Who is Kania Mario Obiga? Flash Uganda Media looks at his biography, age, wife, family, tribe, relationship with Natalyn Etomaru, Makerere University, MP Terego County East, National Resistance Movement (NRM), early life and education of the current State Minister for Lands, Housing and Urban Development in Uganda.
Kania Mario Obiga is a politician in Uganda. He is the current Member of Parliament for Terego County East as well as the State Minister for Lands, Housing and Urban Development in the 11th Parliament.
Previously, he was the State Minister for Internal Affairs in the 10th Ugandan Cabinet (2016–2021). He was also the elected representative of Terego County East in the 10th Parliament of Uganda.
Early Life and Education
Kania Mario Obiga was born on January 1st, 1953. Kania’s wife Natalyn Etomaru is a commissioner at the Electoral Commission and also the National Forestry Authority (NFA).
Kania went to Odupi Primary School, where in 1966 he sat for his Primary Leaving Education examinations. He then moved schools and eventually earned an East African Certificate of Education in 1970 while attending St. Aloysius College Nyapea in the modern-day Zombo District.
He was accepted to the Wakiso District’s St. Mary’s College Kisubi, from where he earned an East African Advanced Certificate of Education in 1972.
He subsequently enrolled in Makerere University, the oldest and biggest public university in Uganda, and earned a Bachelor of Commerce in 1976.
Later, in 2005, the Eastern and Southern African Management Institute granted him a Master of Business Administration degree.
Kania Mario Obiga is also a member of the Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators as an Associate (ICSA).
Career and Professional Work Experience
Kania Obiga served as a representative to the Constituent Assembly that drafted the 1995 constitution of Uganda between 1994 and 1995.
He was subsequently chosen to serve in the Ugandan Parliament between 1996 and 2001.
Between 2001 and 2015, Kania worked as the National Resistance Movement political party’s Secretariat’s Director of Research.
From 2007 until 2011, he served as a member of the Uganda Immigration Board. He was chosen in 2016 to serve as the National Resistance Movement’s representative for Terego County East in Arua District.
And in June 2016, he was appointed as Uganda’s Cabinet State Minister of Internal Affairs in the 10th Parliament.
In 2021, Kania re-emerged victorious in the General elections where he was re-appointed as the Member of Parliament Terego County East. In the same year, he was also appointed by the President to the position of State Minister of Lands.
Controversies
For the January 14th, 2021 elections, Apama Mayo Boroa who ran on the ANT (Alliance for National Transformation) ticket for the position of MP Terego County East rejected the poll results.
Against Kania’s 10,544 votes, he received 5,925 votes. He disagreed with the poll results and filed a lawsuit against the Minister and the Electoral Commission, citing inconsistencies in his name on his academic credentials.
On September 1st, 2021, Justice Boniface Wamala dismissed Apama’s petition in Lira high court along with costs on the basis that the affidavits supporting the motion were ordered by counsel Daizy Bandaru, whose licence to practise law had expired.
The judge also highlighted that Jimmy Madira, the applicant’s attorney, lacked a current practising certificate. Obiga Kania was then confirmed as the Terego East MP by the Electoral Commission.
A red flag was raised during a meeting held to hear land matters in Arua town by Mr Boniface Alioni, the councillor for Logiri Sub-County in Arua District Council, who claimed that Kania and Etomaru colluded with NFA to steal 1000 hectares of land from the Kafu and Ajupani Forest Reserves for investment.
Kania vehemently denied any wrongdoing, claiming that he obtained the disputed land in Logiri and Arivu sub-counties through legal means.
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