The High Court in Masaka has dismissed Rose Nalubowa’s petition challenging Justine Nameere’s election as Masaka City Woman Member of Parliament, ruling that irregularities in the vote recount were not proved to have substantially affected the outcome.
Justine Nameere’
Justice Bernard Namanya, in a judgment delivered electronically on October 21, ordered Nalubowa to pay the costs of the petition.
The judge found that the Electoral Commission failed to safeguard electoral materials and that the recount continued despite compromised ballot boxes.
However, he held that Nalubowa had not produced sufficient evidence to displace the certified results.
“Although she established that the recount proceedings conducted under the direction of the Chief Magistrate were not fully compliant with the electoral law, she did not prove that the result certified after the recount failed to reflect the democratic choice of the electorate,” Namanya ruled.
Nalubowa, the National Unity Platform candidate, was initially declared winner of the January 15 election with 25,443 votes against the National Resistance Movement’s Nameere, who received 20,324.
Nameere sought a recount, alleging that results from 11 polling stations had been omitted. The High Court found that the evidence established omissions at nine stations.
The recount, conducted from January 30 to February 1, reversed Nalubowa’s victory, giving Nameere 25,502 votes against her rival’s 23,176 — a margin of 2,326 votes.
Nalubowa challenged the exercise over missing ballots, unsecured boxes, alleged unlawful delegation of counting and the exclusion of nine polling stations.
She asked the court to overturn Nameere’s declaration and reinstate her as winner.
The court upheld important parts of her complaint concerning the integrity of election materials.
Certified recount proceedings recorded open or broken boxes, missing cast ballots despite evidence of used ballot booklets, and a box containing marked ballots for only Nameere.
Nine polling stations were excluded from the recount.
Namanya held that continuing the exercise after those discoveries breached electoral law.
“A recount is not a mechanical exercise in re-opening ballot boxes; it is a judicial process intended to verify, with greater security and reliability, the numerical will, expressed by the electorate,” he said.
The judge also found that Chief Magistrate Abert Asiimwe acted contrary to electoral law by declaring Nameere winner himself.
That responsibility belonged to the returning officer after receiving the recount certificate, the court held.
But those breaches did not automatically invalidate the election.
Nalubowa also had to demonstrate that they substantially affected the result.
The court said she had not supplied a polling-station-by-polling-station analysis demonstrating errors in the certified recount figures.
It also faulted her failure to produce the complete recount record or evidence of diligent but unsuccessful efforts to obtain the necessary documents.
On the excluded stations, the judge relied on certified tally sheets and declaration forms recording 743 votes for Nameere and 610 for Nalubowa — a combined 1,353 votes.
He held that those recorded votes, rather than the total number of registered voters at the affected stations, provided the appropriate basis for assessing the effect of their exclusion.
Even assigning all 1,353 votes to Nalubowa would leave her with 24,529 votes, still 973 behind Nameere, the court reasoned.
“The declaration of the 1st respondent, Nameere Justine, as the winner of the election therefore stands,” Namanya ruled.
The judge rejected Nalubowa’s separate arguments that the recount fell outside the statutory period and proceeded without judicial supervision.
He found that the recount was appointed within time and that allegations of unauthorised counting had not been proved.
Responding to the judgment, Nameere celebrated the outcome in a statement attributing her victory to her faith.
“I thank the Almighty God for the peace and strength He has given me throughout this entire period,” she said.
She also thanked President Yoweri Museveni and Gen. Muhoozi Kainerugaba for their support, while alleging that political rivals had conspired against her.