National Unity Platform (NUP) presidential candidate Robert Kyagulanyi aka Bobi Wine has dismissed as ‘fake’ opinion polls that show incumbent President Yoweri Kaguta Tibuhaburwa Museveni ahead with about 60 per cent just three weeks to the January 14 poll.
This week, polls run by state newspaper The New Vision and ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) party-leaning tabloid The Red Pepper claimed Museveni would win if elections were held on days their polls were conducted.
Pollsters have previously failed to make sensible predictions.
In the 2016 election, pollsters like Patrick Wakida of Research World International even seemed to favour former Prime minister John Patrick Amama Mbabazi ahead of main opposition leader Dr Kizza Besigye.
But when the results came, Mbabazi had performed dismally.
For Bobi Wine, the claim is that the New Vision and Red Pepper polls are biased.
He has previously sponsored his own polls which show him leading.
These pollsters he has sponsored are ‘independent,’ he says, and therefore thinks are more credible.
“As we told you a few days back, the regime is investing massively in sponsoring fake opinion polls, to lay ground for massive rigging! This has been the usual script every election cycle,” claimed Bobi Wine.
“They normally do this: to create apathy and discourage people from voting massively, to lay ground for massive vote rigging: and to discourage the citizens and prepare their minds for another five years of repression.”
Although even some opposition politicians dismissed both pro-Museveni and pro-Bobi Wine polls, the youthful singer-turned-politician believes the polls by ‘independent’ pollsters he and his agents sponsored should be relied on.
“In the coming days, state media and other paid organisations will publish fake polls showing that Museveni is in the lead! Laughable!” he further claimed.
“For the past three years, all independent polls conducted have showed that we are far ahead of Museveni. There have been recorded cases where individuals don’t respond to researchers for fear of the state!”
Other opposition candidates who have trashed thes polls include Norbert Mao of the Democratic Party (DP) and Lt Gen Rtd Henry Kakurugu Tumukunde.
