The Speaker of Parliament Rt Hon. Anita Among has refuted media reports that legislators plan to increase their salaries.
The Monitor newspaper recently reported that President Museveni rejected a proposal by Members of Parliament to have their pay and pension contribution increased.
The article alleged that in a 13 October letter to Speaker Anita Among, Museveni declined to assent to the Parliamentary Pensions (Amendment) Bill, 2022 because the MPs voted to increase their savings from 15 to 20 per cent, subsequently increasing government contribution to individual lawmakers’ pension from 30 per cent to 40 per cent.
Among said that the President returned the Bill because he was advised by the Ministry of Finance that it did not include the amendment of the increment of the contribution from government fund from 30 to 40 per cent.
She made the clarification while chairing the House on 01 November 2022.
“There was a headline in the Monitor that Parliament secretly increases its salary by 40 per cent. Monitor, if you have nothing to write, do not write about this Parliament. Do not write about what you don’t know. That was an opaque reporting, pension is different from salary,” Among said.
She pointed out that such reporting is misleading, and likely to cause misunderstandings between the public and Parliament.
“Why do you come here and report what is not right. As Parliament, we have never increased our salary. We are here to work for the public, we are not complaining about our little salary. Write what is correct, don’t write what you think,” said Among.
She added that the Parliamentary Pensions (Amendment) Bill, 2022 and the Public Health (Amendment) Bill 2021 that were returned by the President have been referred to the committees of Legal and Parliamentary Affairs and the Health respectively.
“Pursuant to Rule 143 of the Rules of Procedure, I administratively referred the Bills to the committees. I now formally refer the Bills to the respective committees and ask that they are returned to the House as soon as possible,” Among said.
She added that the Parliamentary Pensions (Amendment) Bill 2022 will be handled on Wednesday, 02 November 2022, since the committee has already handled it.