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Watch These Fearless Ugandan Journalists Broadcast Their Own Arrests

March 4, 2016 By Africa Horn Now

Charlotte Alfred | 03/01/2016 | HUFFINGTON POST

The Ugandan government’s post-election crackdown on the media is captured on live TV.

When several of her fellow journalists were beaten and arrested on Monday, TV reporter Bahati Remmy had an uncompromising message for the Ugandan police.

“Journalism is not a crime. It’s a public good,” she wrote in a Twitter post. “Our only crime is we have the courage to tell stories the way they are.”

On Tuesday, Remmy herself was caught up in the government’s ongoing crackdown against the media after Uganda’s disputed Feb. 18 presidential election. Police detained her while she was reporting outside the home of opposition leader Kizza Besigye, who is now under house arrest.

A plainclothes security agent sprays pepper into the face of a Ugandan photojournalist, as he was walking away after taking photographs of opposition leader Kizza Besigye attempting to leave his home, in Kasangati, Uganda Monday, Feb. 22, 2016. Besigye was arrested again Monday as he tried to leave his home, in which he had already been placed under house arrest, as he attempted to visit the election commission's headquarters in Kampala to get detailed copies of the results from the country's presidential election. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)
The Ugandan government is going after the opposition and journalists following the country’s disputed Feb. 18 election. Here, a plainclothes security agent shoots pepper spray into the face of a Ugandan photojournalist. Ben Curtis/ASSOCIATED PRESS

The TV reporter’s arrest played out live on air — and she continued to report as a group of riot police trampled her, chased her through a field, and eventually hauled her off.

“As you can see, we have been arrested by police and they are taking us away to an unknown destination,” a breathless Remmy tells viewers in the video, before being marched into the distance. She was later released.

Police said officers detained Remmy for obstructing them and refusing to obey their orders, according to the free speech group Chapter Four Uganda. Remmy told the Human Rights Network for Journalists-Uganda, also known as HRNJ-Uganda, that police officers pushed her around and pulled her hair while she was in custody.

Remmy works for Uganda’s privately-owned NBS Television, and was reporting on Tuesday’s deadline for Ugandan opposition groups to file a legal challenge to President Yoweri Museveni’s disputed victory in the election. They did so later that day.

The 71-year-old Museveni, who has already ruled for 30 years, has suggested he plans to lead Uganda for the rest of his life.

The official election results showed Museveni winning around 60 percent of the vote and Besigye earning 35 percent, but the opposition says the election was rigged in the president’s favor. European Union observers criticized the “intimidating atmosphere” during the vote and urged the government to release the full results.

Opposition groups say authorities are now targeting them. Security forces have responded to protests with tear gas and raided Besigye’s party offices. Besigye was arrested at least five times in the days after the election before being placed under house arrest.

Journalists have not escaped the clampdown, either. Remmy’s detention was the second time in as many days that a Ugandan journalist was arrested live on air.

A day earlier, police detained Remmy’s colleague at NBS, Elijah Turyagumanawe, outside Besigye’s house.

The camera kept rolling as officers forced Turyagumanawe into a police vehicle, drove him to the police station, and brought him in for questioning. Turyagumanawe continued to report on his own arrest after he was pushed into a cell with his cameraman stranded outside.

“You may not be seeing me, but I’ve been put inside a cell,” he told viewers.

Uganda's main opposition leader Kizza Besigye, center, is arrested by police and thrown into the back of a blacked-out police van which whisked him away and was later seen at a rural police station, outside his home in Kasangati, Uganda Monday, Feb. 22, 2016. Besigye was arrested again Monday as he tried to leave his home, in which he had already been placed under house arrest, as he attempted to visit the election commission's headquarters in Kampala to get detailed copies of the results from the country's presidential election. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)
Opposition leader Kizza Besigye, pictured, is under house arrest after claiming the presidential election was rigged and calling for protests. Ben Curtis/ASSOCIATED PRESS

Turyagumanawe was among at least seven journalists detained around the capital of Kampala on Monday, according to Ugandan newspaper The Monitor. They were all later released.

One of them, Abubaker Muwonge of China’s CCTV, faced criminal trespassing charges after he covered an incident in which members of the opposition reportedly released piglets outside the president’s residence, according to NBS. The Monitor reported that Muwonge and a colleague refused to reveal their sources about the apparent protest.

Uganda has a strong tradition of independent journalism and diverse media outlets.

Yet the country’s journalists have felt growing pressure, especially in the runup to February’s election. Human rights groups documented widespread harassment and intimidation of journalists and civil society activists during the election campaign. The HRNJ-Uganda reports that at least 27 journalists have been arrested and 28 assaulted already this year.

On election day, authorities shut down social media, chat apps and mobile money services on most cell phone networks, although many Ugandans circumvented the ban by using virtual private networks and mocking the government’s heavy-handedness.

Electoral commission presiding officers count ballot papers in Kampala on February 18, 2016, during presidential and parliamentary elections. International election observers warned Thursday that hours-long delays in delivering ballot papers in Uganda's national elections would not "inspire trust" in the polling. Voting in Uganda was due to begin at 07:00 am (0400 GMT) but was stalled for several hours in some polling stations in parts of the city and the surrounding Wakiso district, where ballot boxes and papers did not arrive on time. Support for the opposition is traditionally strong in the capital.  / AFP / ISAAC KASAMANI        (Photo credit should read ISAAC KASAMANI/AFP/Getty Images)
Uganda Votes In Elections

Since the election, the tension has only increased as journalists struggle to cover the crackdown on the opposition without getting caught up in it themselves.

“Every day, we witness a case of arrest or physical assault of journalists,” HRNJ-Uganda’s Diana Nandudu told the Committee to Protect Journalists. “It seems the authorities don’t want people to know what happened during the election.”

A Ugandan police spokesman justified Besigye’s house arrest, saying he called for protests against the vote that could disturb the peace. He also gave journalists a lecture on journalism ethics and accused them “acting as opposition politicians,” according to The Monitor.

For now, journalists are not taking any risks with Ugandan authorities.

After his night in a police cell, Muwonge urged journalists to use chat apps and social media to share information about arrests and harassment. “We need to stand united as journalists now than ever before,” he wrote on Facebook. “Let’s make noise once one of us is in trouble.”

What he won’t do is give up. “I intend to continue with my journalism,” Muwonge ends his Facebook post. “Where is the next story guys?”

 

Filed Under: AHN NEWS

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