How the state protects those who kill for it

Since Jan. 22, when a Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) operation to demolish illegal structures in Port Bell Luzira left at least one person dead and several injured, an angry public has demanded tough action against the killers. Many say the killings are the latest by “untouchable” government operatives and a sign of a return to the dark days of Idi Amin when security operatives committed murder with impunity.

But those seeking justice appear to have suffered a setback when one of the main suspects in the murder case, KCCA Planning Director, George Ninsima Agaba, was released from custody on police bond and without charge.  The Director of Public Prosecutions office reportedly advised the police that charges against him were not sustainable. The DPP’s action has been criticised by the Uganda Law Society (ULS) which announced it would prosecute Agaba for his role in the murders if the DPP does not.

The saga started on Jan. 22, when Agaba, who is in charge of the KCCA demolition squad arrived in Luzira with any army of enforcement staff wielding claw bars, sticks, and batons and ordered his bulldozers to start razing  structures that had allegedly been erected without authorization. The condemned structures included roadside kiosks and stalls, and residential houses. Newspaper reports said the demolished buildings housed between 60 and 70 families. KCCA claims they were erected on a road reserve.

Area local administration leaders said the evictions were carried out with notice to them, the police, and the victims.

During the eviction, a dismayed crowd pleaded with Agaba to halt the evictions for a few minutes to let them salvage some household property but he refused.

“We gave you 28 days eviction notice. We can’t accept anything,” Agaba told the pleading residents.

Soon gunshots were fired as desperate victims threw themselves at the enforcement officers; soon four people lay on the ground. One was dead, while the other three were seriously wounded. The gun that shot them, an AK47 automatic rifle, was Agaba’s. He picked it from his truck and attempted to fire it when the mayhem erupted.  Although the gun jammed when Agaba tried to fire it, his bodyguard, Santos Komakech Makmot, was more successful when he took hold of it.

Video news footage of Santos Komakech Makmot shooting at unarmed civilians gives the impression he was enjoying himself with sadistic glee. Clad in blue jeans pants and long-sleeved white shirt Makmot shot one dead and left three wounded in a twinkling of an eye. When the AK47 run out of ammo, Makmot, with an aura of satisfaction, remembered he also had a pistol at the hip under his shirt. He pulled it out and fired off a few volleys.

Many who saw the video are angry that only Makmot was remanded to Luzira Maximum prison and Agaba, the one who handed him the gun has been let free. It is alleged that Agaba, like others before him who have committed heinous crimes but walked off scot-free, has powerful godfathers in the government.

The brandishing of guns by state operatives like Makmot and Agaba has recently become all too common. Characteristically, the security operatives dress up in civilian clothes.

Another memorable recent incident involved Gilbert Arinaitwe, who publically brutalised Uganda’s opposition leader Kizza Besigye at Mulago Roundabout on April 28, 2011 in scenes that shook the world. An observer asked: If they can torture such a prominent person in broad daylight and under the glare of media cameras, local and international, what heinous crimes do they not commit in their chambers; the so-called “safe houses”?

Around the same time Arinaitwe tortured Besigye, a two-year old baby was shot in the arms of her mother in Masaka. They were locked up inside their house as marauding security operatives hunted down protesters. One of the security operatives, later identified as Paul Mugenyi, aimed his gun at the closed door and fired. The baby died. Mugenyi walked away scot-free.

When the royal burial grounds of the Buganda kingdom, the Kasubi Tombs which are a UNESCO heritage site, were burnt in March 2010 at least three civilians lost their lives after plain clothed security operatives shot at the crowds. Cameras caught plain clothed operatives pointing pistols at the unarmed civilians. This was before President Yoweri Museveni visited the scene. In the shootout that followed, 3 civilians were shot dead; the culprits are yet to be brought to book.

The government instituted a commission of inquiry but its findings have not been made public neither has any security personnel been brought before the military court martial. When then- head of the Chieftaincy of Military Intelligence, Maj. Gen. James Mugira, appeared before the inquiry, he identified one of the commanders as Capt. Napoleon Namanya who denied he fired his gun.

In 2009 more than 27 people were shot dead by Uganda security operatives as demonstration over the government decision to block the Kabaka of Buganda, Ronald Muwenda Mutebi II, from visiting Kayunga district.  Nobody was charged over the killings.

In all these cases, the perpetrators of these acts have neither been brought to courts of law nor been severely punished. In 2005 a military squad baptized “black mamba” attacked the High Court in Kampala to re-arrest PRA suspects who had been granted bail.  The security operatives assaulted some of the suspects and their lawyers. But the despicable actions of the black mamba, condemned as a “rape of the temple of justice” by one the judges, went unpunished as the government shielded the squad. Usually, the attacks are against opposition politicians, especially those from the Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) of Besigye.

After the Agaba incident, FDC’s Deputy Spokesman, Toterebuka Bamwenda, told The Independent: “We condemn the act and the culture of killings by armed men in civilian attire. We demand that police institutes strict rules on the use of firearms. We also demand that security agencies immediately cease the deployment of plain-clothed officers for covert operations”.

The impunity of Uganda’s overzealous security operatives and the failure of the government to either restrain them or bring them to book is being contrasted with the responsibility taken by Kenya’s president Mwai Kibaki who suspended the Deputy Chief Justice, Nancy Baraza, for bruising a supermarket guard, Rebecca Kerubo, and threatening her with a gun.  Baraza had refused to be searched, a routine security measure after increase in Al Shabaab attacks in Kenya. The suspension of Baraza clearly showed that no one is above the law in Kenya and justice should be served to all regardless of whatever their station on earth.

But Uganda seems not to be learning any lessons. George Agaba, who pulled the gun from the car in attempt to shoot at the unarmed civilians, seems to be on his way off the hook.

Briefs on cases of individual operatives

Jan. 2012: Police officer Santos Komakech Makmot shot at unarmed civilians killing one and injuring three others instead of shooting in the air to disperse the crowd. He is now remanded in Luzira prison but his boss George Agaba who handed him the gun was released on police bond.

April 2011: Gilbert Arinaitwe viciously attacked Besigye in April 2011 temporarily blinding him leading to hospitalization in full glare of cameras. Arinaitwe is a free man and no known punishment has been meted out on him.

April 2011: Peter Bimanywa, the operations commander of the Masaka Reserve Force, was arrested for commanding the soldiers that indiscriminately shot at Walk-to-Work protesters in April 2011 that left 2 year-old baby Julian Nalwanga dead.

April 2011: Paul Mugenyi, a reserve force operative attached to Masaka Reserve Force central barracks was arrested in connection with baby Julian Nalwanga’s death. After the murder police boss Lt. Gen. Kale Kayihura paraded Mugenyi to the residents at the home of Aloysius Walusimbi promising that he would be charged in the court martial and left the bereaved family with Shs 1 million. But Mugenyi and Bimanywa are yet to be court-martialed.