NRM has already won the 2011 election rigging contest
By Abbey K. Semuwemba
17th January 2011
So the NRM is up to its old tricks once again. In the face of near-certain defeat in the parliamentary race in some regions like Mbale and Western Uganda, they have reportedly managed to convince or rather bribe some FDC candidates to drop out of the race. It is sad for democracy in Uganda.
Most Ugandans I have spoken are resigned to the fact that these elections are already a sham because they won’t produce a proper outcome. The NRM prefers to compete with itself and I think that is not the ideal situation in a democracy.
These bribery allegations portray the ruling NRM as a party that fears free and fair elections. Certainly a competitive election is more desirable than a non-competitive one but the NRM has ensured that Ugandans don’t get this feeling as long as they are still in power and supported by the State apparatus.
I know FDC has gone into a debate with the Electoral Commission over the legality of the withdrawal its candidate. But my understanding is that the law, as it stands today, favours the NRM’s bribery because a candidate who has dropped out for whatever reason cannot be replaced after the nomination deadline has passed.
Since our parliament is very good at passing emergency bills during elections like the controversial traditional leaders’ bill that president wants passed before the end of the elections, they should in the same spirit find a way of legislating against this bad spirited move by the NRM that involves threatening and bribing opposition candidates to withdraw from parliamentary contests.
The electoral law should be amended so that a withdrawal is only acceptable in case of death or incapacitation of the candidate through grave injury or the death of a parent, spouse, child, or some other traumatic personal event.
Either way, I can see FDC ending up with the short end of the stick because the Electoral Commission seems to unanimously agree that these under-hand tactics by NRM must pass as legal and political mastery; never mind the immorality involved in it.
The only candidate who has so far managed to resist their bribery tactics is Mr. Francis Atugonza who was allegedly offered Shs1.5billion to abandon FDC and join Museveni’s NRM. Atugonza is a rare bird because I cannot see many people in Museveni’s Uganda turning down that kind of money in the name of democracy. I bet there are even some in the opposition who are wondering whether Atugonza is really sane.
By the way, these cunning political tricks have happened elsewhere in the world before.
For example, in the USA’s 2005 West Virginia elections, Thomas Esposito withdrew from the race citing the ill-health of his mother-in law but the real reasons surfaced later and they showed that his candidature had been planted by the FBI to help find evidence of vote-buying in Southern West Virginia.
In the 2004 Afghan presidential elections, The Los Angeles Times reported that some presidential candidates in the race against Karzai were requested by the then US Ambassador to withdraw from the race with alleged promises of cabinet positions for them.
For these reasons, I blame our Legislators and the opposition MPs in particular for having failed to see it coming and devise ways of blocking it before the elections. That said, I think the real questions we should ask ourselves these:
How did we get to this level of political immorality? How and why did we allow the NRM to become a party of crafty politicians who are ready to pervert our democratic process and get away with it? How do they manage to use tax payers’ money to do anything they want as if they own everybody in Uganda?
How did we allow them to develop such deadly bribery tactics which should have been despised by every sane voter in Uganda? The sad note here is that the NRM has already beaten the opposition in the rigging game.
We should therefore expect more withdrawals from the opposition before the end of these elections. Please log into www.ugandacorrespondent.com every Monday to read our top stories and anytime mid-week for our news updates.
The writer is Ugandan living in the United Kingdom
