You Can’t Claim A Party You Lawfully Handed Over To Bobi Wine- Electoral Commission Dismisses NUP’s Kibalama New Leadership
By Uganda Online Media
Kampala: The Electoral Commission (EC) has dismissed efforts by Moses Nkonge Kibalama and his group to reclaim the National Unity Platform (NUP) party that they previously handed over to Robert Kyagulanyi Ssentamu aka Bobi Wine.
Kibalama and his group recently came out to claim that they had taken back the party leadership from the Kamwokya-based group led by Bobi wine whom they accused of running the party like a family affair and not giving clear accountability to other party leaders,
Kibalama went ahead and wrote to Electoral Commission informing it about the above decision to which EC Secretary Leonard Mulekwah has today responded reminding him that prior to his resignation in 2020, he chaired a meeting that concluded the election of office bearers, to whom he handed over the party presidency to Kyagulanyi who was subsequently voted by NUP’s National Executive Commission (NEC).
Further, Mulekwah told Kibalama that EC has not yet received any formal communication from the party executive committee confirming Kyagulanyi’s resignation from his position or rescinding of other offices as he [Kibalama] claims.
“No communication is on record in respect to resignation or rescinding of the offices by the said Executive Committee, who according to Article 6.2(c) (i) of the party constitution should hold office for five years,” Mulekwah said.
“This is, therefore, to inform you that the convening of the delegates’ conference and election of the National Executive Committee ought to comply with the National Unity Platform constitution.
Kibalama last year run to the Court and Electoral Commission (EC) seeking to resolve the party’s leadership and be handed back ‘his’ party claiming that Kyagulanyi breached a Memorandum of Understanding between him and the National Unity Reconciliation and Development Party NURP.
Seemingly after losing hope in the above process, Kibalama resurfaced at NUP headquarters Kamwokya with an apology for all his mistakes and informed Party President Kyagulanyi that he had withdrawn all the complaints he had lodged against him.
Kibalama apologized,” We have to inform the general public that we have withdrawn all complaints that we previously made against National Unity Platform and its current leadership. There were some misunderstandings between ourselves and the party but they have been resolved.”
This whole saga started in 2020 when Kibalama and his group handed over NURP and turned NUP to Kyagulanyi but later after being abducted by the army for unknown reasons, he [Kibalama] came out claiming that he didn’t authorize the handover of his party to Kyagulanyi.
Kibalama weeks later contradicted himself when he now switched tongues and claimed that the NUP leadership had failed to pay him $5m as agreed during the takeover. During those days, other party members led by Secretary-General, Paul Kagombe also surfaced claiming that their signatures were forged to ensure the party is hijacked by Kyagulanyi’s group.
Kagombe, Kibalama and group ran to court to challenge the takeover and during the hearing of the matter before Justice Musa Ssekaana, Kibalama on several occasions contradicted himself a case court trashed and gave green lights to Kyagulanyi’s team to proceed with their political ambitions under NUP.
After the above court ruling, Kibalama who had earlier been blasted by the High Court as being a serial liar, now dragged the government to court for allegedly coaching him to lie against Kyagulanyi.
“During all this time, I was under the forceful custody of the state agents, my rights and freedoms were violated. I was forced and coached to present thoughts and views that were not my own,” Kibalama said in a suit where he wanted the government to compensate him over the alleged torture.
