Journalists boycott police at UNEB press conference
Journalists boycott police address during the UNEB presser on Thursday. This follows police brutality towards journalists especially during the ongoing Makerere University strike. PHOTO BY DAMALI MUKHAYE
What you need to know:
- One police officer dressed in their Field Force Unit uniform ordered the journalists to leave immediately saying their time at the scene was over.
- Kampala Metropolitan Police spokesperson Patrick Onyango instead blamed the journalists for being distant from police and getting caught up in the tear gas fire.
Journalists who were on Thursday covering a press conference by Uganda National Examination Board (UNEB, refused to cover a speech by the deputy police spokesperson Polly Namaye, who was at the same conference.
Namaye and UNEB officials had held a joint press conference ahead of Primary Leaving Examinations (PLE). However, journalists declined to pull out their gadgets and cover her speech. Only two journalists from New Vision and a UNEB photographer covered her speech.
The journalists asked her to return back the message to police top bosses about how journalists are discontented with the way police handle them while covering different scenes. They vowed to boycott Police events until there is a mutual understanding.
This followed a number of journalists being beaten and teargassed by police officers while covering Makerere University strike and are currently nursing wounds.
Mr Alex Esagala, a photojournalist with Daily Monitor, clad in fully branded jacket showing he is a media person, was injured on Sir Apollo Kaggwa Road after police fired two teargas canisters at him.
“It was while I was composing to take shots of the students demonstrating that the gas canister exploded between my legs,” he said.
Mr Geoffrey Twesigye, a photographer with NTV Uganda, was not spared either. The two were taken to hospital where they were still receiving treatment by press time.
Mr Lawrence Kitata of Vision Group, who had been arrested on Tuesday and detained at Makerere University Police Post also suffered the same tale.
The police violence forced the press to flee to safety. They reconvened at Kann Hostel near Makerere to cover the student arrests.
One police officer dressed in their Field Force Unit uniform ordered the journalists to leave immediately saying their time at the scene was over.
Kampala Metropolitan Police spokesperson Patrick Onyango instead blamed the journalists for being distant from police and getting caught up in the tear gas fire.
“We always advise journalists that in this kind of operation they should move near us because teargas does not discriminate,” Mr Onyango said.
He promised to inquire into the circumstances under which the journalists were brutalised.
