Wednesday, June 25, 2014

Here is how FHRI is a partner with tortuous state agencies



                                                                                     Vincent Nuwagaba
C/O Political Science Dep’t
                                                                                           Makerere University
                                                                                                   P.O Box, 7062, Kampala
                                                                                      6th February 2008

H.E the President of Uganda

Dear Sir,


RE: VINCENT NUWAGABA’S  ORDEAL AT CPS AND IN BUTABIKA

Reference is made in reaction to the medical report written about me by Dr Onen of Butabika  Hospital and later confirmed by Dr Kyazze. By the way, what ACTV wanted from Butabika was whether or not I was admitted against my will. Sadly, the two Doctors don’t answer this question.

The report makes glaring and blatant lies about me which I am convinced are aimed at destroying my name. And I am convinced this is deliberate for Dr Onen is one of the people I complained about when I stated like he wrote that Butabika connives with the police and is an accomplice in the torture of innocent citizens.

Let me first draw your attention to the manner in which Dr Onen wrote the report. The language of the report is as though Dr Onen witnessed from step to step what I went through.  I would expect him to write say, Vincent reportedly or allegedly did this or that. Otherwise, looking at the language of the report, one may take the allegations to be the truth.

Dr Onen wrote that on 14th April, police was called because I was busy fighting with everyone on the roadside and that I had destroyed the windscreens of taxis and cars. What a ridiculous allegation! This is why I strongly believe he sat with the police and they together wrote the report. The report is surely not a medical report but a police report. Sadly, for him and his ilk, a lie cannot be sustained for if he wrote that I was arrested on the 14th when the SD reference is 12/11/04/08 who cannot tell that I was arrested on the 11th not 14th. He wanted to portray an impression that I spent only one day in the police cells.

Dr Onen wrote that on 16/4/08 a psychiatrist saw me and noted I had two similar previous episodes of this illness in 1993 and 2000 and confirmed Bipolar Affective Disorder. What an outrageous and inane allegation! On the 16th April 2008, I never talked to anybody for they had sedated me and people who came to see me two days or three days later can attest to this. Secondly, I wish Dr Onen could prove that I had ever been admitted in Butabika.

On 24/4/08, Dr Onen rightly writes that I was taken by friends out of Butabika although he lies about the reasons for which I was temporarily released. If they were sure I was mentally deranged, why didn’t they look for me or why did they let me go without anybody to guarantee I report back?  I went back later and Dr Nakku and Mr Juko started avoiding me having realised the felony they committed against me. In fact, on the 14/5/08 I wrote a letter to the Executive Director of the Hospital complaining about Dr Naku and Juko for having illegally admitted and sedated me in Butabika Hospital after I had ably explained to them that I was tortured, traumatised and dehumanised in the Police cells. I explained in that letter that the conduct of Dr Naku and Mr Juko was antithetical to their medical ethics and called for punitive measures against the duo.

Dr Onen says that the policeman interviewed stated that “I abused the RDC of Kampala and I was detained on 28/5/08 but after my behaviour in the cells I was taken to Butabika as I was aggressive and violent, abusive in CPS, very irritable, very talkative, accusing police of all sorts of things and that I was not sleeping”.
Did Dr Onen expect me to slumber in the police cells where I was being subjected to untold suffering and they were to me synonymous with hell?

The RDC of Kampala Ms Alice Muwanguzi found me in the cells on the 29/05/08. I told her all the ordeal I had gone through: illegal detention, no charges against me, no statement recorded from me, failure to produce me in court and stealing of my property. The RDC told me, “Nuwagaba, let me go and order for your release”. Little did I know I was moving from one torture chamber to another torture chamber but a sophisticated one at that. I had airtime on my phone and when I contacted my relatives and told them the police was kidnapping me,  that’s when the police said I was being taken to Butabika.

Dr Onen wrote that he was asked to see me on 5/06/08, virtually two months after my first detention. If he was not prompted by an ill motive, how does he conclude I was not tortured? In a typical deplorable manner, he wrote that I had no torture marks and therefore I was not tortured. The torture marks were visible, the marks in my neck where they were strangling me were very clear for everyone to see. But also, the absence of torture marks does not mean I was not tortured. What I really went through was hell.

