Covid-19: Museveni okays release of 833 inmates to decongest prisons
President Museveni has given a green light to the Uganda Prisons Services to release a total of 833 prisoners as a way of decongesting prisons in various parts of the country.
This was announced by the Prisons spokesperson, Frank Baine on Monday during a joint security task force press briefing at the Uganda Media Centre in Kampala.
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“The committee on the prerogative of mercy sat and forwarded the 833 names and these have been pardoned. We are waiting for a detailed correspondence from the office of the Attorney General,” Baine said on Monday.
He said a list of over 1500 but noted that only 833 of these have been pardoned by the president but noted it is not necessarily connected to the Coronavirus pandemic.
“These included those who had completed three quarters of their sentences, terminally sick, breastfeeding inmates and those above 60 years of age,” Baine noted.
The Uganda Prisons Commissioner General, Dr. Johnson Byabashaija recently told journalists that they had listed 2000 prisoners to benefit from the prerogative of mercy by the president.
“We are also working on decongesting our prisons and right now, the list of about 1,500 to 2,000 prisons who are not serving capital offences are going to be sent to the AG for consideration of pardon. I hope this will partly decongest our prisons,” Byabashaija said early this month at parliament.
The development comes after government discouraged crowds and consequently decongested public places by closing schools, churches and other places that bring together big numbers of people at ago.
This was meant to help in combating the spread of the deadly Covid-19 virus.
