Court of Appeal throws out case challenging MP Abdu Katuntu’s election

The Court of Appeal in Kampala has thrown out a case challenging the election of Abdu Katuntu as the Bugweri County MP.

Having polled 17,813 votes against Julius Galisonga’s  9,074 votes, Katuntu was declared the winner of the January 14 election for Bugweri County MP seat.

However, dissatisfied with the outcome, Galisonga challenged the results in the High Court but the case was dismissed for lack of evidence.

Consequently, Galisonga continued to the Court of Appeal to challenge the lower court’s decision.

On Thursday, three justices of the Court of Appeal including Cheborion Barishaki, Hellen Obura and Christopher Madrama ruled that Katuntu is the validly elected MP for Bugweri County.

The judges ruled that there is no proper evidence to prove electoral malpractices done by Katuntu as had been alleged by Galisonga in his petition.

“The assertion by the petitioner in the affidavit in rejoinder in paragraphs (a-f) was not enough because the petitioner should have adduced cogent evidence to prove that the alleged interference of his electioneering activities by the lst respondent prevented his election as a candidate,”the judges said.

According to the judges, whereas in his petition he indicated that Katuntu personally supervised the beating of Galisonga, this was not further proved by evidence of a third party.

“This was a serious statement that court must treat with caution and ought to have been witnessed by other persons' We have looked at the viva voce evidence of PW 1 Obbo Peter', PW3 Kimera Salifu and PW2 KisubiBumali and none of them testified to these serious allegations. There is no independent evidence to prove that the first   respondent(Katuntu) organized his supporters and led them to beat the appellant in his presence.”

“ In our view' due to the heat up of elections, this was a political statement which court must take with precaution since the appellant did not lead independent evidence to prove the allegations.”

According to the justices of the Court of Appeal, the law is that electoral offences and irregularities must be proved on a balance of probabilities to the satisfaction of court, but noted this was not the case which Galisonga’s petition against Katuntu.

In his petition, Galisonga stated that there was violence and interference with his supporters specifically  at Idudi and  Namalundu and  that these irregularities affected the results in a substantial manner.

However, the judges noted there is no evidence to prove the allegation by Galisonga.

“The outcome of an election is the choice of a candidate as a Member of Parliament because under section I (l) of the Parliamentary Elections Act' the term "election' means the election of a Member of Parliament. It therefore has to be shown that the non -compliance either substantially increased votes in favour of the declared winner or substantially decreased votes of the runner up candidate who lost to the winner. This is a question of evidence and not conjecture,” the judges said, adding this was not the case with the instant case.

“In the result, this petition substantially fails on grounds 7' 2' 3' 6' 7 and 8' and partly succeeds on grounds  4 and  5 and succeeds on ground 9'. The election of Abdu Katuntu as Member of Parliament of Bugweri District is hereby upheld. Consequently, we now make the following orders that the appeal substantially fails and is hereby dismissed.”

The three justices however directed that each party bears their own cost.