| Mwenda denied bond, faces 5 years in prison | ||
| CHARLES MWANGUHYA MPAGI | ||
KAMPALA The held Monitor journalist Andrew Mwenda will now have to spend the weekend inside the police cells having been denied bond. Mr Nkutu said they requested for bond because "Mwenda had responded to police summons and, besides, he has been charged and bailed before and never jumped bail". The O/C Serious Crime SSP James Habuchiriro, however, turned down the request saying the current sedition case is different and more grave than any of the cases for which Mwenda has been charged before.
Mwenda, who was put in the cells on Friday evening, will appear in court on Monday and may eventually spend up to five years in prison if found guilty of sedition. According to the Penal Code Act (Cap 106), anyone found guilty of sedition "shall be liable on first conviction to imprisonment for a term not exceeding five years or to a fine not exceeding fifty thousand shillings; or to both such imprisonment and fine, and for a subsequent conviction to imprisonment for a term not exceeding seven years". Mwenda, who was held at Central Police Station in Kampala after making a statement before police detectives, is in trouble for allegedly criticising President Museveni and the government on his weekday talk show Tonight with Andrew Mwenda Live on 93.3 Kfm on Wednesday. He allegedly used language that showed him to have seditious intention, which, according to the Penal Code, is an intention to "bring into hatred or contempt or to excite disaffection against the person of the President, the Government as by law established or the Constitution". Monitor lawyer James Nangwala, who accompanied Mwenda through at least three hours of grilling at the headquarters of the directorate of criminal investigations, said the journalist is likely to appear in court on Monday. Mwenda's troubles partly stem from the Wednesday, August 10, edition of his show, which discussed the death of former Sudanese First Vice President John Garang. Dr Garang, who also was the SPLM/A leader, died with 12 others when the Ugandan presidential helicopter he was flying came down under bad weather in southern Sudan on July 30. Earlier on Wednesday, Mr Museveni, incensed by the way the media had reported the Garang accident, warned that he would close any media house that threatens regional security. "Now, any newspaper which plays around with regional security, I will not tolerate it. I will just simply close it, finish, the end," Museveni said during national prayers at Kololo Airstrip for the seven Ugandans who died along with Garang. The President singled out the Daily Monitor and The Weekly Observer newspapers for attack. He specifically mentioned Mwenda, referring to him as a "boy". He warned him against writing on security issues in the newspaper. On Thursday, the Broadcasting Council shut down Kfm and also suspended its broadcasting licence indefinitely allegedly because the station had flouted minimum broadcasting standards as per the First Schedule of the Electronic Media Act Cap 104 2000. Then on Friday, Mwenda was summoned to the CID headquarters at 3:43 p.m. He spent nearly five hours before being transferred to CPS. Lawyers ready Presidential aide Moses Byaruhanga, one of three people Mwenda hosted on the Wednesday show, is reported to have recorded a statement. The chairman of the Broadcasting Council, Mr Godfrey Mutabazi, also is said to have recorded one. The secretary of the Council, Dr Okullu-Mura, was seen at the CID offices on Friday afternoon but it is not clear if he also made a statement. The police detectives also asked the Council to provide them with a recording of the show, which ran between 7 p.m. and 8 p.m. on Wednesday. Monitor lawyers on Saturday described the arrest as an opportunity to challenge the "bad laws that infringe on the constitutional rights of Ugandans". Nangwala said that the law of sedition contravenes constitutional provisions on freedom of speech and _expression_. "This is the opportunity we have been waiting for to challenge this law." The lawyer said that the detention of a journalist on account of a statement he uttered defeats the essence of democracy because he would simply have been asked to explain himself. Arrest condemned "We call on President Museveni to ensure that Andrew Mwenda is released immediately and unconditionally and that KFM is allowed to reopen," said Ms Ann Cooper, the executive director of the CPJ. "Arbitrary censorship and harassment of journalists is not something one expects to see in a democracy." Nkutu spent much of Friday in talks with the Council. "We have had a constructive discussion which we hope will lead to the re-opening of the station," he said. Top opposition leader Mugisha Muntu said that the media would have made a big blunder against democratisation if it backed off amidst the latest assault by the government. "Closure of the [Kfm] station has been drastic," said Mr Ofwono Opondo, the Movement spokesman, while appearing on the Capital Gang talk show on Saturday morning. "In a young state like ours, when the President talks, it's usually likely that security agents interpret is as a directive to act on. "The state has acted in a high-handed manner in this case. Police should have summoned Mwenda and asked him to make a statement then released him to go and come back, because him as an individual and even people at the Monitor are not people who would run away in light of such matters. But these are shortcomings that are rectifiable." The Minister of State for Information, Dr James Nsaba Buturo, said the suspension of Kfm's license does not amount to a closure of the radio station. He said that Mwenda was held to provide further information to the police over and above the comments he made on the show. He said that the journalist's comments "were not only inflammatory but also suggested that he had more information about the death of Garang. The police just wanted him to throw more light." |
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