The Supreme Court had today granted an injunction to stay execution of a Constitutional Court ruling that removed Budaka West MP, William Okecho and 69 other MPs from Parliament, and declared their candidature for the same seat in the 2011 elections null and void.
The five Supreme Court judges led by Chief Justice Benjamin Odoki said that the order by the Constitutional Court, which is also the Court of Appeal should be stayed until the Supreme Court rules on the major suit of the petition filed by Okecho against the lower court’s judgement.
William Okecho
The Constitutional Court ruled that by crossing over to another political party Okecho and other MPs who did the same acted against constitutional provisions and spirit for multiparty democracy.
However it is not all good news for Okecho and his 69 colleagues as the Supreme Court stated clearly that it is illegal for an MP to cross to another party, leave a party to become independent or change from Independent MP to a party without vacating their current seat. Okecho’s lawyers led by Kampala Associated advocates and Okello Oryem were forced to concede that he should have resigned, but are now challenging the constitutional court’s decision to stop his candidature in the 2011 elections.
Analysts say though the Supreme Court has not given a date when it will deliver its ruling on Okecho’s petition and that of the Attorney General that the ruling affected only Okecho and not other MPs, these affected MPs are likely to lose their seats if they win in case the Supreme Court maintains its stand that the MPs should have resigned.
But for now, the affected MPs can focus their energies on their current competitions as the Supreme Court has asked the Electoral Commission to stop implementing the judgement of the Constitutional court to dismiss MPs from their races. But the Speaker of Parlaiment will go ahed to dismiss the affected MPs from Parliament and ask them to refund any monies earned since they were nominated to compete in the 2011 elections.
George Owor, who was competing with Okecho in the West Budama Parliamentary seat successfully petitioned the constitutional court which agreed that Okecho’s dual status as an independent MP and NRM flag-bear was in contravention of the Constitution.
See full constitutional Court ruling