[Ugnet] Over 190 Civilians in Makindye Barracks

Scores of civilians are languishing in Makindye Military Police Prison without trial. At least 195 civilians have been the prison for the last two years. But the head of Military Police, Lt Col Dick Bugingo, contested the figures of the civilian detainees and reports that there was any hunger strike a fortnight ago.

"I have given people access to this place to look for the civilian detainees but they could not see them and even if they are there they are not 195," Bugingo said on telephone.

" I do not know that the prisoners here have been on hunger strike, that's not true," he said.

The prisoners, most of whom were arrested by Operation Wembley personnel in the 2002 anti-armed robbery campaign, have been kept incommunicado and have not been produced before the General Military Court Martial (GCM) - chaired by Lt. Gen. Elly Tumwine.

Sources inside the prison said even the prisoners' three-day hunger strike a fortnight ago did not sway the army authorities. The prisoners were protesting against their prolonged detention.

"We have been kept here for two years now without trial. What these people have resorted to is to keep us here and we have no hope of ever getting out," one of the prisoners told The Monitor in an interview inside the prison.

The Military Police prison facility houses about 500 detainees, split in two groups.

About 86 prisoners, 76 of whom are civilians are kept in a go-down," a source said.

"They do not come out, they do not receive visitors, they do not get bail or trial," he said. The other 119 civilians are in the general remand section and have appeared before the GCM but the cases have stalled.

Tumwine is on a military course in Kimaka, Jinja. He has only weekends to attend to the court.

Over 100 detainees in the remand section staged a hunger strike two weeks ago demanding justice. Sources said six ringleaders have since been removed from the general cell and detained separately.

The Military Police leadership is said to have convened several meetings over the strike.

"If we do not get justice, we will resume the strike until we die," a civilian prisoner said.

In 2002, at the height of armed robberies in Kampala city, President Museveni gave Col. Elly Kayanja the mandate to hunt and rid the city of robbers.

Several robbers were killed and several hundreds were detained. The presidential orders also stipulated that whoever was found with a firearm should be tried before the General Court Martial. Operation Wembley led by Col Elly Kayanja came under fire for using brutal interrogation methods.

The army has been accused by several human rights groups including Amnesty International and New York-based Human Rights Watch of carrying out severe human rights abuses on the civilian population in the north of the country.

The organizations have issued several reports accusing the army and other government security agencies of committing multiple abuses including summary detentions, execution, torture, rape and child recruitment. The army has persistently dismissed the reports as unrehearsed and false.

[Ugnet] Over 190 Civilians in Makindye Barracks

Reply via email to