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Uganda: Arrested Officials in Bad Health
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The Monitor (Kampala)
23 July 2008
Posted to the web 23 July 2008
Robert Mwanje, Rodney Muhumuza, and Mercy Nalugo
Two of the three detained Buganda officials are in poor health and need urgent medical attention, relatives said yesterday, as their lawyers petitioned court to order their release.
The claims of ill health were confirmed by Ms Margaret Sekaggya, the director of the Uganda Human Rights Commission, who said in her petition to Speaker Edward Ssekandi that the detainees had suffered poor health in the days since they were taken into custody.
"Two of the detainees have medical conditions requiring urgent medical attention," Ms Ssekagya said in the petition. "One of the detainees, Ms Betty Nambooze Bakireke, has a one-year-old baby who still breast-feeds. She is yearning to breast-feed her baby."
Mr Charles Peter Mayiga, Mr Medard Lubega and Ms Betty Nambooze were arrested on Friday and are being held in different parts of western Uganda.
Mr Mayiga, Buganda's minister for information and cabinet affairs, is being held in Kyenjojo, while Mr Lubega, his deputy, is detained in Kibaale.
Ms Nambooze chairs the kingdom's Central Civic Education Committee, appointed by the Kabaka to fight proposed land law reforms through public activities.
Ms Nambooze's husband, Henry Bakireke, said yesterday: "My wife and Mr Lubega are seriously sick. The two have not received any medical care or 'safe' food from relatives." But Ms Margaret Mayiga, the wife to Mr Mayiga, said her husband was "not in bad health".
The police chief, Maj. Gen. Kale Kayihura, said over the weekend that the trio were being held on charges of promoting war, inciting violence, terrorism and sectarianism.
The charges, he said in a statement, relate to their alleged connections with some armed groups. The groups were not named, but a well-placed police source said yesterday that the three officials were being linked to rebel activity in western Uganda.
"Mr Mayiga and Mr Lubega have already been positively identified by suspected rebels," the source said, adding that the detainees were being taken through what he called "an identification parade".
It remains unclear when the suspects, who have been detained for longer than the 48 hours that are legally allowed, would be arraigned in court.
The police source, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case, said the suspects would be brought to court before Friday. Maj. Gen Kayihura said in a statement sent on Monday that "the investigations are proceeding satisfactorily, and the suspects are cooperating with the Police in their inquiries.
Once the investigations are complete, the files shall be submitted to the Director of Public Prosecutions for further directions."
Buganda Kingdom, which is currently involved in a row with the central government over proposed amendments to the 1998 Land Act, says the charges are trumped-up and intended to humiliate the cultural institution.
Buganda's Emergency Response Committee, formed in the wake of the arrests, claimed yesterday that the central government is "under extreme pressure" to release the detainees.
"Ms Sekaggya, the director of the Human Rights Commission, has made a presentation to a parliamentary committee stating that they have had access to the detainees and that [two of them] are in poor health...," the statement from Mengo said.
"She further states that the unpredictable and constant movement of the detainees to prisons in the farthest corners of Uganda is deliberate psychological torture and must stop immediately."
Nkoba Z'ambogo, a nationwide network of Baganda youth, has threatened to take to the streets if the detainees are not freed, the statement said. Kampala Central MP Erias Lukwago's application seeking an order compelling the Police to release the suspects will be heard today, a Buganda Road Court magistrate said yesterday.
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Additional reporting by Lydia Mukisa and Alfred Nyongesa
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