{UAH} Allan/Pojim/WBK: Museveni’s toughest election moments
|
4:13 AM |
No comments |
Museveni's toughest election moments
President Yoweri Museveni won the Feb.18 elections but he is still bristling with campaign trail frustration. The President, who won with 61% of the vote, has said publically that international election observers, who announced that he did not win fairly, are "unserious" and their criticism of the Electoral Commission is "rubbish".
Museveni's defiant post-election speeches are a departure from the celebratory tone he has adopted after winning previous elections.
Speaking just days after whipping the opposition, he spoke as if his tussle with them has just started.
"The opposition will be wiped out politically," he told journalists, "I will wipe them out because they are liars and they have been taking advantage of our internal weaknesses."
On the continuing government security clampdown, including the shutting down of social media platforms like WhatsApp, Twitter, and Facebook, the President was equally combative. He told critics that that was just a sample.
"The government can do more," he said adding that his government would use "soft and hard means, non-lethal but tough methods" to deal with opposition politicians.
Museveni has also said he does not need lectures on how to organise elections. But he possibly does because the election appears not to have gone according to plan.
In December 2015, the President told journalists that a poll by Daily Monitor newspaper which showed that he would have got 60% of the vote if the election had been conducted then did not reflect the reality on the ground.
"The NRM will get 80%," he announced.
Following the announcement that he had, in fact, got 60%, the President is raging. The result is among Museveni's worst performance, comparable to 2006 when he managed only 59%. In fact, Museveni has forgotten the 80%. He says he should at least have got 66% if the EC had tallied his votes correctly.
Museveni's frustration is perhaps because he expected voters to reward him for what he considers the superb performance of his government in provision of good roads, electricity and developmental programmes. He also invested a lot financially in the election. According to one survey of 16 districts by the Alliance for Campaign Finance Monitoring (ACFIM), he was spending an average of Shs840 million per month. The next high spender, Amama Mbabazi was spending just Shs40 million and his main challenger, Kizza Besigye Shs30 million.
Throughout the campaigns, there were telltale signs of Museveni struggling. Even when he outspent his opponents and bussed in supporters, he often ended up with smaller crowds than Besigye's at rallies.
Even NRM insiders admit that the party nearly lost this election. The ruling party lost a number of MPs, who included some 17 ministers. The opposition also lost a number of parliamentary seats in what is being described as "incumbency fatigue". Ranking opposition losers include FDC party stalwarts Jack Sabiiti, Alice Alaso, Wafula Oguttu, Odo Tayebwa, and Francis Epatit.
Besigye, who describes it as the most fraudulent electoral process in Uganda, has rejected the results and is calling on the international community to isolate Museveni.
Creeping military coup
Questions are being raised because, quite clearly, Besigye seemed to have more support this time than even in 2006 when he seemed unstoppable. Yet the EC says he got a smaller percentage of votes this time.
"This has not been an electoral process," Besigye wrote in a statement released on Feb. 20, the day the results were announced, "This is a creeping military coup."
It could have been worse
When he finally settles down, therefore, Museveni might possibly instead want to look on the bright side of the bad election. He might see that it could have been worse, for example, had some people on his team not done some great work. Among them is his wife, Janet Museveni.
Many Ugandan will recall Janet's rallying cry for support at many of Museveni's rallies.
"NRM oyee," she would shout into the microphone, the sharp high pitch in her voice amplified by the public address system and the crowd would roar back. Then she would throw in the zinger.
"Those who will give the old man your vote again raise your hands," she would say. And a sea of raised yellow campaign fliers would fill the grounds.
"Thank you," she would end.
But away from the stump, Janet was apparently doing even more work. If any one region can be said to have handed Museveni his 2016 win, it would have to be Karamoja where she is the minister in charge. This sparsely populated area of five districts and 209,652 voters gave Museveni his highest scores in the election, beating even his home district of Kiruhura.
Museveni got 91.3% of the vote in Kiruhura but 94% in Nakapipirit, 91.3% in Kotido, and 90% in Kabong. Even Abim, which had been in the news for having the worst hospital in Uganda, according to opposition candidate Kizza Besigye, voted 80% for Museveni and Moroto 89.3%.
However, Museveni's biggest win in the election came from neighboring Amudat. He got 97.4%. Napak, which completes the picture, gave him 94%.
Together these seven districts gave Museveni slightly over 200,000 votes – exactly the tiny surge of support he got compared to his tally in the last elections in 2011.
Museveni got 5.6 million votes compared to the 5.4 million he won in 2011. That is a 3.8 rise, despite an 18% jump in votes cast. The 14% jump went to his challengers, especially Besigye who this time won 3.2 million votes compared to 2 million votes in 2011.
Besigye grew his vote tally by 1.2 million votes almost equal to all new voters. In 2011, 14 million registered voters of whom 8.2 million voted. This time, there were 15.2 million registered voters and 9.7 million voted. Museveni's percentage fell by 8 percentage points compared to that in the 2011 elections while Besigye's went up 9 percentage points, according to the EC tally at the point of announcing Museveni the winner. At that point, indications were that Museveni's percentage would continue downwards and Besigye's up.
