The Uganda Human Rights Commission (UHRC) has awarded compensation of 60 million shillings to the family of the late Martin Omona, who was killed by soldiers of the Uganda People’s Defense Forces.
The three-day hearing by the Commission’s Tribunal, which commenced in Gulu on Wednesday, is expected to hear 18 cases of human rights violations within the Acholi Sub Region.
The cases relate to torture and degrading treatments, alleged violation of rights to life, and alleged violation of rights against personal liberty.
Until his death, the late Omona, who was 42 years old, was living in the internally displaced people camp in Layibi Division in the then Gulu Municipality in 2006 during the insurgency in the North.
Prosecution witnesses noted that the deceased had left the protected camp to buy food at Patiko, an internally displaced people’s camp, for his family. But upon reaching Coo-Pee Trading Centre, he entered a shop, asked for a bottle of soda and pulled out a note of 50,000 Shillings to pay for the soda.
Prosecution added that the shop attendant was suspicious of Omona to possess a 50,000 Shillings note and tipped the soldiers who considered him a rebel collaborator.
Seven soldiers attached to the Fifth Division Barracks led him a distance away into the bush from the Trading Centre, where they beat him to death.
His relatives pleaded for his release but were threatened and chased away as the deceased was mocked as a traitor until he breathed his last.
The soldiers then carried his body and dumped it in front of a military Barracks at Coo-Pee.
Alex Okwera, the deceased’s elderly son who represented the family, contended that the attack on his father was deliberate, which deprived him of his right to life.
Okwera told the tribunal that his father, who survived with two wives and five children, had left behind a broken family struggling and suffering.
The judgment read by Commissioner Muwanga Nsubuga highlighted the deliberate action of the soldiers in the killings, yet they were state agents at the time.
“The State didn’t file any defense on the balance of probability, section (101) Sub Section (120) of Evidence Act. Life is protected by Article (22) Subsection (1) of the Uganda Constitution, the judgment reads.
It further reads, “no person shall be deprived of life intentionally except in execution of the sentence passed by a fair trial in a competent court”.
Nsubuga argues that “the agony Omona went through in his last moment on earth was tough, you can imagine he went to buy food, and he never reached.
Adding, “His only mistake was entering the shop to buy a soda and because of his low social status, he couldn’t possess a 50,000 Shillings note that Kony had given him?” he wondered.
He further noted that even when the deceased was a collaborator of the Lord Resistance Army, he could have been tried in a court of law but not killed on mere suspicion.
The Commission Chairperson Mariam Wangadya noted that the action of the UPDF soldiers was deliberate, intentional, cruel, oppressive, arrogant, barbaric, dehumanizing, and criminal. “The life of this poor man is the same as the life of a rich man. I award a compensation of 60 million shillings, which will attract an annual interest of 10 percent,” Wangadya ruled.
The Director Complaints, Investigations and Legal Services at the Commission, Pauline Nansamba Mutumba, noted that most of the cases before the tribunal occurred at the time of the insurgency in the region.
The Region Human Right Officers for Acholi Sub Region revealed that the region has accumulated 142 cases with Uganda People Defense Forces, Police and Prison largely topping the list with alleged perpetrators.
The government is being represented by a Senior State Attorney, Mwanja Micky, Maj. Fred Wotpugwak of Fourth Division Barracks and two more lawyers.