Buganda Road Chief Magistrate’s court has finally allowed the state to table additional evidence in the case of cyber harassment and offensive communication against former Makerere University research fellow, Dr Stella Nyanzi.
Buganda Road Grade One magistrate, Gladys Kamasanyu made the ruling on Tuesday afternoon, paving way for detective Bill Ndyamuhaki to tender in eight exhibits in the case where Nyanzi is accused of authoring an offensive birthday poem dedicated to President Yoweri Museveni.
The exhibits were initially opposed by Nyanzi’s lawyers, Isaac Semakadde and Derrick Bazekuketta on grounds that they were disclosed to them after the completion of the investigations.
The exhibits include activation codes used to create Nyanzi’s Facebook account, documents showing the number that activated the Facebook account and a photocopy of the passport Nyanzi reportedly used to apply for the MTN phone number that she used to create the Facebook page.
The others include Nyanzi’s bio data forms obtained from Makerere University vice chancellor and human resource manager, two court orders issued by Buganda Road chief magistrate Miriam Akello in December 2018 and April 2019 that were served to MTN Uganda and Makerere University requesting for the information tendered before court.
Earlier on, Nyanzi’s lawyers argued that the evidence should be rejected because it was served to them in 2019 yet investigations ended in 2018.
The lawyers also argued that the prosecution went and secured court orders to get the evidence in contention from another magistrate instead of the one handling the matter.
However, in her ruling, Kamasanyu said prosecution didn’t have enough time to do its investigations and since they got orders from a gazetted court of judicature, there was nothing wrong with their evidence. Kamasanyu allowed the documents and marked them as official court exhibits.
She adjourned the matter to April 23 for cross examination of Ndyamuhaki. Trouble for Nyanzi started on September 16, 2018, the day on which Museveni celebrated his 74th birthday. Nyanzi allegedly posted a loutish birthday poem on her Facebook page attacking Esteri Kokundeka, the late mother of Museveni wishing that the later died at birth to save Ugandans from sufferings.
Nyanzi has since refused to apply for bail and has been in Luzira since November 7, 2018.