One of the Suspects who is charged with Kawempe North legislator Muhammad Ssegirinya and his Makindye West counterpart Allan Ssewanyana has narrated how he was arrested on violating President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni directives on Covid-19 but ended up on murder, terrorism, attempted murder charge sheet.
Appearing before Justice Alice Komuhangi of the High Court Crimes War Division, Jackson Kanyike pleaded with the pre-trial judge to give him the opportunity to address the problems he is going through.
When he was permitted, he revealed that on 8th September 2021, he was arrested by police from Makindye at night and accused of violating Museveni’s directive on curfew.
He said that while he was in police detention, he was given a deal to pin the troubled legislators on masterminding the panga-wielding men who killed 28 elderly people in greater Masaka.
Kanyike explained to the court that when he refused the deal, he was added to the charge sheet and he has been told that the witnesses who are going to testify against him are in detention with him at Kitalya prison, so, he wants to meet them.
“Why would the state want to hide those witnesses if they have enough evidence against us? My lord, I pray that if really those witnesses are available, they shouldn’t be hidden,” Kanyike said.
However, the pre-trial judge advised him to wait for the main trial before the three justices of the Crimes War Division.
In the same development, the legislators have pleaded to the judge to issue a directive to the prison authority to allow them to meet their lawyers at Kigo prison where they are currently being detained.
Ssewanyana said that they have instructed their lawyers to challenge Justice Komuhangi’s ruling allowing the state to hide the witnesses who are going to testify against them in the Constitutional Court but they have been denied the opportunity to discuss the matter with their lawyers.
He explained that when they asked the prison’s authority why they don’t allow them to meet their lawyers, they were told that it was done because of the outbreak of Ebola in the country.
When tasked to explain why they are denying Ssewanyana and Ssegirinya the opportunity to meet their lawyers, Ronald Hakiiza, a prison warder said that it was a directive issued by the authority of the prison to control the spread of Ebola to inmates and the entire community.
He however advised the accused’s lawyers to seek permission from the prisons headquarters in Kampala.
State alleges that the legislators mastermind the crimes to achieve political grounds against Museveni.
