A female cop squeezed my manhood, reveals ex-Barotse detainee

A female cop squeezed my manhood, reveals ex-Barotse detainee
By Mwala Kalaluka in Mongu
Sun 30 Oct. 2011, 13:50 CAT

A female police officer squeezed my manhood, former Barotse detainee tells inquiry commissioners. And the Roman Catholic Church in Mongu says former president Rupiah Banda and his vice, George Kunda, interfered in the judicial process and declared Barotse detainees guilty before the court process was exhausted.

There were gasps of disbelief when a 30-year-old Barotse activist narrated how a named Mongu female police officer squeezed his manhood before arresting him over January's Mongu riots.

Submitting before the commission During the second day of sittings by the Rodger Chongwe-chaired Commission of Inquiry into the Mongu riots at the Provincial Minister's Conference Hall in Mongu yesterday, former Barotse detainee, Eugene Kapatiso, a 28-year-old traditional doctor of Mongu's Imwiko North Park, named the police that brutally went to arrest him on January 14.

Kapatiso said the four police officers were all local people.

Kapatiso mentioned the first police officer who went to his house to pick him up as Akushanga who had since been transferred from the province because it was feared he would be in serious problems.

"The other one was Audrey. This one also brutalised me and she got hold of my manhood and started beating it. I was undressed," said Kapatiso as some people murmured. "She was squeezing and pulling my manhood and beating it, saying this was what was making me to be foolish."

Asked by Commissioner In'utu Suba if he could identify the policewoman who ‘played' with his manhood, Kapatiso said he could and that he had seen her that morning.

He said the other police officer who took part in brutalising him despite not having anything to do with the said riots was a man identified as Nyirenda.

Kapatiso said he lost US$2,000 and K3.5 million in the process of being brutalised at his house and that during his detention in Mumbwa Prison, he sustained a handicap as a result of the bad conditions he was exposed to.

Kapatiso, who was discharged on medical grounds, told the commission that prison authorities prematurely removed him from his admission ward in Mumbwa Hospital for fear that Post journalists would discover him there and requested the commission to help him retrieve the items that he uses in his traditional practice from the police, adding that if he had a gun on January 14, he would have retaliated against the police brutality.

And Fr Gregory Muliya said a miscalculated action by the armed paramilitary and police sparked the Mongu riots.

Fr Muliya, who is the Diocesan Priests' Council chairperson, said the immediate causes of the January 14, 2011 Mongu riots was the denial of a police permit to hold public meetings on the Barotseland Agreement issue.

"The unwarranted refusal by the police to grant permission to activists to hold meetings angered them to unbearable levels," Fr Muliya said.

"The presence of armed security officers was irritating and made the environment volatile… The paramilitary are known to be heavy-handed and uncompromising. Their presence was seen as a preparation for violent policing and not crowd control policing."

He said the root cause of the Mongu fracas was the abrogation of the Barotseland Agreement, which was a critical need that some people in the area were ready to fight for.

"The authorities that denied the activist groups permission to meet and stopped them from exercising their right to express their views caused the riots. The police were responsible for the riot; they handled the situation in a very provocative manner," said Fr Muliya as the crowd applauded.

"It was surprising that armed paramilitary police were deployed in Mongu before the riots. Some people were arrested on the 13th January 2011, the day before the riots."

Fr Muliya said all detainees were entitled to damages and should be considered as prisoners of conscience.

"It appears there was interference in the due process by the executive. When Hon Mkhondo Lungu, the then Minister of Home of Affairs addressed detainees in Mongu Prison, he stated that the case will go very far, some detainees would be released and others would not be released. These words could be interpreted as interference in the due process," Fr Muliya said.

"On several occasions the then president of Zambia, Mr. Rupiah Banda commented on the matter. His comments appeared to declare the detainees guilty before the logical conclusion of the due process of the law."

He said on several occasions the then vice-president George Kunda, clearly stated that the detainees were guilty of riotous behaviour and associated offences and that the police acted professionally.

"However, we note with appreciation the initiative taken by the new government through the commission, which might result in improved relation between the government and BRE Barotse Royal Establishment," said Fr Muliya. "It was the desire of Mongu Diocese to be part and parcel of the solution to problems that arose because of the refusal by the National Constitutional Conference to include the Barotseland Agreement of 1964."