The Uganda Police Force have Wednesday dismissed claims by a one Bwerwanaho Charles, a former accountant that he was tortured by former Flying squad commander, ACP Herbert Muhangi while in police custody.
While appearing on NBS Television’s morning talkshow ‘Morning Breeze’ on Wednesday, Bwerwanaho claimed that he was tortured three times by the Police Flying Squad and only survived death by the help of God.
“I was first arrested in 2014 because of a land wrangle. Flying Squad people plus some elements of ISO and CMI get to know people who have money and that is the lead they follow to kidnap you,” Bwerwanaho said while on the show.
“You are either killed or released to prepare to give them money. The 2014 case was a land wrangle including my sister and we won the case with a Shs 2 billion award. It is Lt Kakiga Nantamba, a person I know who works in CMI who spied on me and fed Flying Squad with information,” he added.
However, Deputy Police spokesperson, SSP Patrick Onyango has described Bwerwanaho’s claims as false and only aimed at tarnishing the image of the Police along with its officers.
“Mr Bwerwanaho was arrested on the 7th August, 2016 as an accused person wanted by the Buganda Road Court on charges of issuing false cheques, forgery and false documents. After the Resident State Attorney, Buganda Road court evaluated the evidence contained in the case file reference CPS Kampala CRS 1074/2014 and 1075/2014, sanctioned the charge sheet dated 26th July, 2016 ordered that Mr Bwerwanaho be produced in court for trial,” Onyango said in a statement.
He further adds that when Bwerwanaho was later on August 9 presented to court but, he did not complain of any cases of either torture or theft of his money during his time in custody as he claimed on NBS Television.
But in his submission on T.V, Bwerwanaho stressed that he was first arrested and held hostage in an place which he later came to know as Kyengera, a house allegedly owned by a police officer.
“I’ve suffered at the hands of flying squad 3 times but by the grace of God I survived”.
He recounted: “I was blindfolded from Mityana all the way to the safe house and it’s the inmates (5 of them) I found who told me I was in Kyengera. The house belongs to a police man who handed it over to ISO. You can see the coordination in Police”.
He claimed he was tied onto a pole at the balcony for 2 days as his captors bought time for him to sell his house in town and give them the ransom.
“The only thing I would do was pass urine right were I was. When i released, i wrote a 97 paged document to the Minister for Security, Henry Tumukunde but he instead only addressed the issue of Lt Kakiga and Sunday Benson on whether they had committed the said crimes,” he added.
Onyango however insists that these are false accusations intended to tarnish the name of ACP Muhangi and other officers in a way of revenging the sentence which was granted to him following the evidence given by the investigating officers.
Muhangi was yesterday dropped by the Inspector General of Police, Martin Okoth Ochola as the Commander of the Flying squad in the latest police reshuffle. He was transferred to the Department of Human Resource to head audits.