The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
He explained that the candidate provided the EC with all evidence indicating that there was compliance with the law when she adopted the said names during the enrollment for the national ID card in 2015 as she stated before the commission.
“They saw the energy in Pallisa and the only way to deny FDC and Achola a win was to look for a flimsy excuse to get her out,” Mugarura said.
Dr. Patrick Wakida, the executive director of Research World International, a Kampala-based polling firm says the NRM party just panicked because all conditions on the ground showed that they were not going to win that election.
Wakida says that Achola commissioned Research World International to carry out a survey to gauge her support and help her re-orient her campaign strategy.
Wakida told The Independent that the survey which The Independent has seen was, however, halted after three days by the Pallisa Resident District Commissioner (RDC) owing to a lack of permission to carry out such an exercise. That survey showed Achola in the lead in six of the seven sub-counties where the polling firm had already gathered data. It was only in one sub-county where the two candidates tied.
Wakida told The Independent that it was after the campaigns had started and the NRM had gauged their support base that the NRM wrote to the EC to nullify Achola’s candidature on condition that she did not have the required S.4 certificate.
Wakida told The Independent that Achola got advice from her father to add his name (Osupelem) since it would attract a lot of mileage for her.
Wakida says Achola went about that process efficiently. She was registered as a voter under those three names and she registered as a candidate under those three names in 2015. She did a statutory declaration and she presented to the Electoral Commission and then the EC duly nominated her.
But in 2015, the requirement of the law was to do a statutory declaration and go ahead to gazette it if you are adding a name. After 2016, if you wanted to add a name on your original names, you did not have to gazette those names.
“This time around she comes to contest, she is advised to take away all possible maneuvers of the NRM party; she goes on to the gazette to declare all the three names.”
In early June, she confirmed that in the gazette before nominations then she gets duly nominated by the EC and the campaigns began in earnest.
Wakida says the NRM has “shot itself in the foot” because whichever way the Court decides, NRM is going to suffer a beating in Pallisa.
“If the Court decides to reinstate Achola, NRM is going to suffer a beating. If they don’t, still the people of Pallisa who are already crying with the proceedings will revenge.”
Putting the issue into perspective, Kaheru wonders whether President Museveni who has changed the order of his names on the ballot, has sworn an affidavit on each of those occasions.
Kaheru says since 1996, President Museveni sometimes loses a name or changes the order of the names on the ballot paper to gain a favourable position on the ballot.
“Ideally if the EC is taking on the Pallisa case that way, then we should see the president swear an affidavit each time he changes the order of his name,” he said, “But let alone that, President Museveni has been called Yoseri, then Yoeri and then Yoweri. I am not sure all those changes have been backed by an affidavit.”
“And even if they were, there is suspicion bound to be created by such frequent changes in just a single name. For what reason and to what end?” Kaheru wondered, “The question is how come we have not seen the EC take such a stern position?”
“The reason would be that nobody has ever petitioned the president for the name change but if it is standard procedure then the EC should come out and pronounce itself on that anomaly even without anyone coming out to challenge that irregularity.”
