For 19 days, the answer was the same.
“We don’t have him.”
Police said it. The UPDF said it. The Attorney General’s lawyers stood in the High Court and said it too, under oath.
For 19 days, a family didn’t know where their son was. Lawyers didn’t know who to serve. His constituents didn’t know the way about of their leader. His party didn’t know either since he is the deputy President of NUP, Buganda Region. And a country watched as a man who had appeared on television one day vanished the next.
Then this morning, he was “dumped.”
That’s the word people at Nateete Police Station used. Not “surrendered.” Not “presented.” Dumped. Like a sack. By unknown operatives in plain clothes. No record of arrest. No charge sheet. No explanation. Just a body left at a counter, and then, hours later, a police officer saying, “He has been taken to Butambala.”
This is not how a state is supposed to work. Not in 2026. Not anywhere that claims to have courts.
The Paper Trail vs The Human Trail
Last week the High Court, through Justice Collins Acellam, gave the state a deadline. The CDF, the IGP, and the Attorney General were to come back today with a report. Where is Hon. Muwanga Kivumbi?
In court, the government asked for more time. They said police had “a lead.” That phrase is familiar in Uganda. It means we are buying time.
But while lawyers were still arguing about leads, the man himself was already moving. From wherever he had been kept for 19 days, to Nateete, to Butambala Chief Magistrate’s Court.
The court did what courts have done in similar cases lately. It remanded him. To an “undisclosed prison.” Until August 11th.
So let’s pause and count: Abducted July 9. Denied by police and army. Ordered by court to produce him. And when produced, not released, not charged properly, but remanded further. The law was used, but only after the law had first been broken.
What He Said, and Why It Matters
When Kivumbi finally stood before a magistrate, he did not talk about politics first. He talked about his body.
Daily torture. Multiple injuries. 19 days without contact with family, lawyers, or doctors.
Whether you agree with his politics or not, that statement should alarm every Ugandan. Because torture is not a political opinion. It is a crime. Our Constitution bans it. Our Penal Code punishes it. And our international obligations require us to investigate it.
The state’s response so far has been denial, then silence, then procedure. But procedure after abuse is not justice. It is damage control.
The Deeper Question for Ordinary and Elite Uganda
This case is not only about one former MP from Butambala. It is about the bargain we are making as a country.
For the ordinary Ugandan in Old taxi park kampala, in Gulu market, in a village in Bushenyi, this sends a message: You can be taken, and no one will tell you where you are. Your people can go to court and be told “we don’t know.” And when you return, the first thing the state does is put you back inside.
For the elite, the lawyers, the journalists, the civil society, the business people: this tests whether institutions still have weight. A High Court order was issued. It was not obeyed in spirit. The man was produced only after 19 days, and only to be remanded again. If court orders can be treated like suggestions, then what is the point of having courts?
And for the security agencies: You cannot claim to protect the country by operating outside the country’s own laws. Denying knowledge in an affidavit, and then “dumping” someone at a police station the same week, destroys public trust. It also endangers your own officers, because it blurs the line between state duty and criminal conduct.
Three Things That Must Happen Now
1. Medical and Independent Examination.
Hon. Kivumbi’s allegations of torture cannot be ignored. He needs a medical exam by independent doctors, and those findings must be made public. Without that, we will never know what happened in those 19 days.
2. Accountability for the Abduction
Who were the operatives who took him on July 9? Who authorized it? Who drove him to Nateete? The IGP and CDF cannot file a report saying “we don’t know.” The court must demand names, and the DPP must act.
3. A Public Conversation on Habeas Corpus.
A writ of habeas corpus means “produce the body.” It is one of the oldest protections against state power. If it takes 19 days and public pressure to get a response, then the writ is meaningless. Parliament, the Judiciary, and the Bar need to ask: how do we make this right real again?
Final Word
Hon. Muwanga Kivumbi is now in prison. But the bigger prisoner is the idea that the law binds everyone.
When the state says “we don’t know” and then produces the person in court, it is telling us two things at once: We have the power to take you, and we have the power to pretend we didn’t.
Ugandans deserve better than that pretense. Ordinary or elite, NRM or opposition, we all live under the same Constitution. And if that Constitution cannot protect a former MP for 19 days, then it cannot protect any of us for 19 minutes.
The court will sit again on August 11th. The country should be watching. Not just for Kivumbi. But for ourselves.
