The vice president of the Democratic Party (DP), Mukasa Mbidde has revealed his reasons for not campaigning for the party's candidate, Henry Kasacca, in the recent Kawempe North MP by-election.
Kasacca was one of ten candidates that vied to fill the seat left vacant by Muhammad Ssegirinya.
The DP candidate received only 100 votes in the election held on March 13, which was won by Elias Nalukoola of the National Unity Platform (NUP).
It is worth noting that Mbidde did not participate in any campaign efforts for Kasacca leading up to the election.
In a recent radio interview, Mbidde clarified his choice not to support the DP candidate, stating that he actually backed Nalukoola instead.
"I don’t know how to lie. As I mentioned on social media, Nalukoola, who is both a fellow lawyer and my friend, was the candidate I chose to support," Mbidde said.
The former East African Legislative Assembly (EALA) representative for Uganda further elaborated that his decision was influenced by the party's stance against presenting a single opposition candidate for the election.
"I urged my party to nominate one candidate to represent the opposition, but when the majority disagreed, I chose to step back. I didn’t want to create division among them. I am always straightforward and not opportunistic," Mbidde explained.
The election, held last week, resulted in a victory for NUP's Nalukoola, who garnered 17,764 votes, defeating his nearest rival, Faridah Nambi of the National Resistance Movement (NRM), who received 8,593 votes.
In response to the ruling party's rejection of the election results, citing issues like vote stuffing and their intention to contest the outcome in court, Mbidde was asked whether this would affect Nalukoola's swearing-in.
He expressed confidence that it would not, stating, "He will be sworn in this coming week. There are certain things that are impossible unless there are no elections. If you prevent Nalukoola from being sworn in, it would lead us to a state of ungovernability, which is unacceptable because he won, was declared the winner, and will be sworn in."