By Andrew Irumba
Drama surrounding the recently concluded Hoima Woman Member of Parliament By-election is not about to end.
The latest we have learnt is that the Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) party, whose candidate Asinansi Nyakato lost to National Resistance Movement (NRM)’s Harriet Mugenyi Businge, have rejected the results and vowed to petition court.
Held on Thursday, the election ended with Businge being declared the winner after scoring 33301 votes, while Nyakato garnered 28789 votes
However, Nyakato claims the election was marred by gross voter bribery, brutal arrests and detention of her supporters, agents and supervisors, Intimidation, ballot stuffing and vote rigging by NRM officials and some security operatives.
Nyakato said that “I have all evidence pinning some top security operatives and NRM officials who were indulging in the illegal acts during the election.”
Nyakato added that she is not contented with the election results and that she is going to court to seek justice through securing a court order to annul the election results and declare a recount of all the votes cast.
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She described herself as the duly elected Hoima woman MP although Businge was declared winner by the Electoral Commission.
Jenepher Karungi, the Hoima FDC acting Chairperson, said “The election was characterized with a lot of irregularities and therefore we cannot allow such gross anomalies to happen and we are saying ready to face off with NRM in court.”
Harold Kaija, the FDC Deputy Secretary General, said “The election was rigged at gunpoint. There was heavy deployment of the military during and after the election, which is a clear manifestation that people did not have their own freedom as they went to vote.”
He added that “The heavy military deployment forced some of our supporters to abandon voting since they feared to be arrested for supporting FDC. We will first look at the implications before challenging the election results in court.”
However, Simon Byabakama, the Electoral Commission chairperson said the election went on smoothly, adding that this was the first free and fair election he had ever witnessed and supervised.
On the other hand, Julius Hakiza, the Albertine region police spokesperson says FDC supporters who were arrested wanted to cause chaos during and after the election.
