The General Court Martial in Makindye is set to hear the case in which former Boda boda 2010 patron Abdalla Kitatta is challenging his eight-year sentence.
According to the cause-list, Kitatta’s case is one of the three that the court sitting on Friday will hear.
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Kitatta was last year found guilty of unlawful possession of an SMG rifle and a pistol without a valid firearm licence and unlawful possession of 30 and 20 rounds of ammunition for SMG rifles and pistol.
In his appeal lodged before the army’s appeals court at Makindye, Kitatta says the lower court erred in law when it convicted him and his bodyguard by relying on the weakness of the defence team rather than the strength of the prosecution evidence.
“That court erred both in law and fact when it convicted the appellants basing on grossly uncorroborated and falsified prosecution testimonies given by unreliable witnesses who were influenced by a conflict of interest thereby occasioning grave injustice against the appellants,”Kitatta says in his appeal.
The former Boda Boda 2010 patron also says there were many inconsistencies in the evidence relied on by the prosecution side to pin him and bodyguard.
According to two appellants, it was wrong for the army to shift the burden of proof onto them instead of the prosecution side which they say is an illegality.
“The court erred in law and fact when it refused, ignored and failed to discharge its duty to summon material witnesses who were deemed necessary to substantiate the evidence tendered against the appellants thereby arriving at a wrong conviction.”
Kitatta and his bodyguard Ngobi Sowali say the 8 years and 8 months punishment to each of them was harsh and unfair and ask the army’s appellant court to overturn it.
https://nilepost.co.ug/2019/05/14/kitatta-to-spend-8-years-in-the-coolers/