Previously thought to be a three-horse race, the election zeroed down to two strong candidates—Museveni and Besigye.
Former Prime Minister, Amama Mbabazi, previously expected to be Museveni's biggest challenger came in third with only 1.4 percent of the vote. All the other six led by Abed Bwanika followed by Venansius Baryamureeba, Maureen Kyalya, Benon Biraaro and Joseph Mabirizi got under one percent.
Part of the reason is that the EC delayed in declaring results of 1,787 polling stations across 49 districts. Observers noted that the heavily affected districts fall in alleged Besigye strongholds.
At the point, Makerere University don of history, Ndebesa Mwambutsya says failure to declare results from these polling stations makes the EC declared results misleading. He said declaring the full results could "change the percentages significantly".
But EC Vice Chairman, Joseph Biribonwa said the EC was keen not to breach the constitutional requirement to announce results within 48 hours after the polls close, and was guided by the principle of the winning candidate getting 50+1%. According to him, the EC calculated that even if there had been 100 percent turn up at the undeclared polling stations and all voters had voted Besigye, Museveni would still have remained the winner.
Among the undeclared districts was Besigye's home district of Rukungiri, where only votes from 3 out of 273 polling stations were declared at the time Museveni was announced winner with 60%. Rukungiri had 162,019 registered voters. Besigye was leading with 62.4% of declared results but his percentage could end up higher.
Besigye also beat Museveni in Kampala and Wakiso, where results from some 281 polling stations were not declared. Combined, the two districts alone have 1,914,329 registered voters.
Even in districts where Museveni won like Jinja, only results from 11 out of 399 polling stations were declared. Jinja has 233,848 registered voters, only 3842 votes were counted giving Museveni a 62.4 percent victory against Besigye's 35.6 percent. Across the country, Besigye has increased the number of districts in which he won to 14 from 5 in 2011. In central, Besigye won the three districts of Kampala, Wakiso and Masaka, in the east, five districts of Mbale, Soroti, Tororo, Sironko and Ngora, in the north, four districts of Amuru, Lira, Gulu and Pader and in the West, two districts of Kasese and Rukungiri.
However, a critical look at the 49 districts where the EC did not declare all the results shows that Besigye may have won in many more districts especially in the east.
Besigye, who describes it as the most fraudulent electoral process in Uganda, has rejected the results and is calling on the international community to isolate Museveni.
Besigye views of the election have also been cited by international election observers from the European Union, the African Union, and the Electoral Institute for Sustainable Democracy in Africa, and others. Many of them pronounced the election to have fallen below democratic standards. They point at the lack of independence, technical incompetence, and partisanship of the electoral body. Glaring failures include very late delivery of voting material to polling stations. If viewed as deliberate, the delays are the clearest evidence of involvement in rigging by the Electoral Commission.
Observers, including those of the EU who arrived early, noted that partisan security forces allied to Museveni did not allow the opposition to campaign freely. In many areas, opposition supporters faced verbal threats, intimidation, and physical harassment. Opposition supporters were scattered by teargas and bullets fired by a partisan police. Some people were killed. On Election Day, the sight of columns of partisan police scared many from voting.
The EU has been uncharacteristically forceful in its criticism saying the vote was marred by avoidable and logistical failures, which led to an unacceptable number of Ugandan citizens being disenfranchised.
U.S. Secretary of State, John Kerry, rang President Museveni expressing concerns. Following that call, the U.S. commenting on elections said Ugandans deserved better and called for the release of Besigye.
Other observers say many voters paid attention to warnings that only a Museveni win would guarantee their safety. On the other hand, the opposition, kept warning voters to guard their vote against theft and be ready to defend it. Fear of post-election violence was a major factor in the election.
As the Electoral Commission started announcing results on Feb. 19, police stormed FDC headquarters, sprayed it with teargas using canisters and a chopper and arrested the party President, Gen. Mugisha Muntu, its Chief Mobiliser, Ingrid Turinawe, and Besigye himself. The trio was detained without charges at Naggalama Police Station. While Muntu and Besigye were released, Turinawe was detained overnight.
It was the second time in two days Besigye was getting arrested. He was first arrested on polling day in Naguru as he and a group of opposition activists stormed what they claimed was a vote rigging facility.
Besigye was able to grow his support base because across the country, over 45 percent of voters told pollsters they wanted change. Most importantly, a critical mass of those who wanted change voted in urban and semi-urban areas, which also have the biggest populations.
For instance, Wakiso and Kampala, which have the biggest populations in Uganda all voted Besigye in big numbers. The two have a combined voting population of over 1.9 million and voted Besigye with 59 and 65 percent respectively. In the east and north, where Besigye also made major inroads, factors that favored Museveni in 2011 like having ended the insurgency did not count much this time around.
