The team of lawyers representing former Presidential candidate, Amama Mbabazi in his petition seeking to nullify the victory of President Yoweri Museveni have finished their final day of submission pinching the Electoral Commission over inconsistencies between declaration forms and tally sheet results presented before the Supreme Court.
Mbabazi team lead lawyer Mohmed Mbabazi told Court on this afternoon that the process of tallying at the national tally centre in Namboole lacked transparency and was shrouded in secrecy with contradictions in proceedings from districts like Kabale, Kampala, Jinja and Wakiso.
He accused EC of abusing the voters’ rights, “voters take time to vote and if their votes are not tallied, then their rights are abused.” he adds that, “Results declared were a selection of the EC and not the will of the people.”
“Your lordships, the inconsistencies between DR forms and tally sheet results were throughout the country,” Mbabazi submitted to the presidential election petition hearing. Kabale tally sheets from polling stations like Kagoogo, Bunyaami, Bigaaga and Butenda show that all candidates had zero but declaration forms at the Electoral Commission had figures entered,” he continued.
“When they entered results at the district (Kabale), tally sheet show that candidate Kizza Besigye had no single vote from a particular polling station in Butenda yet on the declaration form he had 176 votes recorded just like candidate Yoweri Museveni had 390 votes with none on the tally sheets” he said
Adding “Basically information on the tally sheets clearly show how the will of the people was averted because results were not announced at the polling stations because police and army took the materials away”.
He criticized the EC for working without any law in electronically transferring results to the national tally centre at Namboole adding that all was done to keep the results a secret, “In Kabale, Affidavit of Hope Mwesigye talks of deployment of police and army prior to voting day and Returning Officer was driven away to Kampala before claiming that he had carried a computer server from Kabale to Kampala yet also claimed he transmitted results from Kabale.
“If the Biometric machines were brought we would have proved that it takes two minutes to verify each voter. The valid votes which were cast remained at the districts and what came to Kampala was a selection of Electoral Commission,’ Mbabazi argued.
Mbabazi allegies that the results on the DR forms don’t match with those on tally sheets as claimed by EC. He pointed out incidences in Kabale, Jinja and Wakiso where tally sheets have 00 on data entry (results were not announced at the polling stations.However on the DR forms provided to court by EC, those same polling stations have figures other than 00. Who then tallied them?
“We would like to present incidences where in some polling stations, 100 per cent of registered voters showed up and voted 100 per cent, should we assume that no one falls sick or dies in such areas?,” Counsel Severino Twinobusingye one of the Mbabazi lawyers presented.
The poll petition resumes on Monday, March 21, as required by law when the bench of nine Supreme Court judges led by the Chief Justice Bart Katureebe will give their decision.
