EC clears Bobi Wine for 2026 nomination, shifts date to September 24

• The EC has cleared Bobi Wine after confirming all endorsement signatures from across Uganda.
• His nomination date was moved from September 23 to September 24 at 2 PM, frustrating NUP’s rally plans.
• Bobi Wine accuses the government of deliberately shifting the date to avoid coinciding with Museveni’s nomination.

The National Unity Platform (NUP) has confirmed how its presidential flag bearer for the 2026 general elections, Robert Kyagulanyi Ssentamu, also known as Bobi Wine, will officially be nominated on Wednesday, September 24, 2025, at 2:00 PM.

The development comes after the Electoral Commission issued NUP a nomination clearance that confirmed that Bobi Wine had successfully submitted the required endorsement signatures from across the country as required.

The Secretary General of NUP, David Lewis Rubongoya addressing the media and party supporters at Kavule however said the delays were not due to a lack of signatures but rather “partisan tendencies” within the Commission.

“The Electoral Commission has informed us that Presidential Candidate Robert Kyagulanyi Ssentamu has successfully gathered all the signatures for his nomination—not because he didn’t have them, but because of the partisan tendencies of the Commission. Thankfully, that has now been cleared,” Rubongoya said.

Rubongoya also expressed disappointment that the EC had rescheduled the nomination date from Tuesday, September 23, to Wednesday, September 24, and shifted the time from 10:00 AM to 2:00 PM, frustrating the party’s initial rally plans.

It should be noted that Bobi Wine and President Museveni were all scheduled to be nominated on the same day, Tuesday 23rd September.

Meanwhile Bobi Wine himself reacted sharply to the change, accusing the government of deliberately pushing his nomination to avoid coinciding with that of President Museveni.

“As predicted by many Ugandans, the ridiculous claims about us not submitting enough signatures were intended to push our date of nomination. The cowardly regime did not want us to be nominated on the same day as Museveni,” Kyagulanyi said.

He noted that despite writing to the EC requesting a 10:00 AM slot on September 23, the Commission instead placed his nomination at 2:00 PM on the following day.

“Pushing it to 2:00 PM is clearly intended to frustrate our plans to have two rallies because the first one was meant to begin at midday. But since we know how they normally behave, as soon as they started those stories, we moved ahead of them and booked both Katwe Grounds and Kaala Playground (Nateete) for both dates. Nothing will stop the revolutionary cause,” he added.

NUP has since declared that the much-anticipated public holiday for its supporters will fall on September 24 the day of nomination.