Section after section of the 60page judgment ended with pointing to the lack of evidence to support Amama Mbabazi’s prayer to court to cancel the results of the February 18th presidential election which the opposition say was full of maltipractices. In upholding Museveni’s re-election victory, the panel of nine supreme court judges unanimously ruled that the petitioner lacked strong evidence and that the defense team was more believable in rebutting allegations of electoral malpractices.
It was the first ever unanimous verdict in Ugandan presidential election petition. Judgments for 2001 and 2006 petitions filed by Dr.Kizza Besiugye,at least three judges dissented. On march 1st Mbabazi,a second runner-up in the February 18th presidential election, petitioned the supreme court, disputing the electoral commission’s February 20th declaration of president Museveni as winner with 5,617,503(60.75 percent) Dr.Besigye came second with 3,270,290 votes (35.37percent) and Amama Mbabazi 132,574votes (1.43percent).
The nine judges agreed there was some non-compliance with the electoral laws committed particularly by the electoral commission, but they had no evidence that that flaw affected the final results in a substantial manner. Court should not rush to tamper with the results that reflected the free will of the majority. They ruled, adding that Museveni was validly elected as president of Uganda and so the petition was dismissed with no costs.
‘’Since Ugandans voted there leaders and president. There were beliefs for worse and this has since scared many tourists to the country. But since this business is over and there has been no high political tensions the tourism sector of Uganda expects every thing in normal and that tourists to Uganda are now ready to revisit the country according to Sarah Nakiganda a reservations Manager at African adventure travellers.
Credit:Nicholas Ssewanyana.