Drama, pain and comedy at police CID offices

One place that you would least expect anything to tickle you is the Criminal Investigations Directorate headquarters at Kibuli in Kampala District.
The imaginary impression is the place you would be finding tough-talking detectives carrying green, red and pink files, dragging their shamed handcuffed suspects and depressed complaints.
Although it is often the case, some of these incidents happen in a very dramatic way that you could even think that they are choreographed. Suspects or summoned people throw lines that would only take professional theatre gurus months to craft. And detectives can dramatise an incident to appear as if their real intention is to throw everyone into bouts of laughter.
One case that exhibited so much drama was the investigation of defamation of Miracle Centre Pastor Robert Kayanja, by pastors: Martin Ssempa of Makerere Community Church, Solomon Male of Arise for Christ, Bob Kayiira, Annet Kyomuhendo and Michael Kyazze, pastors of Omega Healing Centre.
The investigations followed a boy, Samson Mukisa, who swore an affidavit claiming that he had been sodomised by Pastor Kayanja.
When Mukisa was arrested, he became a magnet for journalists. Members of the fourth estate pitch-camp at Kibuli to know his whereabouts.
Detectives wanted to sneak him out of CID offices to take him to Buganda Road Chief Magistrate’s Court to record an extrajudicial statement retracting his earlier statements.
The challenge was they didn’t want journalists to follow them to court.
So, he was taken from one building to another as journalists sniffed a goldmine until they kept him in one office for long. Journalists sat metres away from the only entrance of the building as they waited for police’s next move.
As journalists engaged in a conservation, a driver drove his truck towards them then reversed blocking their sight of the only entrance.
The journalists switched their eyes from the entrance to the reversing truck. It was then that the detectives hurried Mukisa in a sedan and drove off.
It took a while for journalists to realise that the person they had long waited for had already been taken away.
Journalists made calls to their colleagues at Buganda Road Court to capture the moment. Many photographers waited for the moment at court in vain. They had expected for a handcuffed suspect, but Mukisa was brought in wearing a motorcycle helmet and he walked past many journalists at the court entrance without notice.
After Mukisa’s extra judicial statement, the case was set in motion. The pastors except Annet Kyomuhendo and Michael Kyazze became like permanent furniture at CID headquarters.
The more they appeared, the more the media sustained the coverage. It became a political issue and pressure mounted on the detectives.
One day, pastors Male and Ssempa came out of the office of the then CID director, Edward Ochom, indifferent.
They instantly rejected media interview about what had happened. It has been their style to brief the media about their interaction with the detectives.
“No! No!” Pastor Male said as he pushed away journalists’ microphones from his face.
Pastor Ssempa just kept rubbing his eye as he made long strides away from the CID. Kayiira was pushing journalists to talk to Pastor Male.
Each of the trio constantly stole an eye at Mr Ochom and his deputy Moses Sakira, who were closely watched everything at their balcony.
Many journalists left in anger. When Pastor Male was out of the confines of CID Kibuli gate, he, for the first time gave an interview where he preferred to be anonymous.
“Mr Ochom told us that he had the powers to keep us in jail from 48 hours. He told us that if we dare talk to any journalist after meeting him, he was to invoke his powers,” Pastor Male told a few journalists.
It was the fear of spending two nights in jail that pastors had to zip up their mouths. They were later prosecuted and convicted.
Often times, journalists ensure that they talk to suspects as soon as they arrive at CID headquarters to understand their side of the story before talking to the detectives. There are times suspects are interrogated and you never talk to them again after they have been detained.

