Uganda’s justice system under NRM is on trial

Makawa himself was praised on social media, by the police and in Parliament for displaying admirable self-restraint in the face of Basisha’s attack. So far so good. It’s a clear example of how today’s smartphones work magic and capture such moments, and over the last decade, these ubiquitous smartphones have helped catch many accidents, racist acts of police brutality in the United States, pickpockets, reckless drivers. and more. A Ugandan police officer showed his professionalism by not retaliating when he was allegedly assaulted by Bashisha, and the Ugandan civil courts did their part by charging him. It turns out the story is not as clear-cut as it seems.

On Thursday, October 24, Daily Monitor columnist Nicholas Sengoba posted a separate video of the same incident in Lugogo involving Basisha and Makawa on his X/Twitter page. This video, also shot by a smartphone, showed scenes that allegedly occurred a few minutes before Basisha began his attack. In Makawa. This second video shows the police officer allegedly beating Basisha. From the perspective of the criminal investigation, a question arises: Which of the two videos was shot first, the one showing Basisha attacking the police or the new video showing the police attacking Basisha?

I bring up all of this to show the complexity of today’s world. Everything is not as it seems. The ever-present smartphone, which has now done so much to spontaneously capture moments and events almost everywhere, can capture a moment but may lead the public to form an incomplete and inaccurate perception because it does not capture several previous moments. A look at what really happened.

Before I saw the video Sengoba shared, I posted the following suggestion on Twitter: “One of the laws that the president of the Uganda Law Society (Isaac Ssemakadde) is on the table to help repeal is the ban on the media from discussing matters before the courts. Our legal system is so corrupt that court proceedings are not publicly available.” By opening it to the court, justice can be better served.” My proposal to the Uganda Law Society by Ssemakadde to repeal the law on the court came from the depressing news about the 16 supporters of the Opposition National Unity Platform (NUP).

Olivia Lutaaya and 27 other NUP supporters appeared before the Makindye Military Court Martial for the 56th time on September 9 to answer to the charges, whose trials have not started since their arrest in 2021. They had maintained their innocence since 2021. “We have been informed that representatives of the regime have secretly reached out to these comrades and their relatives, threatening them with even harsher punishment if they do not accept the charges against them,” NUP President Robert Kyagulanyi said in a statement on September 10. .

The representatives also continued to harass them to drop the party lawyers representing them in exchange for military lawyers.” On 8 October, Kampala Deputy Mayor Doreen Nyanjura visited Lutaaya and in a Twitter post on 14 October, she said: “He (Lutaaya) ) He told me that he had decided to plead guilty to regain his freedom, he broke down and cried but added: (Your Honor, I have been here for four years!”

Youth Minister Balaam Barugahara visited Kitalya prison on October 13 and reportedly asked NUP supporters to admit their crimes so that they could be granted their freedom. Lutaaya and 15 other NUP supporters pleaded guilty to the charges at a military court on 14 October. NUP lawyer Marvin Saasi and NUP general secretary David Rubongoya visited the military court on 14 October. Saasi wrote on Twitter: “(We) went to court martial today… and found Olivia Lutaaya (and) other political prisoners . He (Barugahara) asked Olivia if she pleaded guilty.

‘Yes,’ he replied. He repeated his question twice. He continued his answer. “So what happened in Kitalya prison on October 13? The sequence of events and the general background clearly show that Balaam Barugahara, on his own initiative, negotiated a plea bargain with NUP supporters or was sent by him. The state, with a particularly cruel and cynical approach, tried to negotiate a plea bargain with Instead of fulfilling its part, the State used these confessions of crime, obtained not through physical torture but by taking advantage of traumatized NUP members, as “evidence” and had failed to impose sentences that appeared legitimate on paper since mid-2021. The General Military Court sentenced 16 NUP supporters to three months and 22 days in prison for attempting to overthrow the government and possessing bombs and other explosive devices.

It is unclear whether Barugahara initiated the plea bargain as a personal move out of sympathy for his job as Minister of Youth, or whether he was asked by the state NRM to lead this movement and then used the confessions to go behind the State’s back. NUP supporters. This, then, is the legal environment we live in and explains why the most unlikely maverick, Ssemakadde, was elected president of the Law Society of Uganda by a margin of 69.5 per cent. This is not just the usual political bickering and agitation. Uganda lives under an autocratic regime that is rapidly turning into a fascist regime.

The arbitrariness with which public servants are dismissed by the appointing authority, the appalling injustice that thousands of Ugandans face as they are evicted from their lands, and the sheer, broad daylight impunity that we experience every day in public life, cannot but signal an impending state. breaking point. To be fair, in the case of Mercy Basisha the state acted in good faith and with a sense of justice. However, as I explained at the beginning, the second video changes the entire narrative and shows why the government needs to fine-tune. investigation mechanism.

Finally, the way I bring together these two cases, Basisha and NUP supporters, is proof enough why the judicial system can no longer be the sole arbiter of justice. This should be on the minds of every lawyer, prosecutor, journalist, political party activist, human rights defender and Western diplomat as we begin to look forward to the momentous 2026 General Elections. The opposition’s previous post-election petitions were rejected on the grounds that the evidence presented was “insufficient” to overturn the election result.

Given that the prying eyes of smartphones are everywhere these days, occasionally capturing vital evidence like in Basisha’s case, shouldn’t random citizens, journalists, and idle bystanders be given a greater say in court matters? The Nakawa Magistrate’s Court is considering after reading this new evidence I have presented in the Bashisha case, thanks to my chance encounter with a post by columnist Sengoba and also collating the valuable statements of Bobi Wine, Marvin Saasi and Doreen Nyanjura on Twitter. ?We saw the arrest and re-arrest of former Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) chairman Kizza Besigye in the Supreme Court in November 2005 and the new norm of re-arrest of suspects after the Supreme Court granted bail.

The reality here is that the biggest challenge facing Ugandan courts today is not the verdicts delivered by the news media, but the total impunity, pressure on judges and the military occupation of court buildings by the NRM state.

The reason I am keen on the law, the courts and the recent Uganda Law Society election is because the NRM state uses the law and the courts to give its autocratic tendencies the appearance of respectability and adherence to due process.