Kole North, how MP Dr Opio Acuti’s joint campaigns led to victories

Kole district, which had struggled for years to become an NRM stronghold, finally achieved a breakthrough with sweeping victories in the MP and LC5 elections.

President-elect Yoweri Kaguta Museveni also had a landslide victory with 86% in Kole district.

The party’s flag bearers secured all parliamentary seats. Incumbent MP Kole North, Dr Opio Samuel Acuti won with 26,933 votes garnering 81% of the votes cast.

In Kole South, NRM’s Eng Okot Henry Boniface secured victory with 16,904 votes against UPC’s Peter Ocen, the incumbent.

Sandra Aceng of the NRM also won the district woman representative seat after defeating UPC’s Joy Ongom.

The ruling party’s victory was further consolidated during the district elections. The race for the district chairperson was claimed by NRM’s Eng Moses Oteng with 19,124 votes against UPC’s Denis Obol with 17,248 votes.

Eng Oteng received 80% of his votes from Kole North. The majority of the district councillor positions were also secured by the NRM flag bearers with councillors from Kole North sweeping 9 out of 10 seats and UPC only one seat.

In Kole South, NRM garnered 8 out of the 11 seats with 2 going to UPC and one to an independent candidate.

Among the reasons leading to the success of NRM in these elections were the joint campaigns that were run in Kole North. During MP Opio Acuti’s campaigns, all flag bearers from the Woman MP to the LC5 and district councillors participated leading to joint mobilisation efforts in the 52 rallies.

The messaging in rallies was uniform, urging the electorate to vote for all the flag bearers.

The pivotal efforts played after the NRM primaries by MP Dr Acuti who also serves as the chairperson of the NRM party in Kole North Constituency, also helped to bring the party leaders together and catalyse efforts in voter mobilisation, says Okello Tony, one of the NRM leaders.

In the 11 districts in Lango sub-region, only Kole district and Lira district had NRM sweeping all the parliamentary and LC5 positions.

Other districts had a mixture of NRM, UPC and Independents.