By Mulengera Reporters
Fresh claims emerged at Mengo’s Mwanga II Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday after, now 21-year-old Reagan Ssentongo gave a detailed account of his dealings with city pastor Robert Kayanja of the Rubaga Miracle Centre Cathedral, relying on a forensic report which captured years of communication, photographs, calls and messages exchanged between him and the pastor.
Ssentongo, who is among the nine (9) youths facing charges of defamation against Pastor Kayanja, continued with his defence before Chief Magistrate Adams Byarugaba, largely relying on the forensic report earlier prepared after his phone was examined by police digital forensic analyst Enock Kanene.
The phone examination was ordered after Ssentongo began giving his defence and indicated that important evidence was contained in his device.
Kanene later presented his findings to court and was on several occasions cross-examined by Chief State Attorney Jonathan Muwaganya over the extracted material, including deleted files and electronic communication.
It was on this report that Ssentongo based much of his testimony on Tuesday, referring court to different pages containing WhatsApp chats, call logs, voice notes, pictures and videos.
One of the biggest claims made by Ssentongo was that the forensic material showed communication between him and Pastor Kayanja.
According to him, the communication stretched from 2019 until 2021, when he was arrested, alongside other accused people.
Ssentongo told court that after he became connected to Pastor Kayanja and taken to his farm in Nakasongola where he was made the boss, given an office at the farm house and handed fire arms including eight big guns and six pistols, he was introduced to a WhatsApp group involving himself, Kayanja, church aide Frederick Kisitu, among others, where they used to share sodomy pictures, video, and chats.
He claimed Kisitu was the administrator of the group and that communication continued there before it was later deleted.
He further alleged that he was assigned responsibilities connected to Bunyoro Sub-region as the regional agent, and was instructed to identify boys whom he claimed he would take to the pastor to sodomize them.
Ssentongo told court that he was always given transport and resources to carry out the assignments, claiming he was provided with a vehicle, a Toyota Land Cruiser, and later a Drone van, which he said were driven by a person he only identified as Henry, and later revealed he now resides abroad.
Ssentongo further claimed that he regularly sent explicit pictures and messages to Kayanja which were later recovered during forensic examination.
Referring to page 90 of the forensic report, Ssentongo said it contained a message where he allegedly sent to Kayanja picture of a boy he had recruited from one of the nearest schools, and wrote: “This is my new guy. He has a brother who is also very nice. They are from Kugumba. I spent the whole night fucking [sodomizing] him.”
Ssentongo also referred to pages 91 and 94 of the report, saying they contained additional explicit conversations and photographs he had allegedly shared with Kayanja.
He said page 96 contained audio conversations between him and Kayanja, while other sections contained voice notes and call logs.
According to Ssentongo, the calls were made through an Airtel number he claimed was registered in Kayanja’s names, and the recordings were played in court.
The accused also made a number of claims about how he further engaged with the pastor, telling court that he was introduced to Kayanja while still young and that the pastor, after hearing his story, of how his father had earlier denied being the biological parent, his mother took him to another man, who even gave him the name Sentongo. According to him, Pastor Kayanja promised to take a fatherly role in his life.
He claimed he later questioned the legality of what he said he was being introduced to [homosexuality], but alleged he was assured that powerful people knew about it and no one could ever touch him.
“I asked Kayanja if what I had been introduced to would not cause me problems, since homosexuality is illegal in Uganda and he told me that he’s connected enough and even the president knew him as a homosexual,” Ssentongo told court.
Ssentongo further claimed he was promised assistance to obtain national ID, despite being only fourteen Years old by then, and be able to get documents to enable him travel to the United States of America.
“He told me he would call his people working with NIRA [National Identification Registration Authority] and instruct them to make for me an ID. I later received a national ID after my details, including a passport photo were collected,” he added.
The accused told court that he later left the Kiryandongo far and returned to Kampala where he demanded that Kayanja pays him his money he had promised to pay him whenever he was sodomized, and as salary for doing agent duties he had assigned to him in Bunyoro Sub-region, but Kayanja kept telling him to go back to the farm, that he had sent him their to protect him from the enemies, including Pastor Alosius Bugingo, whose wife he said he and others had earlier been assigned to guard by Pastor Kayanja, whom he said also instructed them not to ever allow him access his home in Kitende, along Entebe Road.
“At that time, I only wanted my money and a passport so that I could leave, the country” he said.
He also narrated to court how he at one point forwarded explicit materials and conversations to Kisitu, after several attempts to reach Kayanja but failed to get responses from him.
The ponographic materials, he said included a video he had received from one of the youths, Ssebale Adrian, who was allegedly sodomized by the pastor. Ssentongo told court that Adrian sent him the videos showing his buttocks bleeding, allegedly as a result of being over sodomized by Kayanja, saying he had severally tried to reach out to the pastor, but in vain, as the pastor refused to pick his calls or respond to his messages.
He referred court to page 36 of the forensic report, saying it showed communication involving Kisitu.
The accused further testified about events leading to their September 2021 arrest, claiming that after being instructed to return to the church over promised payments, they instead found heavy security deployment.
According to him, police officers from Old Kampala Police Station later arrived and arrested them.
He said that their phones were confiscated during the operation and that some information was deleted, although he maintained forensic experts later recovered parts of the data.
Ssentongo’s testimony also touched on alleged communication involving other individuals, claiming that some messages showed he raised concerns and sought assistance for people he said were affected. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