In 2011, Museveni was able to beat Besigye because he won in all the other districts except the three that DP candidate Norbert Mao won in northern Uganda and the five that Besigye won; that is Kampala and Wakiso in central Uganda and Serere, Soroti and Kaberamaido in eastern Uganda.
Apart from Kampala and Wakiso, Museveni won in all the other regions—Eastern, Northern, Northeastern, Southern and West Nile. This was a big gain for Museveni compared to 2006, when he lost the entire North, West Nile, parts of Eastern and parts of Western Uganda. In the 2006 election, Museveni got 4.0 million voters or 59 percent of the vote, against Besigye's 2.5 million or 37.5 percent total votes were 8.2 million. At the time, the north was still suffering the insecurity caused by the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) and Eastern Uganda, insecurity from both the rebels and Karamoja armed cattle rustlers. Majority of the people were still in the war camps facing terrible living conditions.
After that election, Museveni's government embarked on pacifying the north and disarming Karamoja cattle rustlers. With LRA wiped out of the north and government implementing resettling programmes and rehabilitation programmes, Museveni courted the north and his wife Janet Museveni, who was appointed Minister for Karamoja, also helped court Karamoja.
Museveni earned the dividend of these investments in the 2011 elections. He threatened to win the entire north had it not been for the participation of two sons of the soil, Mao and UPC's Olara Otunnu.
However, in the recent election, the ground seems to have significantly changed under Museveni's feet. Although over all, Museveni still won all the regions apart from Kampala and Wakiso according to declared data, a critical look at the data shows that Besigye significantly reduced his numbers.
President Museveni, talking to journalists on Feb.21 at his home country, said the ruling party lost Kampala because of the way Jennifer Musisi, the Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) displaced street vendors and other small business people in her efforts to fix the city.
Apart from the vendors, KCCA developments have also affected boda boda cyclists and taxi operators, groups that President Museveni had managed to court with lots of cash in 2011.
But Museveni does not mention that Kampala is the stronghold of Erias Lukwago, who won elections, became mayor was forced out by Museveni's government only to be reinstated by the courts. President Museveni through his Minister of Presidency, Frank Tumwebaze still blocked him to the chagrin of multitudes of supporters who voted him resoundingly in 2011.
In the north, where Besigye claimed all the three districts previously won by Mao plus one other district, President Museveni might have ended the insurgency and established peace but major issues of contention remain. In Amuru, for instance, efforts to give land to Madhvani to erect a sugar factory resulted into some of the worst protests with old women stripping before ministers as a superstitious way of reportedly cursing them.
Indeed, land grabbing was a major concern throughout the north and the east, where investors have forcefully acquired large tracts of land with the collusion of the government. Besigye also made major in-roads in the east by promising to end poverty in the region. Eastern Uganda is the epicenter of poverty in Uganda.
Apart from these issues, as the ruling party concentrated on neutralising Mbabazi whom they considered the biggest threat, Besigye built momentum and attracted mammoth crowds throughout Kampala, Wakiso, eastern and northern Uganda. That seems to have had a ripple effect on western Uganda with many people turning up at Besigye rallies and giving him gifts.
Most of Besigye voters were urban and semi-urban dwellers, the EC data shows. These also happen to be the areas where a bigger percentage of people told pollsters before the election that they wanted change and would vote against Museveni. In rural areas, fewer areas wanted change and many said they would vote Museveni.
In an opinion poll by pollster Research World International (RWI) conducted between December 19, 2015 and Jan.10, overall, 46% of respondents said they wanted change.
In Kampala, 63 per cent said they wanted change and 65.7 per cent voted Besigye. 60 percent of urban dwellers also said they wanted change and Besigye has won several major cities and polled between 30% and 45% of the vote in several others. Museveni won majority of rural areas, where only 39 percent said they wanted change. Part of the explanation of Besigye's victory in urban areas is the youth factor. Uganda has the second youngest population in the world, with 78 percent under the age of 30. The youth constitute at least 6.4 million voters. Most of these are urban dwellers. Up to 52% of the youth aged between 18and 44 wanted change of the president.
Most of these were born during Museveni's government and only hear about the horrors of the previous regimes. Therefore, the notion of peace and stability is not enough to decide their vote.
The youth also happen to be the most unemployed. About 83 percent of young people are reported to be unemployed. According to RWI's poll, 46 percent of the people said corruption was the biggest problem followed by unemployment at 45 percent.
Museveni's poor performance in the recent elections and his vow to scuttle further the opposition are the latest portends that the 71-year old man with a hat who has ruled Uganda for 30 years is not about to bow out. The constitution places a 75-year age bar on presidential aspirants and Museveni would be ineligible when his newly won term ends in 2021. But he has fiddled with the constitution in the past and is expected to do so as the earliest order of business for the new incoming parliament. The only question is whether Besigye, who will be 65 years old in 2021 and could be buoyed by the strong out pouring of support this time, will also run. If he does, it will be the fifth time the two are dueling for the top job in the land – and not many Ugandans are looking forward to that.
Comments
(3)
Write comment
0 comments:
Post a Comment