NRM wants DP’s Njoki thrown out of Busia LC V race over change of name

The ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) has written to the Electoral Commission requesting to have DP and opposition joint candidate in the Busa district LC 5 polls Deogratious Njoki Hasubi disqualified from the race.

In a letter by the party’s director in charge of legal services, Oscar John Kihika, NRM alleges that the academic documents submitted by Njoki to the commission have different names from the ones on his national ID.

The ruling party says that at the time of nomination, Njoki’s academic documents bore Hasubi Deogratias Njoki while the National ID bears the name Hasubi Deogratias which is a contradiction.

“These are two different persons under the 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,” says the letter by Kihika on behalf of the NRM legal department.

“It is the role of the Electoral Commission to compile, maintain, revise and update the voter register and is on record that there is no person registered as Hasubi Deogratias  Njoki in the register for Busia District and as such making the nomination of Hasubi Deogratias Njoki is void.”

The National Resistance Movement legal department says Njoki ought to be thrown out of the race because he is not a registered voter in the area.

However, in a letter by the National Identification and Registration Authority (NIRA) to the Electoral Commission dated August, 3, the body clears Njoki of any wrongdoing saying he changed the names and it was captured in their register.

NRM's letter

“This is to confirm that Hasubi Deogratias Njoki changed particulars on the national identity card from Hasubi Deogratias to Hasubi Deogratias Njoki with the National Identification and Registration Authority (NIRA) and his data appears in the national identification register,” says the letter Edwin Tukamuhebwa, the NIRA director in charge of registration and operations.

Njoki’s name came to the limelight a few weeks ago when he wrote to the DP Secretary General informing him that he was pulling out of the Busia LC5 chairman race after being given a government job but he would later change mind to stay in the race.

The Busia LC5 position fell vacant in May after the Court of Appeal in Mbale threw out Ouma Adea for being   convicted of corruption in 2013. The by-elections shall be held on November 28.

Past incidents

Last year, the Court of Appeal threw  Nansana Municipality MP  Wakayima Musoke Nsereko out of Parliament for being nominated in error.

The court ruled that Wakayima had been nominated in error because the names on the National ID were not similar to the ones in the national voters’ register.

“Mr Wakayima was nominated in error as his name is not registered in the constituency’s voter register, it was the name of Musoke Hannington Nsereko which validly appears on the National Identification card. I find that the purported change of names is null and void,” the ruling delivered in September 2017 read in part.

In June, the Electoral Commission disqualified FDC’s Achola Catherine Osupelem from the Pallisa District Woman MP race because the names she had presented during nominations were not matching with those on her academic documents.

 

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