Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | The High Court in Kampala has accepted the withdrawal of a petition seeking to disqualify Yona Musinguzi from the Ntungamo Municipality parliamentary race.
The petition was filed by Edward Beyendeza, an independent candidate. He accuses Musinguzi of not resigning his government job 90 days towards the nomination date as Public Service Standing Orders of 2020 stipulate.
On Thursday the petition was withdrawn by Beyendeza’s lawyers Silas Mugabi Kahima before the deputy head of Civil Division Justice Musa Ssekaana who directed his client to pay costs of the petition to Musinguzi and Electoral Commission whom he had listed as respondents.
In November 2020, Beyendeza ran to court accusing the Electoral Commission of illegally nominating Musinguzi who was working as a Senior Science Officer, Bio-safety and Bio Security at Ministry of Science and Technology before resigning from public service at least 90 days before the nomination date.
He argued that Musinguzi claimed to have resigned on July 12, 2020, when he had records from the permanent secretary of the ministry of public service reportedly showed that he resigned on August 31, 2020, and therefore by the nomination of MPs which occurred on October 15 2020, the 90 mandatory days had not yet lapsed.
The petitioner also noted that the Permanent Secretary had backdated Musinguzi’s resignation letter to reflect he had resigned on July 10, 2020, which is irregular, illegal and in contravention of public service standing orders of 2010.
Beyendeza asked the court to disqualify Musinguzi from the said race on that basis.
However, when the case came up for hearing on Thursday, Beyendeza’s lawyers withdrew it without giving reasons which promoted the Electoral Commission lawyer Hamidu Lugoloobi to ask for costs and the Judge agreed with them.
Musinguzi who is the NRM Flagbearer in the race was in the 9th parliament before he was defeated by the incumbent Gerald Karuhanga in the 2016 general elections.
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