In Soroti district, the Return Form for Transmission of Results Woman parliamentary elections had 2,618 votes above the presidential score of 64,937 valid votes while Serere district had 2,019 votes above the presidential tally of 75,276 valid votes cast for all the eleven candidates.
Woman parliamentary
candidates in Teso sub-region scored more votes compared to presidential
candidates in January 14th, 2021 polls. Woman candidates in Soroti
and Serere district had more than 2000 votes in excess compared to the total
votes cast for the presidential candidates on the same day.
In Soroti district, the Return Form for Transmission of
Results Woman parliamentary elections had 2,618 votes above the presidential
score of 64,937 valid votes while Serere district had 2,019 votes above the
presidential tally of 75,276 valid votes cast for all the eleven candidates.
Districts like Kumi, Katakwi and Amuria had more than 1,000
votes in excess for the Woman parliamentary polls while the rest had more than
500 votes in excess. In addition to the
excess votes for Woman parliamentary candidates, there were more invalid and
spoilt votes for presidential candidates.
In Serere, Presidential candidates had 3,896 invalid and 166
spoilt votes while Woman MPs had only 1,839 invalid and 72 spoilt votes. In
Kumi district, presidential candidates had 3,336 invalid votes but the Woman MP
had only 1,763 while in Kaberamaido district, the presidential tally sheet has 1,456
invalid votes while Woman MP had only 654 votes.
In most of the districts, invalid and spoilt votes for the
president doubled what Women MP candidates got. Except for Soroti City, the constituency
parliamentary polls also registered more invalid votes compared to the Woman
parliamentary candidates in all other districts of Teso sub-region.
Deo Natukunda, the Teso Sub Region Elections Officer, says that whereas it is a
new occurrence in his experience, voters have the liberty to vote a candidate
of their choice. He explains that the varying votes could mean that more voters
were interested in the parliamentary election compared to President and direct
constituency elections.
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Emmanuel Aminu, a Polling Assistant at Islamic Polling Station in Soroti City
East Division recalls having two voters who specifically demanded to vote for
the president and not MPs.
“When those people came, we insisted to give them ballot papers for the other
categories and during the counting of votes, we found some ballot papers
instead written, not ticked or thumped as required. That is what increased the
number if invalid votes”, he said.
However, in Katakwi district, both the Presidential and Parliamentary tally
sheets didn’t have invalid or spoilt votes. The invalid and spoilt votes were
only recorded in Local Government elections.
Charles Okure, a former candidate for the Ngariam County parliamentary seat
describes the January elections in Katakwi as a sham. He notes that besides
heavy security deployment that meddled in the process, results were tampered
with on their way to the tally center.
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But Martin Musoke, the Katakwi District Returning Officer, says that they had a
system break down that didn’t reflect invalid votes for the presidential and parliamentary
election result. He, however, says the system was rectified in the local
government elections.
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At least six people who lost in the parliamentary elections have expressed their
intentions to petition the outcome of the January polls in court.
