but that even the 2nd appellant’s voters were disenfranchised.
Mr. Lukwago
hastened to point out that the 2nd appellant is completely silent on this issue. He has
never at any one time complained that the said polling stations never existed.
Likewise, Mr. Lukwago submitted that no evidence was led to show that even one
single supporter of the 2nd appellant was ever disenfranchised.
Mr. Lukwago contends that the trial Judge never made any finding that all the
disenfranchised voters were supporters of the respondent.
After analysing the
evidence before her, the learned trial judge found that the majority of the
disenfranchised voters were the supporters of the respondent.
Counsel for appellants attacked the affidavits of the said deponents on grounds that
most of the affidavits were the same in material particular. According to Lukwago,
this argument is untenable as all these witnesses were faced with the same situation
and their fate was one: no polling station no vote.
Counsel for appellants contend that the number of voters at Gwafu I and II polling
stations was not ascertained and that the claim that the disenfranchised voters at
Gwafu I and II were over 1000 is not supported by evidence.
This argument,
according to Lukwago, is untenable because the 1st appellant which carried out the
registration exercise, ought to have given the actual number of voters to rebut the
respondent’s claim. According to Tally sheet, there were 12 polling stations in Seeta
Parish. The average number of voters in each of the 12 polling stations is 760.
Therefore, Gwafu I and II polling stations would have more than 1000 voters as stated
by the respondent whose evidence on this claim was not rebutted.
There is a contention by the appellants that the deponents did not show that during the
display exercise they went to cross-check their names and verify where they were
supposed to cast their votes from. According to Lukwago, the burden was upon the
Electoral Commission to prove by evidence that whereas it carried out the display
exercise, the petitioner’s supporters did not turn up to check on where they would
vote from. In counsel’s view, the evidence of Engineer Badru Kiggundu, did not
rebut the petitioner’s evidence that voters issued with cards of Gwafu I and II polling