The High court has set Monday next week to decide on whether or not to allow Musherure Shartsi Kutesa, one of the candidates for the Mawogola North constituency parliamentary seat to join an application filed by her rival Sodo Aine Kaguta against the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) party.
Sodo, President Yoweri Museveni's brother sued NRM for failure to announce him as the party flag bearer for the Mawogola North parliamentary seat in Sembabule district. However, when the suit came up for hearing on Tuesday before justice Musa Ssekaana, Shartsi through her lawyer, David Mpanga asked to be added as a respondent to the suit claiming that she holds the same position with the NRM electoral body and central executive committee (CEC) that neither she nor Sodo won the highly contentious Mawogola North NRM party primaries.
Shartsi, who seeks to replace her father and Foreign Affairs minister Sam Kahamba Kutesa, disputed the outcome of the NRM primaries where she lost to Sodo on September 30th, 2020. Sembabule NRM district returning officer, William Katokozi, declared Sodo winner with 17,343 votes followed by Musherure with 16,104 votes.
Shartsi contested the results and accordingly petitioned the party elections tribunal arguing that the elections were marred by gross irregularities. The tribunal chaired by Enoch Barata failed to take a final decision on the petition and instead forwarded the matter to the central executive committee (CEC) for guidance, which wasn't provided.
The CEC referred the matter to the NRM vice chairperson, Al-Hajj Moses Kigongo who allowed the two candidates to run as independents. But Sodo is still exploring his chances to be announced as the NRM candidate while challenging the decision of CEC to cancel his victory and delaying its decision on his appeal which he states was given after the gazetted nomination dates for parliamentary elections by the Independent Electoral Commission.
Justice Ssekaana has also announced that he will give direction on how to proceed with Sodo's case after disposing off Shartsi's application on Monday next week.
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