The High Court sitting in Patongo Town Council, Agago District, will on November 5 deliver its judgment in the election petition challenging Christopher Komakech’s victory in the Aruu County parliamentary elections. Justice Fatuma Nanziri Bwanika set the judgment date on Monday after the parties completed the hearing of the petition and directed their lawyers to prepare and submit soft copies of their final written submissions.
Komakech, who contested on the National Resistance Movement (NRM) ticket, was declared the winner by the Electoral Commission with 10,455 votes, defeating independent candidate Samuel Odonga-Otto by just 26 votes. Odonga-Otto, a former Aruu County MP, rejected the result and petitioned the High Court, citing alleged irregularities at several polling stations and challenging the handling of election materials.
The petition followed an unsuccessful attempt by Odonga-Otto to have the votes recounted. The Pader Chief Magistrate’s Court dismissed his application after finding that the integrity and custody of some election materials had been compromised. The recount dispute partly centred on the condition of ballot boxes inspected during the earlier proceedings, with several found to have broken, loose or improperly secured seals.
The affected polling stations included Acholi Pit, Kilak, Bus Park, Adongkena, Lwala and Kinene. Odonga-Otto argued that the condition of the ballot boxes should not have prevented the contents from being examined against the declared results, particularly given the narrow 26-vote margin.
He also challenged the number of votes declared invalid in the parliamentary election, saying 175 votes cast in his favour were wrongly rejected, largely because of alleged failures of the Biometric Voter Verification Machines. Odonga-Otto further questioned why 407 parliamentary ballots were declared invalid while only 46 votes were rejected in the Woman MP race conducted on the same day.
The Pader District Returning Officer, Eric Gimei, appeared before the High Court through Zoom and was cross-examined after the parties agreed to the arrangement. Gimei confirmed that he declared the results and acknowledged that the ballot boxes remained in his custody despite reports that some seals had been tampered with.
He had earlier admitted that there were procedural gaps and apologised, while maintaining that the final results had been correctly tallied. During the earlier proceedings, the court heard details of the defects found on some of the ballot boxes. The Acholi Pit ballot box, marked EC 1751/96, had a broken seal, while the Kilak box was found open. The Bus Park box, marked EC 175187, also had a broken seal.
At Adongkena, ballot box EC 1832/13 had a loose lock and an open top. The seal on the Lwala box, EC 1751610, was reportedly not properly welded and its top was open. The Kinene box, EC 1823227, was also reported to have a broken seal. The respondents argued that the condition of the boxes made a meaningful recount impossible because the chain of custody could no longer be guaranteed.
Chief Magistrate Martins Kirya subsequently dismissed Odonga-Otto’s recount application with costs and ordered that the ballot boxes be returned to the Electoral Commission for safe custody. Odonga-Otto has nevertheless maintained that a recount should have been conducted because the 26-vote margin falls within the statutory threshold for a mandatory recount.
He has also cited the Court of Appeal decision in Brenda Nabukenya v Rebecca Nalwanga Balwana, an election dispute arising from the 2011 Luwero District Woman MP by-election, in which the court dealt with the failure to complete a mandatory recount where the winning margin was 30 votes.
The Court of Appeal held that failure to complete the mandatory recount could substantially affect the election result and left the High Court’s decision nullifying the election undisturbed. Odonga-Otto has also referred to another election dispute involving Bosco Okello and Walter Raleigh Okello, which he says supports his argument for a recount where the winning margin is narrow.
Komakech, however, continues to dispute the challenge to his victory. Addressing his supporters outside court after Monday’s proceedings, Komakech said he won the election legitimately and was duly declared the winner. “Nobody will go through the backdoor to Parliament,” Komakech told his supporters, insisting that he remains the duly elected Aruu County MP.
He also questioned why his parliamentary votes were being challenged when other elections conducted on the same day, including the presidential, Woman MP and Aruu North parliamentary elections, had also taken place. Komakech acknowledged that some ballot boxes had been tampered with but noted that no recount was conducted.
Odonga-Otto, while addressing his supporters separately, said the petition was about more than his personal political ambitions, describing it as a fight for what he called the legacy of the Acholi people. He accused Komakech of receiving support from people he referred to as “balalo” and urged residents to stand for what he described as the truth.
Odonga-Otto also referred to the Aruu County parliamentary seat as having a “duplicate one” and said he remained confident in his case. “They can delay the process, but they cannot stop what our victory is. I am a long-distance runner,” he told his supporters. Both candidates attended Monday’s proceedings.
Komakech was represented by a legal team led by Alex Musisi of Kania & Alli Advocates and Solicitors, while Odonga-Otto was represented by counsel Paul Layoo Julius. The High Court will now consider the parties’ final written submissions before returning on November 5 at 9 a.m. to deliver its judgment-URN. Give us feedback on this story through our email: kamwokyatimes@gmail.com
