The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | Robert Kyagulanyi Ssentamu, the former National Unity Platform (NUP) presidential candidate, has threatened to withdraw his petition from the Supreme Court challenging the victory of his rival and incumbent President Yoweri Kaguta Tibuhaburwa Museveni.
Kyagulanyi said he has asked the party lawyers to make a formal application to the court laying down their demands that the court must obey or they withdraw their case.
Anthony Wameli, one of the lead counsels of Kyagulanyi declined to say whether they have such instructions or not.
“Can you talk to Counsel Sseggona or party spokesperson Ssenyonyi?” Wameli said. Our efforts to speak to Medard Sseggona who is the lead lawyer for the petitioner were futile as he didn’t answer our repeated calls to his known number. Joel Ssenyonyi, the NUP spokesperson was still attending a meeting by the time of publishing this story.
Speaking to reporters at the NUP headquarters in Kamwokya on Tuesday, Kyagulanyi said the Supreme Court has shown an unprecedented level of bias against him. He highlighted several cases to show what he called the bias of the Supreme Court against him.
He said some of the nine justices including the Chief Justice Alphonso Owinyi-Dollo, Ezekiel Muhanguzi and Mike Chibita can’t be independent jurors because they have in the past worked closely with President Museveni who is the first respondent to the petition.
On Monday, city lawyer Hassan Male Mabirizi filed an application in the Supreme Court asking the Chief Justice Owinyi-Dollo to recuse himself from the case because he was once Museveni’s lawyer. In 2006, Dollo was one of the lawyers who represented President Museveni in the presidential petition filed by Dr. Kizza Besigye challenging Museveni’s victory.
Asked whether he supports Mabirizi’s petition, Kyagulanyi said he welcomes any efforts by anybody to challenge Museveni’s victory in court. He however clarified that any challenges to the petition will be made by what he called a robust legal team of the party.
Kyagulanyi also complained about the decision by the Supreme Court to decline to grant him leave to amend his petition. He said this exposed it as a biased court because in the past, the same court has allowed presidential petitioners to amend their petitions or introduce new evidence in the middle of the hearing.
Kyagulanyi also said he was not satisfied with the court decision denying him a chance to file affidavits claiming that he was out of time. The NUP president also wondered why the court would only have an open hearing for one day instead of following the precedent it had set by hearing arguments from the petitioner and the respondents for weeks.
This all he said is testimony that the court is not fair towards him. Asked why he’s lamenting about the unfairness of the court now, yet in the past he has publicly stated that he didn’t expect justice from the Supreme Court because it’s another of Museveni’s tools just like the Electoral Commission, Kyagulanyi said amidst those fears of bias, he expected them to do their job of dispensing justice.
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“Kyagulanyi said he has asked the party lawyers to make a formal application to the court laying down their demands that the court must obey or they withdraw their case.”
Those are the demands of Dictator Kyagulanyi. His guys are chickening out with a lot of contradictions. Politics is not a walk in the park.
It is easier to accept defeat than subject lawyers to all this nonsense. The lawyers have to be paid anyway.
Shame that the dictator is showing himself with another face. A graceful loser who concedes defeat is better than a lying fool who always cries wolf. Indulging in a baby’s tantrums only makes the child worse.
Kyagulanyi should stop fooling Ugandans. He is such a nauseating replica of Trump. What a demagogue, s cry baby, an intolerant puppet of imperialists, etc, that will never see any good thing in any situation/argument/court if it is not what he wants!! The other day, he and his budding demagogues spent weeks lambasting an independent news media NBS for n9t declaring him the winner of elections as if NBS was the Electoral Commission. Now he is at it again lambasting the judiciary and the courts of law. When in 2020 Justice Sekaana ruled in his favor during the NUP registration court case, Kyagulanyi and co were jubilant and full of praise for the court system: just bcz the verdict was in his favor.
Kyagulanyi should not tire us. Let him withdraw the petition bcz when he was going there, he never sought consent of Ugandans. He has many other avenues bcz for him, anything foreign is the right one: the EU, USA, UN, UK, Anusmsterdam, etc. I have severally advised him to take his petition to Besigye’s peoples government, which am told has a ‘good judicial system’, with Dr Stella Nyanzi as Chief Justice. He will no doubt get the justice he wants from this Besigye government.
It must be puzzling many out there, what can of leader Kyagulanyi really is. As many countries on African continent are yet to recover from the scars inflicted by neocolonialists whom the only recently forced out of their countries via bloody wars that cost thousands of lives and generations of stagnation (examples: Angola, Namibia, Zimbabwe, South Africa, etc), KYAGULANYI AND HIS NUPIST APOLOGISTS, ARE OPENLY CALLING THEM WITH AN OPEN CHEQUE TO TAKE OVER OUR COUNTRY AGAIN. There is NOTHING that NUP does without getting a nod from the Anusmsterdams, and a plethora of neocolonial agents and groups waiting to create a Libya in Uganda. Let him and them be informed that we patriotic Ugandans are ready and determined to fight ferociously this recolonization in all its colors, and forms. Aluta continua.
Talk about your self don’t include others because Ugandans fear war and that is why museveni gets votes although he gets defeated all the times by the if it was NOT fear he couldn’t get any.
Rest your case time will tell
Mr. Kyagulanyi is a brilliant dude, but the court seemed smarter, he intended to expose the poor democracy practiced in Uganda. He knew he couldn’t win the case, 3 of the judges on the panel were former employees of the president. He tried forcing the supreme court to allow him to make an amendment but still, they said No. He complained about the 3 judges.
The supreme court has a right to choose the best team to hear the petition, but I wonder why they chose the former president employees. Were they up to something?
A token of appreciation to the NRM team that reacted smarter, if they do charge him then they would have lost in this game