Uganda opposition to launch ‘defiance campaign’ if vote not fair

Besigye is a long-time opposition leader who has lost three previous elections.

The vote is expected to be the toughest challenge President Yoweri Museveni has faced in his 30-year rule.

On Monday (February 15), one person was killed after police stormed a Besigye rally with tear gas, and both sides have accused the other of organising vigilante groups.

“If we consider that this election is fraudulent to the extent that we reject the outcome, we shall do so,” Besigye told Reuters.

“Then we say we have to continue with our defiance campaign. It will just be a continuation of the defiance campaign, and defiance campaign really means that we don’t cooperate with the regime, we don’t cooperate. We continue to demonstrate against its actions and so on and so forth until delegitimise it, delegitimise it and until the regime succumbs to the will of the people,” Besigye said.

Besigye has said he believes Museveni would rig the vote.

Rights groups have called on Museveni to disband his “Crime Preventers” programme, a loose group of citizens that are estimated to number in the tens of thousands, saying the group is affiliated with the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) party and has carried out assaults.

Analysts say large-scale violence is unlikely around the vote, but clashes between protesters and police often turn violent.

The chairman of the electoral commission said he had received tips that leaders were planning to form “youth brigades, vigilantes, militias.”

“The electoral commission has continued to receive information that some political leaders as well as individuals contesting various elective positions are planning and still planning to form security groups known as youth brigades, vigilantes and militias. The commission wishes to reiterate that it is only the Ugandan police which is in charge of providing security during polling. All candidates are urged to desist from forming any parallel groups,” Badru Kiggundu said.

Political observers predict that Museveni, 71, a Western ally who came to power in 1986, will win, but they say this election is different from previous races because of the size and enthusiasm of crowds at opposition rallies.

On the streets of Kampala, residents were going on with their normal business ahead of poll.

A Kampala resident who did not give his name, said he has no trust in the election process in his country.

“We are used to unfair process, the anxiety of the people, they want to fight it but the whole process has been unfair, and I believe the act and the whole incidence of election even in tomorrow will still be unfair,” said a Kampala resident.

Besigye served as Museveni’s personal doctor in the early 1980s and is now challenging him for the fourth time. He is wildly popular in urban areas.

Museveni’s ally-turned-challenger, former prime minister Amama Mbabazi, is meanwhile hoping to siphon away support from disaffected members of Museveni’s party.

But Museveni’s message of slow but steady progress appears to still resonate strongly among rural voters, and analysts say he has built a patronage system where much of Uganda’s bureaucracy feels indebted to the president.

Besigye is frequently harassed by security forces and says he has been arrested 44 times since the last election in 2011.