Statement On The Unlawful Arrest, Detention And Trial Of Ugandan Writer Kalundi Serumaga

We, friends, colleagues and fellow writers from East Africa and beyond, wish to condemn in the strongest terms possible, the unlawful arrest, torture and detention of Mr. Kalundi Serumaga.

We note that the unlawful arrest of Mr. Serumaga, a writer, broadcaster and filmmaker, by irregular security operatives on the night of Friday September 11, 2009 is a sad development in the fast deteriorating human rights situation in Uganda.

The arrest, which amounted to forcible abduction, and the physical abuse to which Mr. Serumaga was subjected, amounts to torture, is outlawed in the Ugandan Constitution. His detention at unknown locations in Kampala city over the night of Friday and Saturday morning is once again clearly in breach of the Ugandan Constitution. All these make the charges brought against him not just a charade, but also an insidious attempt to sideline and silence Mr. Serumaga.

The mistreatment of Mr. Serumaga only highlights the predicament of hundreds of people in Uganda who have since last week been thrown into detention:

It is an abuse of the freedom of expression, association and a clear violation of human rights.

We as writers in East Africa urge governments in the region as well as the international community to put pressure on the Ugandan government to ensure that the charges brought against Mr. Serumaga as well as others held in detention are dropped without condition given they are politically motivated and targeted at curtailing freedom of speech.

Abduction
According to witnesses at the scene as well as statements from Mr. Serumaga himself, the writer was accosted and dragged into a car, as he was leaving the television station where a weekly talk show in which he is a regular guest, had just ended.

“I came out of the TV station and four guys grabbed hold of me and forced me into a car,” Mr. Serumaga said by telephone on Sunday from the Central Police Station in Kampala. “They were dragging me literally on my back and dumped me into the back of the car. They were punching and kicking me and for some strange reason trying to undress me.”

Mr. Serumaga was abducted after leaving a weekly television talk-show, Kibazo on Friday, which was discussing the on-going stand-off between the Museveni government and the Kingdom of Buganda. His partner Maria and fellow panelists Charles Rwomushana and Bernard Tabaire plus show host Peter Kibazo witnessed the abduction.

That state forces were brazen enough to abduct a well-known media personality in the presence of witnesses is an extremely worrying indication of the direction the Ugandan government is taking against perceived critics. It is chillingly reminiscent of similar scenes from Uganda’s violent past during which prominent personalities were abducted and disappeared by the State.

The treatment of Mr. Serumaga is a sad throw-back to a generation ago when his own father, the playwright, actor, novelist and freedom fighter Robert Serumaga was persecuted by the Idi Amin government, and later murdered in 1980.

We are worried that the charges of sedition brought against Mr. Serumaga today, September 15, 2009, are the start of a tragically familiar pattern of intimidation and repression.

Kalundi himself spent much of the 1970s and `80s living in exile and did not return to Uganda until the 1990s, where he worked variously as the Director of the National Theatre, Director of Panos Eastern Africa, and is currently an independent filmmaker as well as the host of a popular radio talk show in Kampala.

That Mr. Serumaga should be subjected to similar treatment as his father by a government that came to power vowing to permanently rid Uganda of the ills of the past, is an indication of how far it has strayed from its stated goals.

Torture and Interrogation
During the night of September 11, Mr. Serumaga was interrogated and tortured. He says that one of his assailants at one point held him by the throat while asking him such questions as “Is the president your son?”

The methods used to torture him, he says, included twisting his fingers backwards, punches and kicks, poking his eyes as well as attempts to choke him.

Because of the rapid reaction of the media, Mr. Serumaga was later transferred to the Kampala Central Police Station where he was put in a cell with young men, most of them in their 20s, the youngest of whom looked to be about 14 years old. The oldest was about 30 years old.

Mr. Serumaga reported that the young men all looked to have been badly beaten.

Ethnic Abuse
The riots in Kampala and its satellite towns, took on disturbing ethnic overtones, with the events being interpreted as a Buganda insurrection. There could be dire implications if this becomes a trend.

Said Mr. Serumaga, “Technically I was not arrested. I was kidnapped. It was open racist abuse. There was no pretence. It was just abuse by people from western Uganda. Later they brought someone who said he was Lugbara (from northern Uganda) and who said he did not like what I said on TV.”

