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Activists move to renew protest marches against trial of civilians in military court

Activists including Agather Atuhaire address journalists in Kampala on January 17, 2025. PHOTO/BUSEIN SAMILU 

What you need to know:

  • On Tuesday, the military court in Kampala further remanded Besigye, Lutale and their co-accused Capt Dennis Oola to prison until February 3, 2024.

Youth activists’ have vowed to resume marching protests against the continued trial of civilians in military courts, pending a Supreme Court decision on the matter.

Speaking to journalists in Kampala on Friday, human rights activists led by Agather Atuhaire decried what they termed as the “worsening impunity of arraigning civilians in military tribunals.”

On Friday, Atuhaire, who is a journalist cum lawyer, revealed that they had successfully petitioned the Supreme Court against the ongoing trial of opposition strongman Dr Kizza Besigye, his aide Obeid Lutale and the summarily trial of their lawyer Eron Kiiza in the military court.

“We managed to deliver the petition on Thursday, but we were roughed up badly,” she told journalists in Kampala.

“Police is now arresting people who are doing the right thing and that’s why we need all Ugandans to rise up now,” she remarked, flanked by several youths, mostly participants in July 2024 anti-graft March to Parliament protest.

“We should resolve to protests. If we keep quiet now, they will build nests on our heads, and their children too will build them and it will go on and on,” Praise Aloikin Opoloje, who was one of the leaders of the July protests said.

On Tuesday, the military court in Kampala further remanded Besigye, Lutale and their co-accused Capt Dennis Oola to prison until February 3, 2024.

They face charges related to national security, firearm possession and treachery while Kiiza was handed a 9-month jail term by the Makindye-based army court.

Activists Friday afternoon castigated Uganda Law Society (ULS) president Isaac Ssemakadde, accusing him of “neglecting Kiiza’s plight.”

“When Ssemakadde was campaigning, he blamed his predecessor of writing too much letters and promised to bang the tables. In a short period, he has written more letters than what his predecessors wrote the entire year,” activist Gideon Kwikiriza said.

Kwikiriza and other youths want Ssemakadde to lead a group of lawyers donned in robes to storm the Supreme Court and demand action from Chief Justice Alponse Owiny-Dollo against trial of civilians in army courts.

“We want the Supreme Court to pronounce itself on trying civilians in military courts because the Constitutional court made it clear that it’s illegal, a decision whose implementation was stayed after government appealed to the Supreme Court whose ruling has now taken over three years,” Atuhaire emphasized.

Activists push for an end to trial of civilians in army court

Ssemakadde was not immediately available for a comment even as Kampala metropolitan deputy police spokesperson Luke Owoyesigyire warned that “law enforcers will be on standby to stop any protests.”