By our reporter in Masaka:
“Veteran DP politician and senior lawyer who served as Acting DP Secretary General under Dr. Paul K. Ssemwogerere is dead”.
KALUNGU – The career path of John Baptist Kakooza, from serving as the NSSF company secretary to Democratic Party’s Acting Secretary General in 2006 when Dr. Paul Ssemwogerere fell out with his Secretary General and suspended Mario Drametu – was a triumph of determination and doggedness. J.B Kakooza, who has died aged 72, was the son of a peasant in Kalungu district.
During the years in 2001 and 2006 as he was trying to legislate for Kalungu West on DP ticket, he saw himself as an embodiment of blunt and enduring DP values. The leaders he loyally served – Dr. Paul Ssemwogerere capitalized on his roots by contrast to their down to earth backgrounds.
JB Kakooza could persuade the DP leadership who were against the idea of re-registering the Democratic Party, and the consequences of not registering DP at that moment. His close relationship with many DP members and rich knowledge of DP matters may well have come as a conciliator during the party power leadership struggle between Hajji Nasser Ntege Ssebagala and Counsel Francis Bwengye tussling trying to oust Dr. Ssemwogerere from the DP leadership.
JB Kakooza did suffer the miseries of chronic illnesses for 7 years, and type 2 diabetes, diagnosed in 2020, which he also kept quiet about. But they did not stop him reaching the heights of his party.
Born in Kalungu district, John Baptist Kakooza a senior advocate of the high Court, a new vision newspaper columnist who could write about social development issues was married to Irene Mulyagonja the former IGG and now the Justice of the Court of Appeal.
JB Kakooza will be buried on Thursday 22nd May, 2025 at his ancestral burial grounds in Kalungu district.