The allegation that I told him that the police stole from me 14 million shillings is a figment and hallucination of his own imagination. I have stated everywhere what the police stole from me; $500, 120,000 shillings, my shoes, watch and my phone plus 540,000 shs for the first and second time respectively. I have also reported the loss of my laptop computer, 2 flash discs, my academic credentials among others. And the prime suspects are the police who stayed with my keys for all the four days I was in the cells. Moreover, I spent two weeks without accessing my house.

Dr Onen had no moral authority to write a report about me.
Although I was incensed and exasperated by Dr Onen’s report, it never surprised me. I was only shocked that for him to buttress his slanted observation he sank so low as to write what evidently has never happened to me. It is my firm conviction that his report was as a result of the conspiracy between him and the police. This is an antithesis of the medical ethics. Surely, if the institutions were working in this country, Dr Onen would lose his practicing certificate and earn himself a passport to Luzira. And until someone proves to me otherwise, I would like to believe that institutions are functional. I am accordingly contemplating pursuing the matter of Dr Onen with the medical council. That said, Dr Onen had no moral authority to write about me because, it is a principle of natural justice that no man can be a judge in his own case. I complain about Butabika and the police. How then would anyone expect a consultant in Butabika to incriminate himself and his colleagues?

About the ACTV observations
With all the due respect, I strongly believe that while writing the report, the ACTV Doctor and Trauma Counsellor, Dr Kyazze and Faith respectively pandered to the whims of Dr Onen. Otherwise, having got the collateral information from my parents and relative, they couldn’t have gone ahead to uphold Dr Onen’s report.
And with due respect, they didn’t distinguish  assertiveness from aggressiveness. When it comes to my rights I am assertive and I have no apology over that. Nonetheless, I am neither aggressive nor abusive for I was not brought up in that manner. I like the truth and sometimes the truth hurts people to whom it is told.

On 25/11/2008, I called Faith of ACTV and asked her whether she thought it prudent to sacrifice her ethical code of conduct by upholding Dr Onen’s report even after getting information from my family members that I have never suffered any mental illness. She first asked me if I saw her signature anywhere I said yes I saw it inside my file. She told me she made her observation basing on the report from KADIC and Butabika. I told her the Psychiatrist from KADIC Hospital never reported anywhere that I had a mental illness. She told me the file is with the police and I must explain how I accessed it otherwise I will be in trouble. I told her God bless you. This was but a veiled threat.

Truthfully, it is after I brought I report from Butabika that the position of Faith and Dr Kyazze of ACTV dramatically and radically changed. They wrote that I was bitter with the report from Butabika. What’s wrong with that if the report was labelling me what I am not? Would they have failed to uphold that report if I never commented on it? Did they want me to accept the malicious and deplorable contents of the report so that I prove that I am not a person of unsound mind?
By the way, I wouldn’t have any problem with the ACTV Doctor if he had written what he did but pointed out the inaccuracies in Dr Onen’s report which I evidently proved to him i.e the date of my arrest where I showed him the SD Ref of my case which is SD 12/11/04/08. Anybody with the slightest knowledge of police operations will know that I was arrested on 11/4/08 not on the 14/4/08 like Dr Onen alleges. His allegation is meant to exonerate the police who kept me in the police cells for four days in utter infringement of the law.

It is true Dr Kyazze told me to go back to Butabika and I refused because of two reasons; I have no mental illness but also to me going to Butabika would earn me a passport to hell or heaven. I am not about to commit suicide.

All said, I realised it would be asking for too much to expect ACTV doctors to incriminate their counterparts in Butabika. I came to this conclusion after realising how strenuously they defended the report from Dr Onen even when they were furnished with incontrovertible evidence that the report was full of factual errors which were confirmed by the SD ref 12/11/04/08 and the collateral history from my relative and family.

