Ntungamo,
01st/May/2012; A freelance reporter with Daily
Monitor in Ntungamo District, Perez Rumanzi, who was arrested by Special Forces
Group (SFG) guarding the first Lady Janet Museveni, has been released on bond after
two days in police custody. He risks facing sedition charges.
Rumanzi, 27, was
arrested by the SFG personnel who ordered the police to detain him for
allegedly interfering with the security of the First Lady. He was covering the
installation of the members of South Ankole Diocese synod at St. Mathew
Cathedral Kyamate in Ntungamo district where Ms. Museveni was the chief guest.
The SFG spokesperson,
Capt. Edson Kwesiga is quoted to have said that Rumanzi had been allowed to
cover the function but his conduct necessitated that he be stopped and that he
was arrested after he told security personnel that their time in government
would also end.
He told Human Rights
Network for Journalists-Uganda (HRNJ-Uganda) that he was a victim of
persecution because he had been cleared earlier in the morning to cover the
function. “I was cleared by security to cover the function, but when I left the
place to off-load pictures from my memory card, I returned and continued taking
others but security people told me I should leave because I had not been
cleared. When they told me to go away, I went and kept the camera and returned
to attend the service because I had just been cleared in the morning. They then
said they did not want me there. They arrested me and called police to detain
me. When I demanded to know what crime I had committed, they said that I was in
the wrong place at the wrong time,” he said.
Upon being told that he
was in the wrong place at the wrong time, Rumanzi short back saying, “It will
once be a right place at a right time for journalists when we have our freedom…..”
He said that he did not
see the charge sheet while entering and coming out of the cells, but the
officer in charge of crime investigations at the police told him that he was
likely to be charged with sedition. The Monitor’ Bureau Chief for Mbarara
Alfred Tumushabe told HRNJ-Uganda that Rumanzi‘s bond papers had the offence of
obstruction.
HRNJ-Uganda commends
the professional way in which the police handled the matter, and the fact that
Rumanzi was not tortured while in detention and was allowed access to his
people.
“We however are
concerned by the way the first lady’s security personnel treated the
journalist. This is not the first time Rumanzi was being turned away from
covering such functions. It is a violation of media freedom and rights provided
by the Constitution. The police should not use a nullified law of sedition to
charge the journalist. The matter should also be expedited to give Rumanzi’s a right
to defend himself in a fair process.” Said the HRNJ-Uganda Programme
Coordinator Wokulira Ssebaggala
For
More Information Contact;
Human Rights Network for Journalists-Uganda
(HRNJ-Uganda)
Kivebulaya Road Mengo Kampala Opp. St.
Marcelino Pre. School
P.O.BOX. 71314 Clock Tower Kampala
Tel: +256-414-272934 / +256-414-667627
E-mail: news@hrnjuganda.org
humanrajournalists@yahoo.co.uk
Website: www.hrnjuganda.org
BLOG: http://hrnjuganda.blogpost.com
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