Students sue Museveni over Makerere closure

Nov 18, 2016

The president is sued as 'the visitor of the University'.

KAMPALA - Six fourth year Makerere University Law students have dragged President Yoweri Museveni to court over the closure of the university stating that it was unlawful and unjust.

The president ordered for the closure of the University on November 1, following the lecturers' and students' strike. Thereafter, he set up a commission of inquiry into the mismanagement of the institution. The date of reopening is not yet known.

The students also dragged the institution on grounds that it acted unlawfully and unjustifiably when it operationalised the directive thereby failing to assert and safeguard its autonomy.

The president is sued as 'the visitor of the University'. The Attorney General, who acts as government's legal representative is sued as third party.

The students include, Sam Ssekyewa, Moses Mushime, Francis Kibombo, Cissy Nabatanzi, Emmanuel Kanyesigye and John Robert Turyakira.

Ssekyewa in his supporting statement on behalf of the other students, said that pursuant to the president's order that was widely shared on social media, they were forcefully evicted from their halls and hostels of residence and given an ultimatum of up to 9am on November 2, to vacate the premises.

They accuse the president of unlawfully bypassing the university council, which is the supreme organ of the university and the Ministry of Education and Sports, to issue the directive.

"The 2nd respondent's (Makerere) council meeting of November 3, at 2:00pm to operationalise the 1st respondent's directive was demonstrably tantamount to failure by the council to perform its statutory duty," they said.

They contend that the holding of a 'late night' meeting on November 1 by the council and the use of security organs to chase them out of the university was unlawful.

"By mechanically submitting to the 1st respondent's midnight directive and to the 3rd respondents' officers' cruel, inhuman and degrading methods of implementing the impugned directive, the 2nd respondent's council and management did not act freely and failed to take due consideration of our legitimate expectation that our right to access to education to higher education would not be unjustly limited at the whims of the 1st respondent," reads the suit.

They claim that the directive which was 'highhandedly' implemented was arrived at without prior adequate consultation of the institution's council, students, staff and other relevant stakeholders who were adversely affected.

An empty lecture room at Makerere University following the strike. (Credit: Ronnie Kijjambu)


Ssekyewa said that whatever the problem was, the president was duty bound to review the matter in light of the university practices and accepted principles of good administration and where necessary he could have given advice or made recommendations for the council to take the final decision.

"The 1st respondent in performance of his executive and visitorial powers, is oath bound to respect, uphold and promote the autonomy of the 2nd respondent as an institution, the supremacy of the council as the overall administrative organ and the fundamental human rights and freedom of the students," he said.

They said that the directive and the decision of the council were arrived at through a process that was neither backed by law nor consistent with the principles of fundamental fairness, proportionality and other constitutionally prescribed norms and standards.

They also state that the failure by the university to make a statute or regulations streamlining the modalities of closing and reopening the institution in the public interest is both unjustifiable and unlawful.

The students want court to declare that the acts of the three parties were unlawful and thereby quash it.

They want an order prohibiting the president and the university from repeating the same act.

Through their lawyer Isaac Semakkadde, they want the civil court to issue an injunction restraining the respondents from continuing with the closure.

Court is yet to issue summons to the president, the University and the Attorney General to answer to the allegations.

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