Electoral Commission biased - Mao

Dec 09, 2015

The Democratic Party president Norbert Mao has alleged that the national Electoral Commission exhibited bias when it rejected his nomination as a candidate for Gulu Municipality MP.

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By Nicholas Wassajja


The Democratic Party president Norbert Mao has alleged that the national Electoral Commission exhibited bias when it rejected his nomination as a candidate for Gulu Municipality MP.

"The EC had no reason to deny me the right to vote and be voted for because I am a citizen of Uganda. Their actions where biased, prejudicial and discriminatory in nature and for that reason we shall go against them until we receive justice, not for Mao but the many Ugandans without a platform being treated like me," Mao stated at a news conference yesterday in Kampala.

Gulu district EC registrar last Wednesday declined to nominate Mao saying his name was missing from the national voters' register.

Mao said he made several attempts to have his details on the voters' register in vain. He claimed Uganda People's Defense Force officers from Somalia and South Sudan who missed the exercise like him were later registered in Gulu at a place called Palalo.

"I used all avenues including writing to President Yoweri Museveni but I didn't get any help yet UPDF and some other people I know of are being registered at the last minute which means my rejection is deliberate."

But UPDF spokesman Paddy Ankunda denied the allegations. "I am not aware of any registration of officers in Gulu but even if it were true, these men and women have been away on duty so may be internal affairs considered them because they have a right," he stated.

Mao also said the EC had deliberately refused to respond to his appeal against his rejection as a delaying tactic to allow events override his case.

EC spokesman Jotham Taremwa yesterday told New Vision that, "we have invited Mao for a meeting on Thursday to discuss his complaint, so it's not necessary for him to run to the media." 

Mao was Gulu municipality MP from 1996-2006, Gulu district chairman 2006-2011 and a presidential candidate in the 2011 elections.

His lawyers led by human rights activist Nicholas Opiyo also maintained that the EC acted outside the law when it retired the old register which had Mao's name.

"EC has no mandate to retire a voter's register as per the law but they can compile, maintain and update. We have seen a copy of that gazette but even the sections of the Electoral Commission Act cited do not compel them to degazette," Opiyo argued.

EC chairman Badru Kiggundu recently said that during the update exercise all persons who registered for purposes of elections prior to 2011 and subsequent by-elections but didn't take part in the mass enrollment for issuance of a national identification card were required to register afresh for voting in the 2016 general elections.

Early this year, EC announced that effective 31st March 2015, the 2011 National Voters' Register as updated had been retired and degazetted in General Notice No. 257 of 2015 in The Uganda Gazette.

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