EC to deliver ruling on disputed Kikuube nominations next week

KIKUUBE - The Electoral Commission (EC) will on June 10, 2026, deliver its ruling on a petition filed by embattled Philip Mbabazi Burnet, who is challenging the nomination of two candidates in the Kikuube district LC5 by-election.

Mbabazi, the son of Gen. Matayo Kyaligonza, failed to secure nomination on May 26, 2026, after the EC disqualified him over mismatched academic documents.

Following his disqualification, the National Resistance Movement (NRM) party replaced Mbabazi with Paddy Kisembo, who had come second in the party primaries and later opted to contest as an independent candidate.

In the NRM primaries, Mbabazi garnered 23,279 votes, while Kisembo obtained 16,459 votes. Dickson Tushabe received 343 votes, and Valentino Rubasharaza polled 81 votes.

However, after his disqualification, Mbabazi filed a petition to the EC challenging the nomination of Fenekansi Tinkamanyire of the National Unity Platform (NUP) and Paddy Kisembo of the NRM.

In his petition, Mbabazi alleges that the nomination process of the two candidates did not comply with legal requirements under the Constitution, the Local Governments Act, and the Electoral Commission Act.

According to the petition dated June 2, 2026, Mbabazi claims that the respondents failed to meet nomination requirements.

He alleges that the candidates did not submit lists containing the names of at least 50 registered voters from each sub-county in at least two-thirds of the electoral area, as required by law.

The petitioner further alleges that the candidates used similar voter names in support of their nomination papers.

Mbabazi contends that these alleged irregularities rendered the respondents ineligible for nomination and argues that the Returning Officer should have rejected their nomination papers.

EC responds to the petition

According to Annet Nyakecho, the Kikuube assistant elections administrator and returning officer, the EC chairman, Justice Simon Byamukama, on June 4, 2026, convened a meeting at the commission headquarters in Kampala to hear the petition.

She noted that after hearing submissions from the complainant, the meeting resolved that the commission will deliver its ruling on Wednesday, June 10, 2026.

“The commission sat today and the hearing was conducted but the commission did not give the ruling, the ruling will be given on Wednesday next week, campaigns are going on as usual until we get ruling, we already sat with the two nominated candidates and came up with harmonized campaign programs which is what we are following, so until we get communication from our bosses to halt everything, nothing can be changed” she said.

In a telephone interview on Thursday, NUP’s Tinkamanyire and NRM’s Kisembo dismissed Mbabazi’s claims, saying the issues raised in the petition do not carry sufficient weight.