Kirumira’s time
So as a matter of routine, journalists arrive before 10am, the time the detectives often tell the suspects to report.
But when city businessman Godfrey Kirumira, was summoned to record a statement on the irregular transfer of money to his account, he knew that journalists will be waiting for him.
He reported at 7:30am and no journalist was around. Unfortunately, he went to a wrong building and office. At 10am, he had to walk to the CID director, Ms Grace Akullo’s office, which is 20-metre long walkway.
He was like a model walking on the runway and every journalist wanted him filled in his or her camera frame.
It was torturous. He never stopped talk to someone on phone until he had entered the director’s office.
Journalists had to wait for another opportunity when he is done with the interrogation to talk to him.
Just a few minutes in Ms Akullo’s office, we saw her running out to collect her officers and making repeated calls. The rush showed urgency, which the journalists sniffed.
“He has collapsed,” one detective told his colleague.
Soon the police ambulance arrived and medics rushed inside Ms Akullo’s office.
Kirumira’s aides and relatives’ worry wasn’t about the patient, but the media capturing him being lifted into the ambulance. Everything was done to block any capture of photographs and footage.
They succeeded.
He was driven to a clinic without anyone talking a photograph of him in an embarrassing situation. No journalist talked to him at police.
We were later told how he first complained about high temperatures in the room. Windows were opened. He didn’t cease complaining of the same. Then the fan was switched on. He unbuttoned his shirt.
It was then that Ms Akullo run out of office to get help. The head of Police medical directorate, Dr Moses Byaruhanga, who responded to the incident, insisted that Kirumira’s health was not good, but some of his close allies said it was his creation to buy time.
It is interesting that the emotional outflow of the relatives of the presumed suspects is more than those summoned. Many times summoned people keep their worries under control unlike their relatives.

Breaking the brave
The summoning of Maj Gen Jim Muhwezi to CID to help detectives with the investigation of a suspected foiled robbery case of Stanbic Bank branch at Garden City, was a classic as relatives emotions can break even the most brave.
Maj Gen Muhwezi was escorted by an entourage including his wife, constituents and soldiers.
“It is a political witch-hunt. These are trumped up charges. I wasn’t even at Stanbic Bank,” Maj. Gen. Muhwezi said upon arrival.
Gen Muhwezi gave his wife an emotional hug that made Suzan Muhwezi’s eyes teary before he entered the CID offices with his lawyer Peter Kabatsi, for interrogation.
His wife and the family tried to play it cool spreading outside chairs in the CID yard as if they were on a holiday at the beach.
But as the day faded, the scorching sun forced Ms Muhwezi to look for a shade. She became impatient. All of the sudden, the weather changed and it started drizzling.
Ms Muhwezi ran to enter the CID building, but the door was intentionally closed as she approached. She quickly made a U-turn in anger.
“They are treating us like this as if they will die in State House,” she said.
After several hours of grilling, Gen Muhwezi was released on bond amid chants from his friends and relatives and they left for their homes.
The extensions of the police bond put a smile to the General’s face.
“I am happy. Can’t you see my face. I am happy and smiling. What time did I come, what time have I left. I am happy,” he said.
The case against him failed after he reported to detectives more than three times.
The fears of some of relatives of the summoned people become real. Some summoned people never return home.
Mr Theodore Ssekikubo, the Lwemiyaga County Member of Parliament, was arrested after election violence in his constituency and brought to CID headquarters.
Ssekikubo’s wife soon visited and waited up to evening. His wife tried to play a brave woman. She laughed and seemed to be not caring about what was going on. Late in the evening, Ssekikubo guided from the CID director’s office to a waiting double cabin. She walked straight into Ssekikubo’s chest and remained there for a while with a tight clasp onto him. Then she released and took off to her vehicle in tears.
Ssekikubo too broke down.
“It is okay. Let me go to jail. I know I will be released,” teary Ssekikubo said as a detective made a slight push for him to enter the car.

HOSTILITY?
Some suspected people can just turn hostile.
One of them was Moses Kasibante, who was then a presenter at Central Broadcasting Services radio. After the closure of CBS radio, he was summoned for inciting hatred and was told to come with a recording of his previous show.
He didn’t carry the recordings. After talking to detectives, he said he couldn’t retrieve recordings since the government had closed the radio station.
Informed that the government had only disconnected their mast, he responded “that is where we kept some of the recordings”.
Mr Mathias Mpuuga was too summoned to the Special Investigations Division, a branch of CID, over an interview he had given Sunday Monitor. The detectives asked him to tell them what he meant in the statement he gave to the Sunday Monitor reporter, Mr Risdel Kasasira.
“I didn’t go to school to interpret for the police things they don’t understand,” he told the detectives.
It was a draw. Detectives told him to go and that they will inform him when they need him. The file has been shelved.

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