At the CPS, Mr. Serumaga says that security personnel frequently came to their cell where “they heaped abuse on us”, he said by telephone from Kampala. “They abused us for being Baganda, for being stupid. They said the Kabaka was using us as toilet paper.

‘Why do you want to chase everyone from Buganda?’ they asked us”

There were also disturbing reports that members of the local council of the locale where Mr. Serumaga resides just outside the city, may have been forced into making allegations against Mr. Serumaga. The chairman of the local council, the basic unit of local government in the country was, along with other individuals from the area, pulled into a van by pistol-wielding individuals.

FREE KALUNDI

Having considered all this, in summary we wish to reiterate the following:

1. The treatment to which Mr. Kalundi Serumaga was subjected is clearly extra-judicial.

2. The Ugandan Constitution bans the use of torture.

3. Abduction of persons, in this case of Mr. Serumaga, without a warrant, is against the law.

4. The arrest first, and later charging of Mr. Serumaga, clearly indicates that the action of the State is indefensible before any court of law.

5. The use of racially/ethnically charged language against Mr. Serumaga, within Ugandan police/security precincts is a worrying sign that he was not only being persecuted because of the views he expressed, but also because of his ethnic background. This is a manner unbecoming of state officials, and does not bode well for peace and security.

6. The unquestioned transfer of Mr. Serumaga from “unknown” locations into police brings into question the relationship of the Uganda Police and other “unknown” security bodies, especially those that use extra-legal means of conduct

7. We unequivocally demand that the State drop all charges brought against Mr. Serumaga and unconditionally free him.

East African Writers

This statement is endorsed by the following :

1.Muthoni Garland
2.Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor
3.Simon Wachira
4.Anjali saini
5.Ngwatilo Mawiyoo
6.Daniel Waweru
7.Emmo Opoti
8.Billy Kahora
9.Parselelo Kantai
10.Angela Wachuka
11.Al Kags
12.Ronald Elly Wanda
13.F Simiyu Barasa
14.Betty Wamalwa Muragori
15.Tony Mochama
16.Paul J. Goldsmith
17.Shalini Gidoomal
18.Morris Mwavizo
19.Stephen Derwent Partington
20.Wambui Mwangi
21. Rasna Warah
22. Dave Nyambati
23.Ogova Ondego
24.Binyavanga Wainaina
25.Morris Mwaviso
26.Doreen Baingana
27.Kiggundu Fred
28.Jacqueline Nereah
29.Emer Cronin
30.Dr Lizzy Attree
31.Patrick Steel
32.Dana Bustamante
33.Wanyama P
34.Lucy Goldsmith
35.Felix Kyalo
36.Lauren Rosenberg
37.Zuhura Maksud
38.Minda Magero
39.Judy Kibinge
40.Ann Moore
41.Moses Bukenya
42.Joe Pollitt
43.Angela Bukenya
44.Nii Ayikwei Parke
45.Petina Gappah

(To endorse this petition please leave your name in the comments section below)

Appeal From PEN International:

Please send appeals:
* Expressing concern that Kalundi Serumaga appears to be detained solely for having commented on the recent disturbances in Kampala and Kayunga in recent days;
* Adding alarm at the reports that he has been beaten in custody, sustaining injuries that require hospital treatment;
* Therefore calling for Kalundi Serumaga to be released and for assurances that he will not face prosecution on charges that contravene the UN International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights to which it acceded in 1995 and which specifically guarantees the right to freedom of expression, and protection against torture and ill-treatment.

President:

Yoweri Museveni
Parliament Building
PO Box 7168
Kampala, Uganda
Fax: + 256 414 346 102
Email: info@gouexecutive.net Salutation: Your Excellency

Minister for Security:

Amama Mbabazi
Ministry of Security
Office of the President
P.O. Box 7168
Kampala, Uganda
Fax: +256 414 344012 Salutation: Dear Minister

If sending appeals after 24 September 2009, please contact us at the address below for any updates.

For further information please contact Tamsin Mitchell at the Writers in Prison Committee of International PEN, Brownlow House, 50-51 High Holborn, London WC1V 6ER Tel: +44 (02) 20 7405 0338 Fax: +44 (0) 20 74050339 Email: tamsin.mitchell@internationalpen.org.uk