Tiktoker jailed for 2 years and 8 months for spreading malicious information about the president.

Posted on Nov 19, 2024
By LTAuthor
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A court in Uganda sentenced a 21 year-old boy to two years and 8 months in Wakiso District on Monday for insulting Uganda's President, Yoweri Museveni.

Emmanuel Nabugodi was found guilty last week to four charges, including hate speech and spreading malicious information about the president.

The video, shared in September 2024, was deemed to demean and degrade the president, promoting hostility against him.

The incident occurred in Wakiso District, after which Nabugodi went into hiding in the Bugisu subregion. Following weeks of tracking, police arrested him in Mbale.

In July, Edward Awebwa was handed a six-year sentence on similar charges to Nabugodi regarding a TikTok post. Three others are awaiting trial over content on the social media app.

When handing down Nabugodi's sentence, Stellah Maris Amabilis, the chief magistrate of the court in Entebbe, said he was not remorseful and the sentence would help prevent social media attacks against people including the person of the president.

"This court hopes that by the time the convict leaves prison, he would have learnt that abusing people in the name of getting content is bad," she said.

She added that he had the right to appeal against the sentence within 14 days.

He was convicted under a controversial amendment in 2022 to the Computer Misuse Act.

It made it illegal to "write, send, or share any information through a computer, which is likely to ridicule, degrade, or demean another person, group of persons, a tribe, an ethnicity, a religion or gender".

 



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