The Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) is pushing for constitutional amendment of the 48 hour rule in order to buy more time for investigation of capital offences like terrorism.
DPP Jane Frances Abodo, while speaking at the 10th annual conference of the East Africa Association of Prosecutors (EAAP), said that 48 hours are not enough to investigate offences like terrrorism and that the time should be enlarged or else they will have no one arraigned before the courts of law.
“You cannot say that within 48 hours, you can be able to actually do a meaningful investigation of a terrorism case and have someone in court…. otherwise we shall not have anyone in court. The 48 hour rule should be there but we are asking….can the time be enlarged in some cases, that we go to court and ask for enlargement of time…that we have ABCD to handle…we are not saying all offences but it will be a case by case basis and not generally,” Abodo said.
DPP Abodo added that the 48 hours are impractible in some cases and can only be applicable when there are enough prosecutors to quickly investigate the cases.
“The 48 hours is constitutional but it is impractible for us who are on ground. It is really impractible to do that in some cases…these are cases we are saying that we should be able to go to court and make an application for more hours to cover some ground investigations. We can keep the person beyond the 48 hours,” Abodo added.
The minister of justice and constitutional affairs Nobert Mao said DPP is challenged with low pay of prosecutors and that arrangements to ament the 48 hour rule were ongoing.
“The prosecutors are not well paid here in Uganda. We have tried to enhance the pay…Justice Abado has been pushing us concerning the 48 hour law because in Uganda we are not suppossed to keep you in custody for more than 48 hours. The minister of justice in me wants to amend the law but the human activist in me doesn’t want to amend the law,”Mao said.
Article 23(4) (b) of the Constitution provides that “a person arrested or detained upon reasonable suspicion of his or her having committed or being about to commit a criminal offense, shall, if not earlier released, be brought to court as soon as possible but in any case not later than 48 hours from the time of hie or her arrest”.
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