The High Court in Kampala has dismissed an election petition filed by National Unity Platform (NUP) candidate Waiswa Alex Mufumbiro challenging the election of National Resistance Movement (NRM) candidate Fredrick Ruhindi as Member of Parliament for Nakawa Division East, ruling that although 22 polling stations were omitted from the final tally, the irregularity did not substantially affect the election outcome.
In a judgment delivered on October 30, 2026, Justice Allan Paul M. Nshimye of the High Court Civil Division upheld Ruhindi’s election, saying Mufumbiro failed to present sufficient evidence to prove that the alleged electoral irregularities warranted nullification of the results.
The court found that the Electoral Commission (EC) breached the Parliamentary Elections Act by failing to include results from 22 polling stations in the final tally sheet. However, the judge ruled that adding the missing results would not have overturned Ruhindi’s victory.
Ruhindi was declared winner of the January 15, 2026 parliamentary election with 18,575 votes against Mufumbiro’s 15,067, giving him a winning margin of 3,508 votes. The results were gazetted on March 2, 2026.
Mufumbiro, who contested on the NUP ticket, had challenged the declaration, alleging that the Electoral Commission’s returning officer falsified and inflated votes in Ruhindi’s favour, failed to tally results from 22 polling stations and declared the winner based on incomplete results.
He also accused electoral officials of failing to provide a transparent tallying process, alleging that his agents were denied the opportunity to scrutinise results at the Kampala Capital City Tally Centre. He further raised concerns about alleged ballot stuffing, discrepancies in declaration of results forms and irregularities involving ballot papers and voter turnout.
The petitioner asked court to declare him the winner, set aside Ruhindi’s election and order the Electoral Commission to organise fresh elections.
However, Justice Nshimye observed that Mufumbiro had failed to substantiate several of his allegations, particularly those concerning inflated votes and discrepancies in declaration of results forms.
On the allegation that a correct tally would have shown Mufumbiro as the winner, the judge declined to rely on approximately 418 photocopied declaration of results forms attached to the petition, covering about 835 scanned pages.
The court noted that the documents were not certified, yet declaration of results forms are public documents whose authenticity must be established through certified copies in accordance with Section 76 of the Evidence Act.
Relying on the Supreme Court decision in Kakooza John Baptist v Electoral Commission and Yiga Anthony, Justice Nshimye held that uncertified photocopies of declaration of results forms could not be validated merely because they had been attached to an affidavit.
Consequently, the court found that Mufumbiro had not proved his claim that he obtained 16,422 votes against Ruhindi’s 15,957, which would have given him a victory margin of 465 votes.
The judge also rejected allegations that unusually high voter turnout in some polling stations pointed to electoral malpractice.
Mufumbiro had cited polling stations in Luzira, including Murchison Bay Primary School, Staff Nursery School and Remand Prisons, where he alleged voter turnout was close to 100 per cent.
However, during cross-examination, his witness, Kato Wilson Kenneth, admitted that some of the percentages he had presented were inaccurate. For instance, he had claimed that Staff Nursery School, Village 5, recorded 99.5 per cent voter turnout, yet the tally sheet showed 66.78 per cent.
Justice Nshimye further faulted the petitioner for failing to present agents who had actually witnessed the alleged irregularities at the affected polling stations.
On discrepancies in declaration of results forms, the judge noted that several forms had been signed by Mufumbiro’s agents without any recorded complaints. He said the petitioner should have presented the agents to explain what had happened at the polling stations and why they signed the forms without raising objections.
The court also found that evidence from some of the petitioner’s witnesses was based on information received from other people, making it hearsay and insufficient to establish the alleged irregularities without corroboration.
In examining allegations of inflated results, the judge considered 12 declaration of results forms marked J1 to J12. However, only two of the agents who had signed the forms, Wanyenze Justine and Kasete Benjamin, were presented as witnesses in support of the petition.
The court found that the results recorded at Kasasiro polling station along Turker Road, where Wanyenze had signed the declaration form, added up correctly to the total number of valid votes recorded.
At Outside St Stephens Nursery School Gate polling station, where Kasete Benjamin had allegedly signed the declaration form, the judge found inconsistencies in the evidence. Kasete’s affidavit identified him as an agent at a different polling station, Kamwanyi, outside Uganda Waragi Gate in Luzira, rather than the station whose results he was expected to challenge.
The judge therefore found no sufficient evidence to establish that the returning officer had inflated votes in Ruhindi’s favour.
However, the court agreed with Mufumbiro that results from 22 polling stations had been excluded from the final tally sheet.
During cross-examination, Kampala Capital City Returning Officer Rashid Hasakya confirmed that the results from the 22 polling stations had not been tallied.
Justice Nshimye found that the omission amounted to non-compliance with Sections 72 and 77 of the Parliamentary Elections Act, which require electoral officials to tally votes obtained by candidates and record the results accordingly.
The judge, however, said the critical question was whether the omission substantially affected the outcome of the election.
He observed that where results from affected polling stations are available, court should consider the actual votes obtained by candidates rather than the total number of registered voters in those areas when determining whether the irregularity could have changed the election outcome.
An examination of the available declaration forms showed that Mufumbiro obtained 1,072 votes from the affected polling stations, while Ruhindi secured 599, giving the NUP candidate a lead of 473 votes.
The judge then deducted the 473-vote difference from Ruhindi’s original winning margin of 3,508 votes, leaving him with a reduced lead of 3,035 votes.
Justice Nshimye also considered figures presented by Mufumbiro, who had claimed that he obtained 1,335 votes from the excluded polling stations against Ruhindi’s 735. Even using those figures, the judge observed that Ruhindi would still have won by 2,908 votes.
The court consequently concluded that although the Electoral Commission had failed to comply with the law by excluding the 22 polling stations from the final tally, the omission did not affect the election result in a substantial manner.
On allegations of electoral offences, including ballot stuffing, falsification of declaration forms and undue influence, the judge found that Mufumbiro had not presented witnesses who directly linked Ruhindi to the alleged offences.
Justice Nshimye noted that most of the allegations were based on information allegedly received from other people, while no witness testified to having personally seen Ruhindi commit ballot stuffing or participate in falsifying election results.
He further observed that completing declaration forms and entering results into tally sheets are statutory responsibilities of Electoral Commission officials, and the evidence before court did not establish that Ruhindi personally, or with his knowledge and consent, committed any electoral offence.
In dismissing the petition, the judge said the evidence presented by Mufumbiro did not justify setting aside Ruhindi’s election.
The court ordered that the petition be dismissed, confirmed Ruhindi as the duly elected Member of Parliament for Nakawa Division East and directed each party to meet its own legal fees.
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