Uganda police surround Bobi Wine’s opposition party offices
KAMPALA, Uganda — The opposition party of Ugandan presidential challenger Bobi Wine said on Monday that police have prevented top officials from going to their headquarters in the capital, Kampala, as they prepare to launch a legal challenge to free Wine from house arrest.
Police swooped in at dawn at the offices of Wine’s National Unity Platform, diverted traffic, and stopped people from entering, party spokesman Joel Ssenyonyi told The Associated Press.
Wine, whose real name is Kyagulanyi Ssentamu, was the main challenger in presidential elections last week that electoral authorities say long-time leader Yoweri Museveni won with 58% of the vote.
Wine, who took 34% of the vote, has rejected the official outcome as fraudulent and insists he will use all legal means to protest the allegedly “cooked-up” results. Wine can petition the East African nation’s Supreme Court, but justices have been reluctant to rule against Museveni in previous election suits.
Wine’s party has said it has video evidence of the military stuffing ballot boxes, casting ballots for people and chasing voters away from polling stations.
Opposition lawmaker Medard Sseggona, an attorney for Wine, said he feared police would seize any vital information related to the polls that was kept at the party’s headquarters.
Questions continue to swirl over the validity of the official election
results, especially after the electoral commission on Monday acknowledged an account in the local press that results from over 1,000 polling stations had not been counted.
The commission, trying to meet a constitutional deadline, concluded that the vote difference between Museveni and his closest challenger Wine “would not be overturned by votes from the remaining 1,223 polling stations,” it said on Twitter.
The Daily Monitor newspaper reported that the vote-rich central district of Wakiso, widely seen as Wine’s stronghold, was the most affected.
Museveni has dismissed the claims of vote-rigging.
“I think this may turn out to be the most cheating-free election since 1962,” when Uganda won independence from Britain, said Museveni in a national address on Saturday.