How it all started
A woman complained that the conductor of a taxi had cheated her. I ask the conductor and the driver, why do you always cheat passengers yet many of them budget for their transport and hence when you cheat them you put them at a risk. The driver and the conductor began abusing me and when I said no, your conduct is bad, they got enraged and pushed me out of the taxi. Sadly, they asked me to pay and I refused for I had not reached my destination. They roughed me up and threw me in a vehicle. They couldn’t heed calls from other passengers to leave me. They, together with UTODA people lifted me to CPS. By the time they reached CPS the driver and conductor told the police that I had told them that I had a gun. I sadly thought I would be relieved when I reach CPS but all they did to me was to beat me up and dump me into the dungeon with some policemen telling me they had finally got me. They told me they had files against me from high profile people whom they named but in my own view they were lying to me. I believe these are the people who have been following us including in public places and they find some of our views unpalatable to them.    

They threw me into the dungeon and ordered the inmates to torment me. The man who took me there told the inmates mumukoleko.

Hell in the police cells
When I reached the police cells, I found many people some of them too aged and others juvenile. Some told me they had spent three months, others two months, others three weeks etc. whenever I would talk of getting out soon they would scoff at me. When I told them I was a human rights activist, many inmates began calling me to give me their stories. They even got me a pen and old newspapers where I would write in the margins. Upon learning of that, the police transferred me to another cell which was a toilet facing Buganda road. I talked to anybody who would care to listen to me until I got a policeman who accepted to call Professor John-Jean Barya. Professor Barya came early in the morning of Sunday 13/4/08. Ironically, his social status as professor of Law not withstanding, the police blocked him from accessing me. These are the law enforcement institutions that we have in this country!

After Professor Barya had come to see me, they removed me from the toilet facing Buganda road for they realised I was now getting into contact with people outside. They locked me into another toilet inside the dungeon wherein I couldn’t make noise and anybody comes for my rescue. I spent a night there and the following day was Monday 14/4/08. it is vital to note that since they detained me I had not eaten nor drunk anything for they had told me they would poison me which I thought was possible. So I resolved that I would rather die of hunger than die of poison. Their purpose was to have me starve to death as they had totally cut me off from communicating to anybody outside. After realising that the mission of these people was to have me dead, I  used the mug that was inside the toilet and drew water from the sink and poured it through the ventilators to the police who were with other inmates. I never did this because I was mad but because I wanted to be opened for as I was sure I was going to die in the cells.

After doing that they opened for me and put me in another tiny place. It was littered with faeces and urine and the floor was too painful. When I stepped there, I yelled too much. I was “helped” by one of the stupid inmates who were being used by the police to torture me when he poured on me around a hundred basins of water through the door openings. When he did that he diluted the acid on the floor. Meanwhile when I was in the cells, they would pour on me a lot of water and I was freezing always and they almost broke my arm. They also hit me with a metal bar on the head and the scar is still visible.

Bruce Balaba and Thomas Tayebwa found me toward midnight after I had spent four days. Thanks to David Tumusingize who called Tayebwa’s brother Dennis (David Tumusingize left me in the cells on Monday). Clearly then, you can realise that the police never made any effort to inform anybody that I was detained. Was it in order for me to be detained incommunicado?

When Bruce and Tom came for me the following morning on the Tuesday 15/4/08, they were told me unless you are taking him to Butabika, we shall not release him. Bruce told me that they saw Butabika as a better devil than CPS because they thought if I had stayed at CPS I would die. Unfortunately, they could not forecast the danger of subjecting someone to drugs he is not meant for. Those who found me in Butabika have a tale to tell.

After nine days, I was temporarily discharged for my friends Albert Ajuna, Moses Khisa and Tusiime Alex had brought me Manchester Uninversity forms which I had to fill and submit to Kulika Charitable Trust. Of all the reasons I gave for my release, that is the only one they accepted and I had no reason whatsoever of going back to hell after I had tactfully left that awful place.

On 28/5/08, I had gone to CPS to make a formal complaint in regard to my property they stayed with and the one that was stolen from my house in Ntinda Stretcher next to Naguru Police station. No sooner had I reached the CPS entrance than the policemen who tortured me started beating me with a stick. They later pushed me into the dungeon for the second time! They deprived me of all I had and left me only in my clothes. It was on Thursday 29/05/08 when the RDC found me in the cells. Why does Onen say I abused the RDC and I was detained on 28/05/08? I am sure the RDC can attest to this. Incidentally, before she found me in the cells I never knew her.

