KAMPALA, UGANDA: The Electoral Commission (EC) has admitted that there was an error in the presidential declaration results it posted to debunk “fake results” on social media.
The results in question were for Anyang Polling Station in Nebbi District.
According to announced results, they indicated that presidential candidates Patrick Oboi Amuriat got 6 votes, Joseph Kabuleta, Willy Mayambala and Nobert Mao each had no vote, Nancy Linda Kalembe and John Katumba each had 1 vote while Robert Kyagulanyi had 8 votes.
Mr Gregg Mugisha Muntu and Mr Fred Mwesigye each scored four votes, Tumukunde Henry Kakurugu had two while Yoweri Museveni Tibuhaburwa Kaguta had 198.
The form indicates that the total number of valid votes cast for candidates were 300 and yet when the votes are tallied, they add up to 224.
On their Twitter handle, @UgandaEC, they asked the public to disregard the information referring to it as doctored.
“Please, disregard the misleading information on a doctored DR Form. The DR Form with genuine results as received and uploaded on the Electoral Commission website, is provided here,” reads the EC handle.
Hours later, the EC spokesperson, Mr Paul Bukenya, admitted that there was an error in their form they posted and promised to follow their internal processes to establish how it came about.
“The course of action is to look at it and question it and go backwards and see what happened. Someone posted a fake form. The form we issued to the presidential candidates has eight but the total has an error. We have to find out if they were panicking, rushing or just an error or it was deliberate,” Mr Bukenya said.
The mistake was first highlighted by Prof Nic Cheeseman, a professor of democracy and author of How to Rig an Election, on his Twitter handle @Fromagehomme, questioning EC computation.
“The Ugandan Electoral Commission just released this as an “official” results form to dispel rumours of rigging. Hilariously and shockingly, it shows ballot manipulation. The number of votes cast do not add up,” Prof Cheeseman tweeted.
In another thread, he said: “Look at the single digit votes – in each case the person filling out the form has written 06, 01, 02 etc. When it comes to Bobi Wine’s vote they have written 8. This is because he did not get eight votes but 84 votes, so there is no zero to the left of the eight.”
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