A sombre mood engulfed Kibuli Mosque as hundreds of mourners braved an early morning drizzle to pay their last respects to former Electoral Commission (EC) chairperson Aziz Kasujja.
Kasujja, 75, died on Sunday afternoon at Platinum Hospital in Wandegeya, Kampala where he had been rushed after collapsing during a school meeting in Kawempe.
Supreme Mufti Sheikh Siliman Kasule Ndirangwa said Kasujja had died on an “exemplary mission of education yet many die doing useless things”.
Prince Kassim Nakibinge Kakungulu, the titular head of the Muslim community in Uganda, described Kasujja as open-minded, honest and hardworking.
Their political rivalry aside, government and Opposition leaders also united to pay tribute to Kasujja, who also served as Uganda’s Ambassador to Saudi Arabia.
Dr Kizza Besigye, who challenged the election the deceased presided over in 2001, described him as a “decent man”
“Farewell Aziz Kasujja. Inna lillahi wa inna ilayhi raji’un [from God we came and it is to Him we shall return]. Aziz was a decent man and did his best in 2001,” Dr Besigye said in a tweet.
Kampala Lord Mayor Erias Lukwago described the deceased as a father figure who had raised and guided him.
NRM’s vice chairman Moses Kigongo, who represented President Museveni, said the deceased never failed in assigned duties.
“As a chairperson of the EC, he did a good job and he has been serving in other capacities. Whatever he has been doing, he has been doing it so well,” he said.
Buganda Lukiko speaker Nelson Kawalya, who represented the kingdom prime minister, said: “We cannot forget the good job he and his colleagues did when they opened up Greenland Bank.” The bank was closed in 1999.
In 1997, President Museveni appointed Kasujja who had been a commissioner at the Stephen Akabwayi-led Interim Electoral Commission as chairperson, a post he held until 2002 and was later appointed Uganda’s ambassador to Saudi Arabia.
In 2012, Kasujja was admitted to Mulago National Referral Hospital following a heart attack and was also later hospitalised in London, UK.
He was buried yesterday at his ancestral home in Mbulire, Masaka District.
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