By Mulengera Reporters
Having acrimoniously lost the Buganda CEC NRM Vice Chairman race during the 27th August voting at Kololo Ceremonial Grounds, businessman Moses Kalisa Karangwa on 29th lodged a petition demanding nullification of Minister Haruna Kasolo’s victory. According to official results, Kasolo polled 4,194 votes against Karangwa’s 3,981.
Falsely claiming to have won with 3,981 (55.5%) from his own tally against Kasolo’s 3,198 (44.5%), Karangwa unsuccessfully claimed that his opponent’s declared victory had resulted from his supporters being disenfranchised and locked out of voting; participation of ghost voters; Kasolo being permitted to campaign during voting time; falsification of results; violation of NRM elections guidelines and intimidation of voters allegedly committed by Rubaga NRM Chairman Majambere who he claimed acted on Kasolo’s behalf.
Karangwa’s claim was that the disenfranchised voters of his who were blocked from voting for him where mainly members of the historical league. He paraded affidavits deponed by Yasiin Matata Buga, Amina Nakajiri Nsalasatta, Bonny Ssebiddo, Nyanzi Ahmed and Betty Nakamanya to unsuccessfully demonstrate this. And, having inquired into the same, the NRM Election Disputes Tribunal (EDT) agreed with Kasolo’s lawyer Mukasa Mbidde that this was merely a speculative move as no cogent evidence was tendered to prove that these were actually members of the said historicals league or even that they were indeed blocked from voting.
Comprising of John Musiime (Panel Chairperson); Esau Isingoma and Anthony Bazira as members, the EDT rejected contents of all the written submissions made by Karangwa’s lawyers (Ronald Ruhinda and Jamada Maga) as mere fishing expedition and demanded to know why no such complaint was ever made to Tanga Odoi, the NRM EC Chairman, or even Police.
The ill-fated Karangwa also unsuccessfully used the affidavit evidence of his other supporter Paul Michael Kimamati to allege that the last-minute withdrawal from the race by Godfrey Kiwanda, Sewava Mukasa and Hakim Kyeswa, all in favour of Kasolo, only moments before voting started had created confusion which disadvantaged him. The Tribunal panel members unanimously rejected this on grounds that no cogent evident was demonstrated to prove this claim as something that diminished the integrity and credibility of the entire election and the eventual outcome in any substantial way.
The alleged falsification of results in favour of Kasolo was equally rejected because Karangwa failed to adduce any proof and the DR forms he attempted to rely on were rejected by the Tribunal as “inauthentic” because they were incomplete with the last agents’ signature page missing. The same DR forms were declared “unreliable” by the Tribunal because they sharply differed from those the NRM EC had issued and used that day at Kololo.
In it’s 10-page ruling, dated 10th September, the Tribunal observed that Karangwa’s DR forms couldn’t be relied upon because even their author(s) was unknown.
Making it clear that such falsification amounts to forgery which is a criminal offence under the laws of Uganda, the Tribunal members wondered why the same was never reported to Police anywhere by the Karangwa team. The same was never raised with the Returning Officer during voting at Kololo. Karangwa, who ought to have rallied his supporters to protest and demonstrate over the same at Kololo as voting proceeded, is advised to report such forgery to Police, because it’s not too late, so that the DPP can sanction charges to have the culprits criminally prosecuted.
The Tribunal members also clearly exonerated Kasolo in their judgment by making it clear that even if there was any non-compliance with the high integrity standards prescribed under the NRM election guidelines (which gratefully wasn’t the case), blame had to lie with the party’s Electoral Commission and not with the microfinance minister because he was merely a candidate and not the one charged with organizing elections.
This duty-bearing in favour of the party’s EC is clearly imposed on Dr. Tanga Odoi under the provisions of Regulation No 3(i) of the party’s election regulations 2005. The petitioner had made Kasolo 1st respondent and the party’s EC 2nd respondent but he unfortunately didn’t prove any of his claims and allegations. He made his own case even more complicated when he boycotted the Tribunal hearing sessions after his discovery-related request to compel Dr. Tanga Odoi to give him certified copies of tally sheets was rejected by the Tribunal.
The dismissal of that simple discovery application angered Karangwa to the extent of staying away from all the subsequent proceedings, where his lawyers would have had the opportunity to make some oral submissions. He stayed away while declaring war on AG Kiwanuka Kiryowa and declared the Tribunal his (AG’s) mere walking stick. All this unwarranted paranoia and hostility complicated, as opposed to strengthening, his case as the petitioner seeking to overturn Kasolo’s victory. He addressed reporters claiming that the Tribunal was biased against him because he is not a Muganda and that they were acting on orders of Kiryowa whose alleged intimidation tactics he vowed to resist.
To corroborate the alleged intimidation, which he claimed had diminished his victory chances, Karangwa relied on the affidavit evidence of his supporters namely Alfa Asiimwe, Esther Boonabaana and Nabakusu Josephine Nsubuga. Their unsuccessful claim was that the Rubaga NRM Chairman Majambere proved too powerful during voting at Kololo to the extent that he gave verbal directives and orders to election officials besides personally unleashing violence on and cowing many of Karangwa’s supporters and agents.
The Tribunal rejected this as mere speculation and castigated Karangwa for presenting evidence of a “generalized” nature as opposed to being specific. He also ought to have presented corroborating witnesses, which he didn’t.
In their ruling, the EDT members demanded to know why Karangwa’s camp didn’t protest this by immediately bringing the matter to the attention of the NRM EC Chairman or even reporting the same to Police. The same claim was also rejected on grounds that Karangwa’s camp didn’t produce any evidence to demonstrate agency by clearly bringing it out to the satisfaction of the Tribunal that Majambere was indeed Kasolo’s agent acting on his express or implied orders (assuming the alleged intimidation was true and indeed happened).
Karangwa was also faulted for failing to demonstrate that the irregularities and non-compliance he alleged was substantial enough to vitiate the final election outcome substantially. The Tribunal described Kasolo’s margin of victory of 213 votes “as a clear and substantial lead” which couldn’t be vitiated by Karangwa’s “speculative and generalized” claims.
That the petitioner also failed to show that Kasolo personally committed any of the impugned fraudulent acts besides failing to quantify and demonstrate the substantiality effect. The Tribunal members were also angered by Karangwa’s reliance on what they termed as “unauthenticated materials [basically the strange DR forms whose authenticity couldn’t be established as the same was established to be alien to what the party’s EC deployed for usage at Kololo].”
CONTEXTUALIZING A BIT:
Ordinarily, under the NRM election guidelines 2005, the EDT can set aside one’s victory on chiefly three grounds. These include non-compliance with NRM Constitution in a substantial manner; a candidate different from the one who actually won being declared and where a candidate declared by the EC to have won is one who had been disqualified from competing in that election, for some reason.
Among other remedies, the EDT can nullify a wrongful winner and declare the right one; deduct and take away votes fraudulently obtained or added onto a candidate; can order a recount of the votes or even outrightly dismiss the petition the way they have done in the instant Karangwa case. And what makes the entire situation a very unhelpful one for Karangwa, the Tribunal’s decision is final and there is nothing the otherwise powerful NRM Kayunga district Chairman can do about it from now going forward. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
