Politics
FDC faults EC over ‘inadequate civic education’
EC Boss Byabakama Simon
The Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) has attributed some aspects of electoral violence witnessed in the NRM primaries to inadequate civic education amongst electorates by the Electoral Commission.
The EC is constitutionally mandated to carry out civic education as a way to inculcate a culture of democracy, tolerance and good governance.
Addressing a news conference at their party headquarterspart Spokesperson Ibrahim Ssemuju Nganda attributed irregularities in the recently concluded youth elections to the Electoral Commission’s failure to carry out effective civic education before elections.
He also attributed the low voter turn out in the recently concluded youth elections to inadequacy of civic education noting that this is likely to be worse case in coming general elections.
“There is almost no information about these elections. We have candidates who don’t even know that the nominations are about to happen. We have a population which gets to know about these elections either when they are under way or when they are being completed,” Ssemuju said.
“That’s why we saw chaos in youth elections. It is because the Electoral Commission is not supplying sufficient information to the population, the candidates and to the political parties,” he added.
He further noted that unless the Electoral body and other stakeholders can embark on effective civic education in this remaining limited period, the violence that erupted in the recently concluded youth elections might continue prevailing in almost every election more so in the forthcoming general elections.
“The 2021 general election is most likely to be the worst election we have ever organized in Uganda,” he said.
Meanwhile, the acting Electoral Commission Spokesperson, Paul Bukenya, said they (EC) are hindered by inadequate funding which makes execution of some duties hectic and hard.
“We have always said that we don’t have adequate funds but that does not mean that we do not have some money to do what we are doing that is why we are having some activities going on,” he said.
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