By Mulengera Reporters
On Monday 12th January, a group of defence lawyers led by Sam Ahamya (including some from the ULS probono program) were at the Makindye-based Utilities Court ready to defend their client Dean Lubowa Saava, the TV10 online broadcasting journalist who has been on remand in Luzira prison since last September when he was first arrested and arraigned.
The state prosecutors from Uganda Communications Commission (UCC) have since September been prosecuting Saava before Her Worship Gladys Kamasanyu over the three counts which he was charged with.
These include installing broadcasting equipment without a license, doing the actual broadcasting without the requisite authorization or licensing by UCC and finally disobeying lawful orders whereby he defiantly continued broadcasting without a license even after the Commission had, in writing, called upon him to stop.
Saava, who faces other criminal charges in other Magistrate courts, besides civil cases in the High Court, during the Monday Court session once again indicated to the Magistrate that he is keen at amicable resolution of the dispute between him and UCC, which is mandated to regulate all public broadcasting and communication activities in Uganda.
The prosecution lawyers (who say they were ready to prosecute the case from day one) aptly corrected the accused person that the option of negotiating (its the word he keeps using) is never available in criminal matters. Its applicable to civil matters often filed in the High Court.
Led by Dr. Abdul Salaam Waiswa, the UCC prosecution lawyers notified Saava that in criminal matters, the appropriate word to use is plea-bargaining. And once the accused person chooses that option, he or she opts to plead guilty to the charges so that he saves his personal time and money that would have been expended on defence lawyers, especially if it happens to be a prolonged trial.
Plea-bargaining also saves Court’s time and state resources that would have been spent on facilitating prosecutors and on bringing witnesses to Court.
But entering the plea-bargaining agreement doesn’t prevent the accused person from being subjected to custodial sentence, fine or both. But pleading guilty could cause the trial Magistrate to be more lenient in his or her sentencing.
As is the case with most plea-bargained trials, the accused persons tend to expect being excused from serving a custodial sentence. And in his case, journalist Saava seems keen at escaping the custodial sentence so that he only pays a maximum fine for the alleged offences, which could go as high as Shs30m especially for the offence of setting up broadcasting apparatus without licence or authorisation by UCC. The alternative is a maximum 3-5 years.
Saava is also keen at having returned some of the broadcasting equipment, which the enforcement officers from UCC confiscated from his TV10 premises in Lungujja. He has indicated at the talks with UCC representatives that some of the equipment that was confiscated doesn’t belong to his TV10, but to someone else. He would like those to be returned to the owner as UCC proceeds with the mandatory burning and destruction of the remaining equipment, that is ascertain to be belonging to his TV10.
It was agreed at the Monday 12th January Court session that Saava’s lawyers work with Policemen attached to UCC to sort out this and then an agreed joint report about the same is subsequently tendered in Court.
As of Monday 12th January, the issue of distinguishing the equipment seemed to be the biggest hurdle remaining sticky as the accused person seemed prepared to plead guilty and serve out whatever sentence the Magistrate prescribes, and preferably the payment of fine.
Whereas this is something not even the prosecutors from UCC can dictate upon, Saava is praying hard that the trial Magistrate accepts sentencing him to only payment of fine, while waiving the requirement to serve out a custodial sentence. The money, which Saava’s rich friends can raise very quickly, will then be paid to the consolidated fund as the law prescribes.
Gratefully, the accused person has already served out almost five months on remand and these will be considered and deducted off whatever custodial sentence Court hands out, should the Magistrate use her discretion and insist on it.
The UCC-Saava matter is expected to return to Court on Tuesday 27th January when the parties will update the Magistrate on how far they have gone with plea-bargaining. If all goes well, a deal may have been reached by that time in which case Dr. Waiswa will read out the plea-bargaining agreement and explain its terms to Court.
That agreement will among other things have the accused person accepting to plead guilty in which case he gets convicted on his own plea. The plea-bargaining agreement can also have the agreed upon sentencing with the accompanying reasons (just in proposal form), which the trial Magistrate can agree with and adopt as is or alter, while using her discretion.
The UCC prosecutors will most likely be maintaining their demand that Saava publicly apologizes to those he wronged, retract the offensive statements uttered during the period his TV10 operated without a license and also going ahead to delete the impugned videos.
As a way of demonstrating remorsefulness for his past actions, the accused person will most likely have no problem accepting these demands by the regulator, in order to expedite the achievement of the much-desired de-escalation of the dispute between him, his TV10 on one hand and UCC on the other.
If all goes well, this breakthrough in this seemingly hard-to-defend UCC case will leave the accused person with fewer active Court battles to fight and keep defending himself against. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
