Former Common Man's Party (CMP) presidential candidate Mubarak Munyagwa Sserunga, popularly known as "Mugati Gwa Butter," has raised serious concerns over the credibility of the recently concluded general elections, citing widespread failures of biometric voter verification kits (BVVKs) and deviations from electoral law.
Speaking during NBS Barometer on Tuesday, the former Kawempe South Member of Parliament said the integrity of any election hinges on strict adherence to the law, particularly with regard to voter verification.
"The BVVK machines are provided for by law. We must therefore ask ourselves whether an election that does not comply with the law can truly be considered credible," he said.
Although acknowledging that the Common Man's Party did not win the election, Munyagwa insisted that the process was flawed in several polling stations, where results did not accurately reflect the will of the voters.
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The general presidential and parliamentary elections, held nationwide on Thursday, 15 January 2026, were marked by widespread technical failures of BVVKs in several parts of the country.
Reports from multiple polling stations indicated that the biometric kits either failed to start or malfunctioned during voting.
In response, the Electoral Commission (EC) directed all returning officers to allow voting to proceed using the manual voters' register wherever the biometric systems failed, citing existing electoral guidelines. The EC argued that this measure was necessary to ensure continuity of the voting process and to prevent voter disenfranchisement.
However, critics, including Munyagwa, contend that reliance on manual registers undermined the transparency and integrity that biometric verification was intended to safeguard.
Biometric voter verification had been strongly supported by the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) as a safeguard against electoral fraud, particularly in urban opposition strongholds where past election results had raised questions about the incumbent's level of popular support.
Despite the controversy, during the final declaration at the EC headquarters on Saturday, EC Chairperson Justice Simon Mugenyi Byabakama announced President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni as the winner of the 2026 presidential election.
According to the official tally, Museveni secured 7,946,772 votes, representing 71.65 percent of the total valid votes cast, extending his leadership to a seventh term in office. The victory marked the first time in nearly three decades that Museveni surpassed the 70 percent threshold, a feat he last achieved in 1996, when he garnered 74.3 percent.
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President Museveni's closest challenger, Robert Kyagulanyi Ssentamu, popularly known as Bobi Wine, who ran on the National Unity Platform (NUP) ticket, received 2,741,238 votes (24.72 percent). Nathan Nandala Mafabi of the Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) finished third with 209,039 votes (1.88 percent).
The remaining five candidates each received less than one percent of the vote. Munyagwa himself polled 31,666 votes, representing 0.29 percent of the total votes.
