The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | Shock and emotions enveloped the International Crimes Division of the High Court as the prosecutors screened a video showing the aftermath of the Barlonyo camp attacks by the Lord’s Resistance Army rebels who left hundreds of people dead 18 years ago.
This was during the ongoing trial of Thomas Kwoyelo, one of the commanders of the Lord’s Resistance Army who is facing 93 charges over atrocities committed in Northern Uganda about 18 years and two weeks ago during the political insurgency.
The trial is being heard by a Coram of three Judges comprised of Michael Elubu, Stephen Mubiru and Duncan Gaswaga.
The court audience was seen in grief and grimacing in pain as a state witness who is a police officer showed the exhumation process of people who had reportedly been burnt alive inside their huts, hacked to death with machetes while others stabbed with bayonets, clubbed with sticks and those that are said to have been shot as they fled their homes following the political insurgency in 2004.
As the two-hour video played, some lawyers from both the defense and the state were seen leaving the bar and stepping outside the court to control their emotions after seeing scenes that included roasting of human body parts and bodies of babies apparently cut out of their pregnant mothers.
In the audience, students of Law doing internship were seen with their tears flowing freely.
Relatives of the victims were also seen outside the court being consoled after the horrific memories were rekindled. The flies and maggots were clearly seen on the bodies being exhumed from mass graves.
A section of the people at the scene where the terrible incident occurred could be heard speaking during the exhumation process, saying the pain was unbearable for them, forcing them to flee.
Inside the court, only the Judges paid uninterrupted attention to the horrific video as the rest of the people just kept peeping on and off at the screen and burying their eyes back into their phones, trying to look busy.
The lawyer representing the victims Henry Kilama Komakech said that the video was very horrible but they have had to endure as lawyers and watch it.
Earlier before the screening, the defense lawyers led by Caleb Alaka, Evans Ochieng and Charles Dalton Opwonya asked court to bar the public from watching the video because it would bring back the bad memories to the people yet they have since started recovering from the tragedy.
According to Ochieng, this was because some of the images in the clip included naked women whom they never wanted the public to see and circulate in the media.
They said it was also for their personal safety reasons because they are reportedly being threatened as defense lawyers. Ochieng however didn’t tell who is threatening them and how.
In response, the Deputy Director of Public Prosecutions William Byansi objected saying that the public has to be involved throughout the trial but they can disconnect those upcountry who have been following through the live streaming links not to follow proceedings.
Consequently, the Judges directed that live streaming should stop, people with gadgets inside the court were ordered to disconnect them to avoid recording and taking pictures and videos.
Later, Dr Bonny Ndiwalana, a police surgeon who also participated in the postmortem exercises testified and the case adjourned for further hearing.
The evidence before court indicates that Kwoyelo who was born in the present-day Amuru district in Northern Uganda got enlisted in the LRA group and underwent thorough military training to rise through the ranks before establishing his base at Kilak hills from where he would command systematic attacks on civilians notably in the years of 1987, 1993, 1996 and 2004.
In these incidents, the office of the DPP says that Kwoyelo would use axes, clubs and guns to attack and take residents hostage from his place after finding them collecting firewood, attending rituals and these would be discovered dead the following day with their hands tied behind their backs.
Kwoyelo was captured in the forests of the Central African Republic in 2008 by the Uganda People’s Defense Forces-UPDF and since then he has been on remand at Luzira Maximum Prison.
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