Hell in Butabika
While in Butabika, I experienced the worst treatment ever. I developed scales akin to those of tilapia fish; I developed patches on my body; I was goose-bumped; and I was swollen. I am sure on the second incident they discharged me after realising that their mission was accomplished. In their heart of hearts they must have said, let this go and die elsewhere. If you could see the ACTV documentary of 26/4/08 two days after I had been discharged, you can appreciate what I am saying.
Indeed , only three days after I was discharged I was almost dead and when I went to the hospital it was proved I was dying of the drugs they had subjected me to. This is contrary to Article 7 of the ICCPR, which quoted verbatim states, “No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment. In particular, no one shall be subjected without his free consent to medical or experimentation.

What is the implication of declaring sane people persons of unsound mind?
If people are declared persons of unsound mind anyhow, they are being licensed to commit crimes and go scot-free. As for me, I want to account for my actions. Whatever I do, I know its implications and I should face the due process of the law if I break or I am suspected of having broken the law.

During my detention, all the three out of the four non-derogable rights enshrined in Article 44 of our constitution were violated. I think the following human rights issues deserve attention in this case;
1)      Right to a fair hearing
2)      Right to freedom from torture, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment
3)      The right to the writ of habeas corpus
4)      Right to liberty
5)      Detention incommunicado, among other.

CONCLUSION
I had never suffered any mental illness before. If Dr Onen and Dr Kyazze firmly believe I have a mental illness then it must be a consequence of the torture the two institutions subjected me to. Hence, the government should be made to account for the conduct of its institutions. Dr Kyazze states in my file that I was speaking coherently and consistently although he goes ahead to state that I was speaking excessively. To me excessive is subjective. I really had a lot to tell him and a lot to complain about. If it was because of “excessive” talking that he upheld Dr Onen’s report, let him say so. And I put excessive in inverted commas.  Having a mental illness is not a crime of the patient for no body applies for it but I don’t want to hoodwink anyone that I am mentally deranged. No criminal charges can be brought against a person of unsound mind. For my case, I am a law-abiding citizen, if there is any criminal activity I have been engaged in I should be prosecuted and convicted if found guilty. Otherwise, I hold my name very dear and it should not be destroyed by a stroke of the pen. I have occasionally made and written statements that are critical to the government in power but mine is constructive criticism. For example I have written on corruption (Sunday Monitor, 16th March 2008), on Women (Monitor 24th March 2008 and Monitor 9th March 2005), on NSSF (Monitor 9th April 2008). I also write for an online magazine called the African Executive and I have a number of letters that have been written on issues of governance and human rights and I have appeared on radio and TV talk shows. Actually, prior to my arrest I had appeared on UBC with Honourable Bakabulindi. My concern has always that we need to do what is right. I sincerely don’t like being alienated although I am from a humble background. I am sure I do have a contribution to make. But, all said and done I am a true son of the Movement. My Dad Henry Rukundo is your unwavering cadre. The NRM Chairman of Bitereko Subcounty in Bushenyi Mr Tito Ntsigaireho was my guardian and I still regard him as my Dad. Mr Rukundo can be reached on 0772993655 if you want anymore information about me and Mr Ntsigaireho can be reached on 0392944649/ 0772340817. They will surely tell you I am not rebellious but may be I am hungry.  Lastly, Mr Bahimbise Bernard who presided over my torture should be brought to book so that he can tell exactly the policemen who tortured me for he knows them because I showed them to him and I must be sincere I am contemplating revenge in any possible way if my plight is not heeded to. The only thing I want is a fair hearing. Mr President the reason I have written to you is because all the other institutions have failed or deliberately refused to act. I am sure Your Excellency you will use your good offices to settle this very small matter. I await your kind response.

Vincent Nuwagaba
+256772843552
vnuwagaba@gmail.com

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