Heavy deployment at Nyabushozi tally center

Kiruhura, Uganda |  THE INDEPENDENT |  There is heavy deployment of the army and police at the tally center in Nyabushozi County, Kiruhura District following the fresh primary elections held on Thursday.  

Tension has been high in Nyabushozi county since the September 4 primaries where the District Registrar, David Agom Andiinda declared Col. Fred Mwesigye as the duly elected candidate after polling 36,147 votes followed by his rival, Wilson Kajwengye with 13,248 votes and Christopher Bakashaba with 5,601 votes.

Kajwengye disputed the poll results and petitioned the NRM Electoral Commission and party leadership citing voter bribery, intimidation and a host of irregularities.  This prompted President, Yoweri Museveni to set up a team to investigate the complaints in his capacity as NRM party National Party Chairperson.

Following the findings of the investigations, Museveni directed the NRM Electoral Commission Chairperson. Dr Tanga Odoi to conduct fresh polls. Kajwengye pulled out of the fresh polls a day to the voting prompting Odoi to declare Col. Mwesigye NRM party candidate.

However, in a twist of events, NRM has withdrawn the flag from Mwesigye and decided to conduct fresh elections.

The tally center has been shifted from the NRM offices that are located in the centre of Rushere town to the district headquarters 10 kilometres away. 

According to a police officer who preferred anonymity, the deployment is meant to deter any chaos that may arise.

“People here are grieved, it has been four times this voting has been postponed so we suspect chaos might erupt we have to be prepared”. he said.

During the voting, two soldiers were deployed at every polling station across the county.

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