Reports Leo odera Omolo
THE nomination dates for presidential and parliamentary candidates for 2011 are October 25 and 26, the Electoral Commission said yesterday.
In a statement, chairperson Badru Kiggundu said presidential candidates will be nominated at the commission’s head offices in Kampala, and at the district headquarters for parliamentary candidates.
Kiggundu showing journalists that the leader of opposition in Parliament, Ogenga Latigo, is registered too. This was at the EC headquarters yesterday
District chairpersons and councillors will be nominated on November 4 and 5 at the district and county headquarters, respectively.
For the municipality chairpersons and councillors the date will be November 4 and 5 at the district headquarters. Kiggundu also said sub-county chairpersons and their councillors will be nominated from October 27 to 29 at the county headquarters.
“The nomination guidelines and forms shall be available at the offices of the district returning officers from September 8,” he said.
To be eligible for the presidential and parliamentary seats, a candidate must be a citizen of Uganda, a registered voter and have at least an A’level certificate or its equivalent.
A person cannot stand for president if he is of unsound mind, holds an office that handles elections, or is a cultural leader or is bankrupt.
Anyone under a death sentence or a sentence of imprisonment exceeding nine months without an option of a fine cannot also stand.
Candidates may be disqualified if they have within seven years immediately preceding the election, been convicted of a crime involving dishonesty or moral turpitude or convicted over election crimes.
Presidential candidates must also submit 100 supporters from at least 75 districts to be nominated, Kiggundu stressed.
Commenting on the exclusion of voters’ photographs on the web-based national register, Kiggundu said: “The national voters’ register has 15,002,720 voters. The inclusion of photographs would have extensively slowed the downloading speed.”
He said following the conclusion of the display of the national register on Tuesday, the commission would display the lists of all persons whose names have been recommended for deletion from September 3 to 10 at parish headquarters.
“The purpose of this supplementary display exercise is to enable any person who may have been wrongly recommended for deletion to raise an objection to the parish tribunal,” he added.
On the delay to pay field election officials, Kiggundu said many of those they recruited did not have bank accounts and submitted accounts of friends and relatives to receive their wages.
“Such accounts were queried by Bank of Uganda, and the commission has contacted the officials to clear the matter. All the affected officials will be paid.
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