Amuriat threatens EC with defiance over crowds

Kampala, Uganda |  THE INDEPENDENT | The FDC presidential flag bearer Patrick Oboi Amuriat has threatened to defiantly violate key covid-19 regulatory guidelines as issued in the electoral commission roadmap given to political actors ahead of general 2021 campaigns.

Amuriat says, the idea of holding campaign meetings of not more than 70 attendees as suggested by EC is inapplicable in a democratic dispensation Uganda claims to be.

Amuriat issued the threat while meeting his campaign coordination team from Kampala and Wakiso at the party headquarters in Najanankumbi.

He argues that if government thought it was not ready to organize a fully democratic free and fair election, the elections would have been called it off, but he will not accept going to the nomination center with only ten people.

However, the electoral commission spokesperson Paul Bukenya responding to Amuriat’s threats told URN that once candidates get nominated, they will be bound by electoral laws and once they violate them, it will only be absurd and the enforcers of those laws will have to handle them accordingly.

He explained that it was after receiving guidance from the ministry of Health, that the electoral commission is gradually lifting restrictions, it hence managed to shift from its previous guidance of not allowing public gatherings to allowing at least 70. 

Meanwhile Amuriat has also expressed discontent over what he calls the increasing commercialization of politics and buying of voters to stop them from making independent decisions

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URN