Court confirms NRM's "Panadol" as Iganga Municipality MP

The Court of Appeal in Kampala has confirmed NRM's Peter Mugema also known as Panadol as the duly elected Member of Parliament for Iganga Municipality constituency.

In the 2016 general elections, Mugema was declared winner prompting the FDC candidate to petition against the election in the Jinja High Court which later overturned the results and declared Abed Nasser Mudyobole the duly elected MP for Iganga Municipality.

Mugema would later appeal against the lower court's decision.

On Thursday, the Court of Appeal panel of three judges including the former Deputy chief justice Steven Kavuma,Cheborion Barisaki and Catherine Bamugemereire in a ruling read by the Deputy registrar Esther Nambayo said it was wrong for the lower court to overturn the election of Mugema.

"There was no evidence of relationship between Yasin Ngobi and the appellant(Mugema) who was found bribing voters,"the panel of judges ruled.

In its ruling,the Jinja High Court accused Mugema of bribing voters through Ngobi,the area NRM chairman but the Court of Appeal in Kampala aaid this was only rumours that could not be relied on by court.

"We have not found evidence to prove that despite being a party chairman,he was bound to be working for the appellant."

In his evidence,Mudyobole accused Mugema through one Waibi of having given shs300,000 as donation to a church and the Jinja High Court said this was a form of bribery.

However,in its ruling,the Court of Appeal said there was no evidence that Waibi who had not supported Mugema in the party primaries was now working for him.

"We find no evidence that Waibi was an agent and acted on instructions of the appellant and recieved shs300,00 to be offered in church."

There court declared that Mugema was the duly elected MP for Iganga Municipality.

"We order that there was no justification for declaring Mudyobole as the Member of Parliament for Iganga Municipality."

The court ordered Mudyobole to pay costs incurred by Mugema in the case.