Ugandan opposition leader Bobby Wine on Monday filed a legal challenge in the country’s Supreme Court against President Yoweri Museveni’s victory in last month’s presidential election, claiming the poll was manipulated, reported Africa News.
Museveni, who has led Uganda since 1986, was declared the winner of the January 14 election with 59 percent of the vote. Wine, whose real name is Robert Kyagulanyi, was declared the runner up with 35 percent of the vote. He slammed the vote as a sham.
Wine has accused Museveni of staging a coup in the election and has previously urged his supporters to protest the election result through non-violent means. He was held under effective house arrest from polling day until court-ordered security forces end his detention last week.
Under the Ugandan constitution, Wine had 15 days from the declaration of results by the electoral commission to challenge the outcome. The Supreme Court must now rule on the petition within 45 days.
Notably, Museveni, who is one of Africa’s longest-serving rulers, has won every election since 1996, almost all marred by allegations of irregularities.
“Any election Museveni participates in can never be a peaceful election, can never be a free and fair election,” Medard Sseggona, one of Wine’s lawyers, said.
Sseggona claimed that security forces invaded polling stations and stuffed ballot boxes with pre-ticket votes. He added that electoral registers were tampered with at other locations.
“Museveni cannot be left to cheat and steal scot-free,” Wine’s lawyer said.
The incumbent president, however, declared the election the cleanest in Uganda’s post-independence history.
The run-up to the vote was marred by violence and a sustained crackdown on government critics and Museveni’s rivals.
Human Rights Watch said the lead-up to the elections was characterized by widespread violence and human rights abuses. The Ugandan government had shut down the internet across the country shortly before voting started. It has since returned, though access to social media is blocked.
