The National Resistance Movement (NRM) has set up a special inquiry into the defeat of its parliamentary candidates in the constituencies of Terego, Obongo, Ayivu and Arua. In each case the NRM lost to candidates from the Forum for Democratic change.
Ibrahim Abiriga, the Arua Resident District Commissioner was actively involved in the NRM campaign despite legal regulations preventing civil servants from public involvement in partisan politics. He says his party did everything to ensure that the NRM took hold of all constituencies in the district.
Abiriga says the inquiry is intended to discover exactly what went wrong.
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The defeated NRM candidates are Obiga Kania who stood in Terego, Amasi Fatak who contested in Obongi, Ben Dravile who lost the seat in Ayivu and Alice Arumadri sho was defeated by the incumbent Arua Woman MP, Christine Bako.
Peter Debele, the NRM general secretary for Arua, says the investigation will look into how the money sent by the party secretariat was used. He says sufficient funds were disbursed and it is likely that the NRM candidates were just not popular with the people.
News of the inquiry is not sitting well with opposition politicians in Arua.
Hamza Manzu, the district FDC chairperson, says if the NRM is dissatisfied with the outcome of the elections, it should seek redress from the courts. He suspects that the inquiry is merely an attempt by NRM leaders in Arua to get money from their party headquarters.
President Yoweri Museveni won majority support in the West Nile in the February elections. However his candidates at parliamentary and local council level didn't fair as well.
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