The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | Isaac Kwagala, the Makerere University Guild speaker is in trouble for calling an emergency student’s General Assembly. Kwagala was picked up by Military Police from Pool Road between Mitchell Hall and College Of Computing And Information Sciences -COCIS on Tuesday evening.
He was detained briefly at Wandegeya Police Station before he was transferred to the Central Police Station in Kampala. A student, who witnessed the arrest, says Kwagala was walking alongside other students returning to Nsibirwa Hall around 8:38pm when he was picked up.
A police source at Makerere University confirmed Kawagala’s arrest, saying he is wanted for mobilising students for the Assembly scheduled for this morning at Freedom Square.
Kwagala had invited the students in his capacity as Guild Speaker to chat a way forward on the staff strike, which has been on for over two weeks. University staff laid down their tools on January 18 protesting the ‘irregular’ suspension of their leaders for alleged insubordination and inciting staff.
The suspension of Bennet Magara, the Chairperson of Makerere Administrative Staff Association-MASA, his Secretary General, Joseph Kalema and Dr. Deus Kamunyu Muhwezi, the Chairperson Makerere University Academic Staff Association (MUASA) has paralysed work at the university.
Student leaders led by Kwagala have faulted management for stalemate, which has seen them go without lectures for over two weeks. On Tuesday, Kwagala sent out a notice inviting students for consultations on the stalemate.
“Following the failure of the University management and the three staff associations to reach an agreement on how to resolve the current impasse, which has constrained all academic activities in the University, I hereby invite you for a General Students Body consultative meeting tomorrow the 6th of February at the Freedom Square starting at 10:00am,” Kwagala’s communication to the students read.
He had earlier on told URN that it was regrettable that the university management had deliberately chosen to deny the existence of a strike, and to misrepresent the state of affairs at the university by consistently misleading the general public. Kwagala also noted that student leaders had withdrawn all cooperation from the University management, arguing that their patience had been taken for granted.
“The student Guild will, for as long as all students are not studying or being instructed by lecturers in all academic activities that they normally have to be instructed in, will not deal with management in any matter, including but not limited to, not participating or organizing the forthcoming Guild Government elections,” he said.
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