Lawyers ask court to allow ACTV examine torture of terror suspects

Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | Lawyers representing 15 terror suspects have asked Buganda Road Magistrates Court to allow the doctors from the African Centre for Rehabilitation of Torture Victims to access the prisons and examine the health status of the suspects.

The suspects include money operators Yusuf Muwonge alias Hamza Ssemaganda alias Robert Danze, Shamirah Naddamba, Ismail Kiyemba, a welder, Muniru Bogere, a boda boda rider, Eron Nanfuka, a student, Sharon Nakitende, a tailor and Annet Nakato Nakibirango, a housewife.

The others are business persons Zam Naiga, Ismail Matiwa, Huzaifa, Faisal Nadir Nsubuga, Bashir Jjuuko Kiwanuka alias Fred, Mohammed Kisiitu, Hamuza Bakyayita, a conductor, Jero Ishaq, a shop attendant and Twaha Wambedde, an Imam at Kabila mosque in Nabweru, Nansana municipality in Wakiso district.

The prosecution alleges that between 2017 and 2021, the suspects without any due regard to the safety of other people manufactured, placed and detonated improvised explosives intending to cause death and serious injury which resulted in major economic loss.

It further notes that the five women unlawfully harboured and rendered financial support to the male suspects well knowing that such support will be used in the commission of terrorism acts.

When the matter came up for mention on Thursday before court presided over by Grade One Magistrate Asuman Muhumuza, the State Attorney Patricia Cingtho informed court that investigations into this matter were ongoing and she asked for an adjournment date.

However, the suspects’ lawyer Geoffrey Turyamusiima told court that in the previous session, they tried to raise human rights concerns about their clients but they were told to raise them today. Turyamusiima told court that his clients were tortured because they were charged after they had spent nearly a month in unknown custody thereby infringing on their constitutional right to liberty.

Court has also heard that the accused persons had wounds on their legs, buttocks and hands which Turyamusiima suspected could have been as a result of torture adding that one of them, Zam Naiga appeared to be the most tortured.

He added that another female suspect Sharon Nakitende is heavily pregnant and in the last session, she fainted because of high blood pressure.

Turyamusiima thus asked court to issue an order directing the doctors from the African Centre for Treatment and Rehabilitation of Torture Victims- ACTV to go to various prisons where the suspects are on remand so as to examine whether they were tortured.

ACTV is a non-government organization that was started under the guidance of the International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims (IRCT) and it is dedicated to the promotion and protection of human rights with emphasis on advocacy against torture as well as treatment and rehabilitation of survivors of torture by state and non-state actors.

The magistrate adjourned the case to January 27 for the prosecution to make a response.

Grace Sonko, the mother to one of the suspects Nakitende, has appealed to the government to release her daughter.

The suspects were reportedly arrested with children aged between one year and a half and eleven years and for the heightened.

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