By Nathan Eyagu

The high court in soroti yesterday Tuesday 12, October,2021 dismissed the election petition that was filed by the former mp of Ngora county hon.David Abala against hon.Achayo Lodou as the Ngora county mp with each party meeting their costs.

Lady Justice Jane Okuo Kajuga in her ruling  stated that Achayo won the election with 11,556 against the petitioner, Abala. 

Achayo was given additional 2,049 votes to secure her victory by the court as she polled 9,517 votes and Abala polled 9,226 votes as declared before.

The judge in her ruling found out that the results that were used for declaring Abala were incomplete.

The court also heard that the returning officer, Toddu declared partial results due to network problem in uploading results.

 The court, which was faced with the task of determining whether Achayo was validly elected in accordance with the provisions of the law.It found that whereas there were contradictions in the tallying and declaration of results, the petitioner failed to prove his case. 

"The petitioner must produce proof that the effect of non- compliance with the law on the result was substantial. Even if there were irregularities, the petitioner is expected to demonstrate the effect they had in the results to the satisfaction of the court" reads part of the judgement.

Justice Okuo said she found that the declaration of the results by the Electoral Commission contravened provisions of the law and that the tallying of the results was incorrect.

The Judge also added that voters from eleven polling stations were not satisfied because their votes were not taken into consideration during the tallying.
The said polling stations include Kodike PAG Church, Kodike Primary School, Nyamongo Mango tree, Kalengo Primary School, Opot Primary School, Aagu Primary School, Agolitom Primary School, Kees Catholic Church, Acoroit Mango Tree and Odwarat Primary School, among others.

 But she also added that although the failures of the EC affected the results, court was faced with the mandate to set aside the declarations with justifiable costs or uphold the result of the election as true reflection of the voters' will. 

The judge based her ruling on the declaration forms tendered by EC after trashing the tally sheets and return form for the transmission of results presented by EC.

"There is no evidence from the petitioner that his declaration was based on the 65 Polling Stations neither did EC produce evidence that the first declaration was based on the partial results from the 54 Polling Stations. Court was, therefore, unable to determine votes in the remaining eleven Polling Stations", the Judge continues.

In her ruling, Justice Okuo said that there were major contradictions in results of the Ngora County election based on the affidavits of the returning officer, Toddu. In the vote tally sheet, Toddu said that Abala polled 8,317 while Achayo polled 7,828 yet in the supplementary affidavit, he indicated that Abala got 8,303 votes against Achayo with 7,513 votes. 

The same officer in the same affidavit, gave Abala 8,865 votes and Achayo 9,108 while EC Kampala declared Achayo with 9,517 votes against 9,286 votes for Abala.

But the evidence in the said irregularities was struck off in the 25 affidavits filed by Abala during the preliminary objections in the case. The matter was then determined with just an affidavit, also the petitioner's affidavit.

Lodou was represented by three lawyers,evans ochieng,okello oryem and Joseph chaza while philip Engulu represented Abala.
According to one of the lawyers who represented lodou,evans ochieng,he appreciated courts' decision following a few mistakes during the election.

"What's important is that juliet achayo won and those other claims of fraud were investigated extensively that even with the addition of all the 65 polling stations, she still won as opposed earlier and if they take another part of appeal in the next 14 days then we shall also be ready" he added

Achayo who never expected such a rulling told media that she was so speechless and so happy as court found no merit to dismiss her election as the mp of Ngora county as she had a team of competent lawyers who had a merit on the case as the people of Ngora voted for her wholeheartedly.

Brief background
It should be noted that during the tight Ngora county parliamentary elections, Peter Toddu the Ngora district returning officer declared hon.abala as the MP-elect for Ngora County on January 15, 2021, after he got 8,317 votes against his closet rival Achayo, who polled 7,828 votes this forcing Achayo who wasn't satisfied with the electoral results to run to soroti high court for a vote recount after Abala was declared winner on the basis of 54 out of 65 polling stations but her application was dismissed by the soroti chief magistrate monica Amono on grounds of insufficient evidence.

But later in February,the EC head office also announced as the Ngora county parliamentary election victor who according to the EC spoke's man paul bukenya the votes from eleven polling that were not included were all later summed up that Lodou polled 9,517 votes while Abala got 9,226 votes this forcing abala to go to court.