Curious case of Mukisa: A victim or blackmailer?

On April 22, 2021, Elisha Mukisa wrote a letter addressed to the Deputy Inspector General of the Kenyan police asking for immediate intervention.

In the two-page letter, Mr Mukisa claimed to be in a perilous situation having filed a case of gang rape at Ngong police station under number 37/15/ 04 /2021.

Mr Mukisa further revealed that a Ugandan, he only named Hudson, took him to Kenya.  Hudson was said to have promised to take Mr Mukisa to Canada. Unbeknown to the latter, the former was reportedly running a homosexual organisation in Uganda and Kenya.

While sheltered at the unnamed organisation, Mr Mukisa claimed he was infected with HIV and hepatitis B after being, among others, sodomised.

“… the police at Ngong station can affirm to this,” Mr Mukisa said of the sexual assault before describing the treatment he got from the police as “very demeaning.”

A day before writing the letter, Mr Mukisa had pressed charges against five Ugandans at Ngong Police Station.

The accused included Sulah Mawejje, Chris Wasswa, Rodgers Ainebyoona, Stephen Ssebuma, and Robert Luzinda. They were accused of “wilfully and intentionally causing their penis to penetrate [Mr Mukisa’s] anus without [his] consent.”

Mr Mukisa’s evidence was supported by two statements made by two Kenyan police detectives—North Kajiado and Polly Kanana.    

Mr Kaijiado said he had received a phone call from another officer notifying him about a Ugandan who had been allegedly ganged raped within the Matasia area, north of Kiserian Town. Upon arriving at the scene of the alleged crime, Mr Kaijiado said Mukisa identified five of the suspects as the ones that had gang raped him.  “The victim was escorted to Nairobi Women’s hospital where he was examined and treated and also the doctor confirmed that there was a swelling and bruises around his anal area,” Mr Kaijaido revealed.   

Following those charges, Mr Mukisa complained to the Kenyan deputy Inspector General of Police that his life was now in danger. He added that his family members back in Uganda were being threatened with violence from community members who were asking him to withdraw the case. 

“It is therefore premised on the above background that I proceed to request that you find it fit and allow my request for protection, shelter under the witness protection unit in the interest of the case still at hand,” he said.

Dismissed

The case was, however, dismissed by the Kenyan magistrate court at Ngong after the state decided to withdraw the charges. 

“The application to have the matter withdrawn by the prosecutor under section 87 (a) CPC (Code of Civil Procedure) is allowed. All accused persons are discharged thereof,” Principal Magistrate Irene Ngotho Ruguru ruled, adding, “All sureties are equally discharged and securities deposited in court can be released to them.” 

Before taking issues to the authorities on April 15, 2021, Mr Mukisa had taken to social media to write in an anti-human trafficking support group. He claimed that he was a Mengo Senior School student who had been trafficked to Kenya by what he termed as “homosexual people.”

He further revealed that he was being held against his will with other innocent Ugandans and being “sodomised night and day.”

“All I need is to come back home, I need help in coming back home [because I’m] apparently financially constrained and I have lost my phone were (sic) my contacts to my family are [because] they confiscated them all just asked our [askari] who accepted to help,” he wrote.   

While Mr Mukisa claimed to be a Mengo Senior School student on social media, he had earlier told the police in Kenya that he was a second-year catering and hotel management student at YMCA in Kampala.  

“I do recall that during the month of December 2020, Raymond and Brian—my friend who is in USA—called me on my mobile phone and told me that there were opportunities in Kenya for going abroad through the UNHCR (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees) and especially when you say you are gay, you are settled in Canada or United States,” Mr Mukisa said.  

Back in the news

Now back in Uganda, Mr Mukisa has yet again dragged himself into another gay maelstrom. This came after he recently took to social media to accuse Small Minorities Uganda (SMUG)—a non-governmental organisation that advocates for gay rights in Uganda—of pressuring not only him but other minors into acting in gay pornographic movies. He added that a reward of Shs5m was staked.

According to police records seen by Sunday Monitor, Mr Mukisa filed a case against SMUG’s top brass earlier this year, accusing it of human trafficking, recruitment of people into homosexuality, inter-alia.

He told The Weekly Observer midweek that he was shocked when the case that was filed in court was registered as a common assault against Diane Sydney Bakuraika and Hanifah Nabulime.  

A cache of police records seen by this newspaper show that on July 4, 2022, SMUG directors responded to Mukisa’s charges at Kira Police Station by labelling his claims as false and unfounded. 

The dossier says that SMUG only came to know Mr Mukisa after he was released from Kakiri prison. This was after him serving a seven-year jail term having been convicted of defilement by the High Court criminal division.  

“Paralegals referred him to us for medical, food, and clothing support,” SMUG wrote, adding, “A charitable organisation then supported him with the said requests. Mukisa didn’t disclose any known relatives or friends.”

  SMUG dismissed “as unfounded” and “made in bad faith” a claim by Mr Mukisa that he was an employee of SMUG in 2014 who trained as a paralegal.

“Mukisa  Elisha’s alleged duration of employment was serving a prison sentence at Kakiri Main Prison in Jinja. He was convicted on October 16, 2015, and released on June 27, 2020, from Kakiri Main Prison,” the organisation revealed, adding that a prisoner’s road pass was signed by the officer-in-charge at Kaikiri Main Prison—Ben Moses Kuboi. 

“Upon release from prison, he wrote letters of false accusation to Uganda Prisons headquarters against all prisons officers. The matter of which was investigated, and all the officials were exonerated,” SMUG further noted.

Wild accusations?

When contacted, Mr Kuboi corroborated SMUG’s account, saying Mr Mukisa reported “me to my bosses, accusing me of several things, but I think he just has a problem that needs to be diagnosed.”

SMUG further accused Mukisa of blackmailing other NGOs that advocate for sexual minorities such as Human Rights Awareness and Promotion Forum (HRAPF) and Chapter Four. In one of his tirades on social media, Mr Mukisa accused Chapter Four’s Executive Director Nicholas Opiyo of hiring henchmen who hacked into his account. 

“Having exposed his wrong deeds on my former account, he stupidly opted to take such a silly weaked (sic) move simply like any fool would do,” he whined, adding, “Anyway, I have reopened a new one. I want to assure you Nicholas Opio (sic) that I’m in the position of opening as many accounts as I want and exposing your dirty works. You have pressed the wrong button….”

   When contacted, Anthony Masake, Chapter Four’s executive director, said Mr Mukisa had tried to throw dirt at the organisation and its leadership with no supporting evidence.

“He has been making wild claims, which if not checked can land the publisher in legal trouble. You have to be careful with what he tells you,” Mr Masake said.

   Asked if the police were following up on Mr Mukisa’s claims of being recruited into homosexuality, Mr Fred Enanga, the police spokesperson, said they can only act if invited.

“If he has a problem, he has to come to the police and he is checked by medical personnel, but we can’t act on media reports,” Mr Enanga said.  

Although in 2014 Uganda’s Constitutional Court nullified the Anti-Homosexuality Act on grounds that Parliament had passed it without coram, homosexuality is still illegal under Section 145 of the Penal Code Act.

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