A section of Members of Parliament have raised a red flag ,saying they are uncomfortably legislating following foul and choking smell that has gutted the parliamentary chambers.
The MPs have silently endured the heat and foul smell in the chambers since Thursday until Butemba County MP Innocent Kamusiime Pentagon today brought it to the attention of the Deputy Speaker Jacob Oulanyah who was presiding over the House.
He said that from the time he entered he was perturbed by smell some heavy gas and his chest was paining, adding that they are about to suffocate.
“From the time I entered here I smell some heavy gas and my chest is paining. We are about to suffocate and I don’t know what is happening. We need to know what is happening here because we might get a problem. This is on a healthy ground, personally my chest is paining and my colleagues have confirmed the same,” Pentagon complained during the Friday morning plenary.
In response, Oulanyah confirmed that indeed the House is messy due to ongoing renovations in the parliament canteen.
“I am also in the same situation [choking]. The explanation I got is that there is a temporal activity going on in the upper canteen, the kitchen is under renovation so they have temporarily shifted the kitchen to the basement and that is why we are having this challenge,” Oulanyah said.
“It was supposed to be completed by yesterday, but we are still in the same situation. You enter [the chamber] and it is like you are in the kitchen, but let us bear with them and hope that by next week they would be done. So it is not dangerous gas.”
