Behind teargas for Besigye, house arrest for Bobi Wine

POMA contentious

However, unofficially, the take away was that POMA as a law remains contentious.

Since POMA was enacted in 2013, it has been used to break up rallies, make arrests and cancel any meeting or assembly organised by any opposition party or individual.

Mainly it has been Dr. Kizza Besigye, a veteran politician who has been targeted but police attention appears to have turned to Bobi Wine. A day after the IPOD meeting, on April 26, Besigye and other FDC leaders and supporters were teargased and dispersed as they celebrated the opening of their office in Kitgum town in northern Uganda. The next day similar scenes were repeated in Lira town. On April 29 Bobi Wine was arrested as he drove from his home, with a huge crowd of supporters in tow, to Kibuli Police CIID headquarters to answer summons over the Busabala incident. He was locked up at Nagalama.

Ochan has since told journalists that “the police has made its own interpretation of the law”.

“The implementation has been the problem. The police turned the notice into permission. And even then when you want to notify them, they do not respond and then teargas follows after,” she said.

Sources say even the government side is “a divided house on this law”.

Some government officials reportedly believe the police brutalization of the opposition hurts the image of the government and should stop. But the other side, which is reportedly led by President Museveni, believes opposition figures have a mission to cause anarchy with the hope of inspiring an insurrection and should be blocked at every opportunity.

The problem starts with Section 5 of the POMA. This states that “an organiser of a meeting shall give notice in writing to the authorised officer of the intention to hold a public meeting at least three days before the proposed date of the public meeting”.

That appears clear enough. However on many occasions, leaders of opposition parties say they write notices to police but it does not respond. Sometimes police deny receiving the notice. Both appear deliberate ploys by police to frustrate the opposition.

Daniel Ruhweza, a lawyer and law lecturer at Makerere University agrees with those opposed to the law. He argues that the implementation has turned out to be totally different from the intention.

“It says notify the police of your intended activity. It does not say seek permission, to the best of my understanding. When you notify the police, police provides guidance and security if you require it.”

He says the law was not intended for what it is being used for and it is the reason why it is only used to curtail those with alternative views.

He says the way the police is implementing POMA goes back to Constitutional Appeal no. 09 of 2005; a prominent case filed by Muwanga Kivumbi against the government.

Muwanga Kivumbi argued that Section 32 of the Police Act did not give police permission to prohibit political activity and was unconstitutional if it did. He won. But POMA appears to have resurrected the police’s impunity.

“Right now where an activity is not in the interests of the powers that be, it will be prohibited,” Ruhweza told The Independent.

The issue of contention is that Section 8 of POMA grants an authorised officer the right to stop a public meeting.

Section 8(1) reads: “Subject to the direction of the Inspector General of Police, an authorised officer or any other police officer of or above the rank of inspector, may stop or prevent the holding of a public meeting where the public meeting is held contrary to the Act”.

Section 3 of the POMA has also become contentious. It says, “The Inspector General of Police or an authorised officer shall have the power to regulate the conduct of all public meetings in accordance with the law”.

If those opposed to POMA say it majorly talks about notification of the police, those on the government side can as well say the IGP has powers to regulate public meetings and it is well within the IGP’s right to interpret the broad powers as to grant or deny permission for the meetings to proceed.

Critics have argued that the POMA was in many ways a replication of Section 32(2) of the Police Act which was declared null and void by the Constitutional Court in the ruling of Muwanga Kivumbi vs the Attorney General in 2008.

One of the judgments read; “It is my considered view that section 32 (2) of the Police Act gives the inspector general of police excessive powers that which he may use a he wishes to curtail people’s rights and freedom of conscience, speech, association and assembly…”

It adds that “In case the inspector general of police sees any possibility of a breach of peace at any assembly, the police should provide protection.”

Ruhweza says as long as the Constitutional Court does not come out and declare clearly once again the significance of POMA, there is going to be an increase in the number of events and public engagements that are being frustrated by the misapplication and misinterpretation of this law.

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