Perennial litigant Male Mabirizi has accused National Unity Platform (NUP) leader Robert Kyagulanyi aka Bobi Wine’s legal team, including Busiro East MP Medard Lubega Sseggona of incompetence.
Sseggona and other Bobi Wine’s lawyers are in the process of withdrawing a presidential election petition filed challenging incumbent President Yoweri Kaguta Tibuhaburwa Museveni’s victory.
They cited alleged judges’ bias and lack of an opportunity to present more evidence.
Now, Mabirizi has joined Museveni lawyer Jet Tumwebaze and retired judge George Wilson Kanyeihamba in blasting Bobi Wine’s lawyers of incompetence.
“[Bobi Wine’s] lawyers Sseggona and his team are at fault for treating this case with simplicity: they failed to treat it with importance, they treated it like a personal case,” Mabirizi told ‘Faceoff.’
“Sseggona and team should be sued for incompetence, they are so incompetent.”
He also hit Sseggona and team for being lazy and looking for excuses.
“Their client reached out to them to draft a petition. On Friday they asked the court to file on Saturday; the court gave them two more days they came at 3pm,” went on Mabirizi.
“The petition must be the finest work any lawyer would have done because it comes only once in five years. I read through the petition and it was a pure mockery.”
Verbatim: What else did Mabirizi say?
They were able to say ‘yes we can beat the deadline.’ A few days later they came back to court saying we want to amend. That was unserious.
Sseggona was the lawyer who filed the petition, he can not be the same lawyer seeking to amend.
He had enough time to get the petition right, he can not come again and say I have seen something different, who is he fooling?
When they filed the petition, primarily, they came with just one affidavit. A case of this magnitude and you come with a single affidavit 11 days later; no single affidavit had been filed.
Sseggona said he had many more affidavits and when he got more time, he only came with 50 affidavits, then he returns and says we have an extra please allow us, that is foolery.
You are given a timeframe and you are failing at every level, no wonder they withdrew the petition.
Circumstances are very different, in the Mbabazi case, Severino Twinobusingye and team filed a petition.
Then when Mbabazi hired another senior lawyer Mohamed Mbabazi, he sought to amend because he was not the one who wrote the petition.
He needed to get control of this petition hence an amendment was required.
This is different because Sseggona and team wrote the petition: they can not claim they did not go through it.
They thought it was a land case.
That is why someone just goes to Kamwokya and says I am withdrawing; they have no idea about the technicalities.
The rules say you just support the petition to withdraw with two affidavits, including that of the petitioner stating he had not been bribed; still, they could not do it.
Additional reporting: courtesy
