The head of operations at Mukono police, ASP Juma Sabira is said to have been at the head of the violence, and took the role of commander of both his men and the masked goons.
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Violence involving bloodshed and locking opposition leaders and voters outside the polling centre took the upper hand during youth elections for Mukono Municipality, and NRM leaders are said to have connived with electoral commission officials to distort the process in favour of the ruling NRM.
Matters began with haphazard and unexplained relocation of the polling centre from the gazetted Mukono Municipality headquarters to the youth centre, a known seat of a UPDF contingent, where masked youths set on opposition candidates, beat them up and left them bleeding.
The head of operations at Mukono police, ASP Juma Sabira is said to have been at the head of the violence, and took the role of commander of both his men and the masked goons; all along, UPDF soldiers exhibited self-restraint and simply looked on as the saga took its course.
NUP youths who began by reporting to the known polling station at Mukono Municipality, later discovered that it had been relocated and proceeded to the youth centre at about 8:00am but were locked out by the goons.
They immediately began assaulting them and the aspirant for the chairmanship Marvin Ssaava was beaten and had his toe nails plucked out on addition to stealing the money he had on himself and a phone.
The election process was headed by Peter Ssekirya deputized by Jimmy Nteza a programs director of Mukono diocesan radio station, Mukono FM, both of whom are said to have physically participated in the violence. This comes at a time when the NUP managed to get 45 wins in the earlier parish elections, while the NRM got 36.
Despite the flawed exercise where the NUP team were denied entry to the polling area in addition to beating them along with their candidates, Ssekirya shamelessly announced NRM candidates as having lifted all the positions unopposed.
NUP leaders including Mukono Municipality MP Betty Nambooze, Mukono Central Division chairman Robert Peter Kabanda and his Goma Division counterpart Herbert Humphrey Kyasa proceeded to the office of the district electoral commission, where they were for close to two hours, locked out of the gate by security operatives headed by the Officer in Charge of Mukono Police Station, Juma Arituha and OC operations Sabira.
They were later allowed entry together with three of their candidates and entered a closed-door dialogue with the district EC Registrar, Mark Muganzi.
Robert Ssekirya who attended the dialogue, admitted that he had been overwhelmed by the situation after being held hostage by the goons allegedly hired by the NRM machinery. However, he could not explain further.
After an hour into this engagement, they came out whereupon MP Nambooze disclosed that they had reached consensus to file a formal written petition.
In her statement, Nambooze appealed to the EC Registrar Muganzi to remove Ssekirya from the electoral process, arguing that he has exhibited himself as an impartial person bent on serving only one side.
She castigated police for staging a situation implying that every contesting side should field their own security system as the NRM had done.
“We have the capacity to do the same and if it is the way to go, let us be duly informed”, she angrily said.
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