DP goes to court over EC's cancellation of Njoki nomination

The Electoral Commission on Friday cancelled the nomination of both the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) and the Democratic Party (DP) candidates for Busia LC5 race.
The EC chairman, Justice Simon Byabakama in two different statements said the nomination of Mr Paul Boniface Oguttu as a candidate for the District chairperson, Busia District had been cancelled on grounds that the names in the nomination papers he presented during nomination do not match the names on the requisite academic documents accompanying his nomination papers.

This followed a complaint filed by DP challenging Mr Oguttu’s nomination.
In a related development, Justice Byabakama said the DP candidate, Deogratius Hasubi Njoki was not a registered voter under the national voters register and thus overturned the returning officer's decision to have him nominated for the Busia District Chairperson elective position.
The cancellation of Njoki’s nomination follows a petition from the NRM alleging that the nomination of Mr Njoki who is also the joint opposition candidate, was illegal.

In the petition, the NRM legal team argued that Mr Njoki’s National ID and academic documents belonged to two different persons
“The academic documents he filed with the commission at the time of nomination bear names of Hasubi Deogratias Njoki while the National ID and voter’s names read Hasubi Deogratias. These are two different persons under law and there was no legal document that was filed with the commission at least at the time of nomination to show that the two said persons are one and the same,” the NRM petition reads in part.
Consequently, in a letter dated November 23 to Mr Njoki through Busia District returning officer, Justice Byabakama stated that: “The person nominated under the names Hasubi Deogratias is not a registered voter under the national voters register and thus overturned the Returning officer's decision to have you nominated," the two page letter reads in part.

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However, DP administrator Mr Peter Ssempijja said after receiving the news, the party executive convened a hasty meeting to discuss the next course of action.
"But certainly as a party ruled under principals of law, we will file a court case on Monday to overturn the latest decision," Mr Ssempijja said on telephone.

Mr Njoki said this did not come to him as a surprise and that they had been waiting for any decision from EC but said they are not resting.
“We are consulting our lawyers to come up with the next step. This can't be my problem because if the mistake was reported in 2014 and written to EC in 2017, I don’t know how late this can be,” Mr Njoki said. .
DP secretary general Gerald Siranda said the party was reviewing the EC decision and would file an appeal.
"But primarily we will file an injunction on Monday at Mbale High Court. They chose to take a decision late Friday when you cannot run to any court. They think by the time of the injunction the voters will already be confused," Mr Siranda said.

The NRM spokesperson, Mr Rogers Mulindwa said that they had received the news of the cancellation of Mr Oguttu’s nomination.
“At a moment, we are yet to receive the legal interpretation of the ruling from our legal team and thereafter the Secretary General will brief the Central Executive Committee (CEC) on the same. We shall get back to the public with the official position after the guidance from the CEC,” Mr Mulindwa said.

On Tuesday, NRM petitioned EC indicating that the academic documents and the National ID of Mr Njoki had two different names and therefore asked the commission to cancel his nomination.
A day later, DP also logged in a complaint about the nominated names of Mr Oguttu and the academic documents he forwarded for the same. They claimed the two did not match and asked that the nomination be cancelled.
The commission sat in a two day hearing from which they resolved to throw out the two candidates.

This leaves the race with three independent candidates; Mr Chrispus Bwire, Mr Tony Ojambo and Mr Geoffrey Wandera.
The 16 sub-counties of Busia District will, on Sunday November 28, cast their vote for the LC5 chairperson at the 234 polling stations amidst a changing political face.
The three candidates will battle to share votes of about 52, 000 registered electorates out of the total population of 350,400 people in the district.