Kampala — The National Resistance Movement top leaders yesterday amended the party constitution to abolish the use of electoral colleges to elect candidates.

Sources at the closed meeting of the National Executive Committee at State House Entebbe said late last night that the decision was reached after a day's debate.

The Central Executive Committee, chaired by President Yoweri Museveni, had earlier recommended the amendment in order to allow registered party members to elect the party's flag-bearers.

Deputy spokesperson Ofwono Opondo said candidates for the presidency, MPs and LC5 offices would be elected by all registered members.

He said 451 members voted in favour of voting the presidential candidate through adult suffrage with only 18 against.

The amendment was one of many reforms recommended by the Central Executive Committee in its report to the NEC.

The officials said the move was intended to cure the problem of disgruntled members who stand as independents, thereby splitting the party's vote.

Despite the majority support, some members yesterday expressed reservation on the amendment.

The colleges are considered unreliable and easy to manipulate. During the 2006 elections, many NRM members stood as independents, claiming that the primaries were rigged.

Although President Yoweri Museveni, the NRM chairman, had pushed for the amendment, after seven hours of debate yesterday, he warned that the method of adult suffrage would cost much more. Whereas the electoral colleges would cost sh4.7b for the election materials, adult suffrage would cost 5.7b, he reportedly cautioned.

Accordingly, a subcommittee was set up to discuss ways and means of raising the money, Opondo said. The committee is chaired by Margaret Zziwa, deputised by Arimpa Kigyayi, with Ruth Tuma and Bernard Mujasi as members.

The meeting also discussed other matters, a caucus spokesperson, Kasozi Muyomba, said. The meeting, he explained, also looked at the "core principles of the NRM' as it debated Museveni's key note address.

"We agreed on nationalism as a core principle. On modernisation, we adopted a strategy of industrialisation, human resource development through UPE and USE, and modernisation of agriculture through NAADS and value addition," he said.

Museveni reportedly said the country was on a democratic course and that as the largest party, the NRM should demonstrate clean democracy. "We should be free of pollution as the ruling party. We should set the standard for other political parties," he said.

He castigated members who rig in the primaries. The meeting said some district leaders create fake villages for purposes of rigging the primaries. Some leaders sack their executives if they suspect they will vote candidates they do not support, the meeting also noted.

The amendments will be passed to the National Conference which will sit in October 2010, to approve and effect them.