World

Museveni Wins In Uganda

By CBSNews.com staff CBSNews.com staff

March 14, 2001 / 8:27 AM EST / CBS

Incumbent Yoweri Museveni easily won Uganda's hard-fought presidential election on Wednesday, but his main challenger rejected the vote and demanded a fresh poll.

Museveni, who came to power in 1986 after fighting a five-year guerrilla war, won 69.3 percent of the vote, electoral commission chairman Aziz Kasujja said. His closest rival, Kizza Besigye, won 27.8 percent. The remainder of the vote was split between four other candidates.

Besigye, Museveni's former ally, has already said he will not recognize the results and will challenge them through Uganda's courts.

"I write to inform you that my task force and I vehemently reject the...election results that are now being declared by your commission and demand fresh elections," Besigye said in a letter to the commission on Wednesday.

"We will not meekly submit to those who want to govern without the people's mandate, we shall resist them," he said. "We consider the results being declared null and void."

"We are rejecting the election completely," said his campaign spokeswoman, Anne Bushiga, accusing the commission of tampering with the results.

"It is Besigye's right to deny the results because everybody has the right to complain," Kasujja said after announcing the results.

"I do not accept there was rigging."

Turnout was 70.3 percent, Kasujja said.

Museveni had been widely expected to win a final five-year term as leader of the east African nation, but the poll was marred by reports of vote-rigging and intimidation of Besigye supporters.

Museveni's campaign spokesman, Information Minister Basoga Nsadhu, said his candidate had won fairly.

"He (Besigye) should accept that he has been defeated," Nsadhu said.

The streets of Kampala were calm after the result was announced on the radio, although some Museveni supporters drove through the capital waving small flags showing the president's face, honking their horns and whistling.

"I think it's clear he has massive support in the rural areas, so even without the rigging he would have won," said Verna Mbabazi, who works for a construction firm.

Others said Besigye had a right to complain.

"If he has ample evidence then he can take legal action, otherwise he should accept (defeat) and we move on with our lives," said Kenneth, a newspaper distributor.

Besigye has said his agents had been chased from many polling stations or detained by the army during the voting. He said Museveni supporters had engaged in multiple voting and some ballot boxes were stuffed.

An independent group of Ugandan election monitors said that no more than 15 percent of the vote was subject to irregularities.

Local election monitor NEMGROUP found significant cases of malpractice in roughly 10 percent of the polling stations.

Irregularities included cases of polling station officials influencing voters, eligible voters being denied the right to vote, and in some cass people were stopped from voting.

"We would say it is an election that has been characterised by problems, but it is an election where people have been able to express their will," said NEMGROUP leader Reverend Canon Grace Kaiso. "This election reflects the will of Ugandans."

Local observers and foreign journalists corroborated reports of rigging and intimidation by Museveni supporters in at least four of the country's 56 districts.

Museveni took power as the head of a guerrilla army 15 years ago and was elected president in 1996. He ended a nightmare period under dictators Idi Amin and Milton Obote during which hundreds of thousands of Ugandans were tortured and killed.

Museveni rebuilt the economy, introduced free education, championed women's rights and brought AIDS under control. He also banned political parties, which he blamed for ethnic and sectarian hatred. Besigye's campaign tapped disillusionment among insiders and those left behind by the system.