The Cabinet is set to meet this week to discuss shocking allegations that embattled tycoon and NRM CEC contender Hassan Basajjabalaba has been confiscating delegates’ National IDs and secretly ferrying them to Kenya and Tanzania to participate in what security sources describe as “illegal cross-border voting.”
Highly placed government officials confirmed to this newspaper on Sunday that the matter has been placed on the agenda for the next Cabinet sitting, following fresh intelligence briefings submitted by security agencies.
“The President and Cabinet ministers have been furnished with a detailed report on the scheme. It will be a priority issue in Cabinet because it touches not only on party integrity but also on national security,” a senior minister revealed.
Security operatives last week said they were investigating claims that Basajjabalaba and his close associates were coercing delegates by seizing their IDs, holding them hostage, and planning to transport them to Nairobi and Arusha where private venues had allegedly been rented as “NRM polling centres.”
A senior security source described the plot as “a direct assault on Uganda’s electoral sovereignty,” adding that it mirrors the candidate’s history of electoral malpractice and financial scandals.
“This is no longer just an NRM matter. When someone starts creating foreign polling stations and trafficking voters across borders, it becomes a national crisis,” the source emphasized.
Cabinet insiders said the discussion is expected to weigh possible sanctions against Basajjabalaba, including disqualification from the CEC race and prosecution under electoral laws. “No one is above the law,” another minister noted. “If these allegations are proven, he has no business seeking leadership.”
The revelations come as several NRM delegates from Busoga, Karamoja, West Nile and Mbarara have already rejected Basajjabalaba’s candidacy, accusing him of abandoning the business community and using his position for personal enrichment.
With Cabinet now stepping in, analysts say the scandal has escalated into the biggest test yet for Basajjabalaba’s troubled political career.
