Kampala - Losing Ugandan presidential candidate Amama Mbabazi has lost his petition before Uganda’s Supreme Court to have February’s presidential elections overturned on the basis of alleged vote rigging and non-compliance with electoral procedure.
The nine justices of Kampala’s Supreme Court ruled unanimously Thursday afternoon that incumbent President Yoweri Museveni was validly elected while further dismissing Mbabazi’s petition with no orders to costs.
Uganda’s Electoral Commission (EC) on February 20, 2016 declared Museveni winner with 60.7 per cent of valid votes cast.
Mbabazi, a former prime minister and secretary-general of the ruling national party, emerged a distant third in the poll when he ran as an independent.
Mbabazi brought his petition, containing about 25 grievances, before the Supreme Court at the beginning of March. Under Ugandan law the court had only 30 days to reach a verdict.
Hundreds of soldiers and police surrounded Kampala’s Kololo neighbourhood, where the Supreme Court was holding session in a small, hot and crowded office, rented by the judiciary to serve as a court room.
Only accredited members of the judiciary and the media, and others on a security short-list, were allowed to cross police lines and pass through several security checks to reach the court room.
Journalists, lawyers and other witnesses spilled into the corridor outside the court as soldiers and police mingled with the crowd.
Half way through the court’s ruling Kenneth Kakande a lawyer assisting Mbabazi’s legal team, told the African News Agency (ANA) that Mbabazi had already lost on three major issues he raised as part of his petition grievances against the elections.
“The court rejected Mbabazi’s claims that during the elections there was non-compliance with electoral law. They disagreed that Museveni was wrongly nominated and disputed that the election results were not based on declaration forms,” Kakande told ANA.
Kakande sat amongst a number of colleagues listening intently to proceedings. Some of them laughed at certain comments made by one of the nine justices reading out the court’s ruling, others nodded in approval while others shook their heads in disapproval as their faces settled into grim resignation.
But they all seemed to be getting on just fine.
“Some of the lawyers I was sitting with were part of Museveni’s legal team,” Kakande told ANA.
“There is no animosity between us … we went to university together and are friends.”
Meanwhile, outside the court, beyond the police barriers and armoured vehicles, groups of Mbabazi and Museveni supporters stood on opposite sides of the road, chanting and singing as riot police cordoned off the road leading to the building.
Museveni supporters dressed in yellow outnumbered the Mbabazi supporters and appeared fairly relaxed although they told ANA they were being harassed by members of the security forces to move away.
Their confidence was possibly based on the fact they were fairly sure that the Supreme Court would rule in Museveni’s favour. He is now serving his fifth straight-term in office as leader of the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM).
Museveni supporter Suliman Kiyaga, 40, a vendor from Kampala, said he believed that Museveni would win and warned that if the opposition started any trouble or resorted to violence they would be “taught a lesson they won’t forget”.
“As soon as we win we are going to celebrate the victory. The opposition are stupid and have just been wasting everybody’s time,” Kiyaga said.
However, on the other side of the road one of Mbabazi’s supporters Agaqba Johab, 26, from Kampala looked rather apprehensive.
“I have come here to support Mbabazi. His supporters have come here to witness what the court is saying,” Johab said.
“We know what Museveni did and we exposed the clear evidence of vote rigging and intimidation and how unfair the election process was.
“We don’t expect to win the trial. It’s pretty obvious the way things are going to go. The Supreme Court is under the control of the government.”
“However, we will not let this slide. If he loses we will take whatever action is needed to assert out rights,” Johab said.
Presidential hopeful Joseph Mwambazi, a lawyer, said he had been unable to run as an independent candidate due to new restrictions introduced to keep independents critical of Museveni out of the running.
“The bar to run was raised by making the fees to enter as a candidate exorbitant and they also withdrew funds to support candidates,” Mwambazi said.
“There was a conspiracy between the court and the government to back Museveni.”
Semujju Nganda, the spokesman of the main opposition group, the Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) said there was never any reason to attend court even from the beginning of the trial as everybody knew the outcome beforehand.
“The justices will make some strong comments against the EC but this will not be enough to annul the elections,” Nganda told ANA.
Following Thursday’s ruling, Dr Kizza Besigye the leader of the FDC, who has been under house arrest since before the elections, said: “You cannot imprison your challengers and then masquerade around as having won the election. That is absolutely unacceptable.”
The day’s dramatic events were rounded off by a power outage in parts of the capital caused by a massive thunder storm with torrential rain and black thunderclouds enveloping Kampala.
But the real drama and political thunder may yet come.
African News Agency
The full ruling of the court:
1. Assertion of voting without opening ballot boxes was not supported by any evidence so it was not proved.
2. Evidence on record show that envelopes opened by returning officers were received .
3. Petitioner’s agents being chased; we find it lacking and with no evidence to back it up since the agents signed on DR forms. In some cases the petitioner’s polling agents were indeed denied information at polling stations.
4. There was no evidence to back claims that anybody ineligible to vote actually voted as alleged by the petitioner.
5. On multiple voting; Two of petitioners affidavits are based on hearsay. Therefore no evidence to back the claims
6. Claim of polling before and after time had no concrete evidence.
7. Evidence in affidavits before court doesn’t prove there was pre ticking of votes anywhere.
8. EC did not comply with its duty in failing to deliver voting material in time. It was a sign of gross incompetence.
9. The petitioner blamed the late delivery of voting materials to some polling stations on the Electoral Commission (EC). EC said in its defence that voting was extended to 7:00pm.
10. EC in defence submitted that not only the BVVK machine was used but the voter’s ID, national ID and the Voter’s Register. The petitioner submitted that EC used the unreliable BVVK to identify voters which was slow thus affecting the process.
11. EC also submitted that the constitution allows them to use National ID data to compile, maintain and update voter’s register, EC went ahead to submit that they compiled, maintained and updated the voter’s register as guided by the constitution.
12. EC submitted that the extension of nomination deadlines wasn’t intended to favour any candidate as alleged by the petitioner.
13. The petitioner alleged that EC illegally nominated the 1st respondent. EC denied this basing on Lumumba’s affidavit.
14. On lack of transparency: the petitioner did not provide evidence that EC received results from an illegal tally centre in Naguru.
15. We recognise the 24hrs given to EC to announce. However EC hasn’t provided any explanation why other results weren’t read.
16. We have concluded that EC could use other devices to transfer information- there is no non-compliance.
17. EC should have done more to ensure that all candidates and their agents were briefed about the mode of results transmission.
18. There were no illegal tally centres from which the electoral commission received results.
19. We are satisfied that the results declared by EC were based on the tally sheets received and Museveni was validly declared winner.
20. The allegation regarding electronic transmission of results is not non- compliance because EC can use electronic means to transmit results.
21. We find it difficult to believe that the petitioner’s performance at polling stations was due to unavailability of his agents.
22. The first respondent (Kaguta Museveni) did not bribe voters with hoes as alleged because this was an ongoing government programme.
23. On voter intimidation by using violent group called the Kifesi to beat up opposition members: The credibility of the “Kifesi group” as witnesses of the petitioner is questionable so information provided by them is doubtable.
24. On crime preventers presence and their alleged behaviour: It is through the crime preventers that law and order was maintained through the election period, the petitioner did not prove that crime preventers were recruited to destabilise peace and intimidate.
25. On using civil servants, UNRA ED Kagina and KCCA ED Musisi to campaign:“They were called to explain government programs, not campaign.”
African News Agency
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