State Minister for Labor Mwesigwa Rukutana has been acquitted of all charges stemming from a shooting incident in last year’s party polls.. He was facing seven counts including attempted murder, threatening violence and malicious damage to property.
Rukutana was arrested with three of his bodyguards from his home in Kagugu in Rushenyi county, a day after the National Resistance Movement -NRM party primaries on September 4, 2020. He had been accused of shooting his rivals’ agent Dan Rweburingi and damaging property among others, and subsequently charged for the same.
But the Chief Magistrates Court in Ntungamo presided over by Gordon Muhimbise said that the evidence adduced in court by the prosecution against Rukutana on all seven counts was full of concoctions, falsehoods and grave inconsistencies.
Muhimbise said that the prosecution evidence was nothing but ‘naked lies’ and that no reasonable tribunal or court can convict anyone basing on such statements. He added that most of the allegations were discredited during cross-examinations.
Rukutana welcomed the judgement and said that his political enemies who had falsely testified against him in the court were like the builders of the Tower of Babel who wanted to reach God but failed in the way because of their ill intentions.
