial action,” Kamunyu stressed.

He said he is not sure why he was suspended, and would therefore not handover office.

“So, I don’t know why I was suspended, a suspension I have since rejected. I am not going to recognize it. I will not handover as they said harshly in the letter.”

And probed whether he is ‘indisciplined’ as in the content of the letter, Kamunyu said: “As a teacher, I am very disciplined. I have never raised issues that I raise as MUASA Chairman. So, yes, errant workers should be punished but it is determined by law and it is why there are different levels of punishment including suspensions that take 14 days but errant is also defined in the law.”

Weighing on the content of the letter, he said it was in ‘bad faith’.

“I have never been invited by police or charged in any way. I don’t know where the VC gets that assertion that I committed crimes relating to computer. It means then that Makerere has become a state. I have never been warned. There is a difference between a warning and a letter. I have never been warned and told to write back. A warning is a charge. It has charges that you must respond to or defend.”

He stressed that as MUASA, they want laws to be followed. “We don’t want to stampede on the university but if the decision was made that we think that anyone who made it is very lawful, then please allow people to appeal within the 45 mandatory period and then they get justice or they say goodbye and receive their benefits and then go. That’s how we want to handle these things,” he said.