Museveni scoffs at FDC over poll victory claims

President Yoweri Museveni has criticized leaders of opposition political party Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) for claiming that they defeated him in the February 18 presidential elections.

He told thousands of ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) supporters celebrating his victory at Kololo Airstrip on Saturday that those claiming to have won the presidential race "want to behave like Jesus who turned water into wine".

Museveni said that if the NRM rigged three million votes to secure victory, then top leaders of FDC are sleepy and weak to be entrusted with political power in Uganda.

"How could we have rigged three million votes? Did they [FDC] have agents at polling stations and does FDC qualify to be called a political party?" wondered the NRM leader.

On February 20, the chairperson of the Electoral Commission, Eng. Badru Kigundu, declared incumbent Museveni winner of the eight-strong presidential race with over 60% of the votes.

But FDC refused to concede defeat, arguing that Museveni rigged their victory and the party's flag bearer, Col. Kizza Besigye has threatened to form a parallel government.

Another former presidential candidate who lost the election, Amama Mbabazi, went to court to challenge Museveni's electdion victory, but nine justices of the Supreme Court dismissed the election petition for lack of evidence.

The Supreme Court said that its ruling validated Museveni's victory.

At Kololo, where thousands showed up to celebrate NRM's victory, Museveni said FDC's claims are laughable because NRM could not have rigged elections at all levels including in parliamentary and local council elections.

The statistics for the 2016 general elections that the ruling party's secretary general, Kasule Lumumba presented at the ceremony showed the party thumped opposition at all levels.

The results included elections for the 112 offices of LC5 chairpersons where NRM got 84 seats while FDC, UPC and DP got five, four and two slots, respectively.

 Security was so tight that this suspected pick-pocketer did not have it his way . . .