A police officer restrains a man who was found flogging the effigy.
Police in the Ugandan capital Kampala yesterday arrested a man found flogging an effigy of a person whom he accused of engaging in election malpractice.
Holding a stick and a loudspeaker, the man dressed in a black T-shirt, kept caning the effigy and saying “he should be punished for the crimes he has committed.” The effigy was dressed in a black suit and a green hat.
Mr Patrick Onyango, the Kampala Metropolitan Police spokesperson, said the suspect, who belongs to the Alternative Social Movement, a pressure group, was arrested on Kampala Road.
Mr Onyango added that upon interrogation, the suspect admitted that the move was to show their discontent with the ruling party and its conduct of last month’s elections.
“We are charging the suspect with the offence of common nuisance according to Section 160(1) of the Penal Code Act section 160(1),” Mr Onyango said.
Mr Norman Tumuhimbise, the national coordinator for Alternative Social Movement, confirmed that the arrested person is their member.
“The motive of the demonstration was about challenging the reckless statements that President Museveni stated during his national address on security on Saturday, the President was proud of his UPDF commando unit that has killed people, we found these statements unbecoming, primitive to be said by the fountain of honour,” Mr Tumuhimbise said.
Last week, police in Masaka arrested two people for allegedly circulating leaflets with messages ‘demeaning’ the person of President Museveni.
The leaflets were also inscribed with messages branding Museveni a dictator and castigating his administration for failing to end poverty, nepotism, extrajudicial killings, and human rights abuse.
