Security forces have swiftly acted on the President’s orders to arrest individuals instigating fake death rumours on social media platforms.
While speaking at the opening of the virtual health summit last week, President Museveni directed his security ping pongs to arrest bloggers and social media individuals alleging his death.
This followed flooding reports on various social media platforms that Sevo had succumbed to covid 19 at a hospital in Germany where he was transferred from Agha Khan hospital in Kenya.
In a security briefing at the Police headquarters in Naguru on Monday, Criminal Investigations spokesperson-CID, Charles Twine said a number of suspects have been busted and detained to help with investigations.
Twine says last week 1 suspect identified as Peter Ssekyondwa was nabbed from the Luweero district and others have since followed suits.
“We have been undertaking investigations and on Thursday we arrested one of the suspects (Ssekyondwa) who had authored a message extending what had been authored by people outside our jurisdiction. He edited the message(from abroad) and started sharing it. The people who received it also started sharing it,” Twine said.
Twine says the information is mostly being spread by bloggers abroad seeking asylum abroad.
Twine says the crackdown is still on for self-styled bloggers and one by one, they will be hunted down and caged.
“ When you announce someone dead and you are not from their family or personal doctor or official spokesperson of the institution where he works, society condemns you as one who is indisciplined. To us the law enforcement agencies, we take up the matter as a crime. When you share that information ignorantly, you may also be charged,” Twine said.
The CID mouthpiece has meanwhile issued a stern warning to all persons involved in the ‘crime noting that they won’t go Scott free.
He says they will be charged under the Computer Misuse Act section 25.
“Desist from sharing such unfounded information on social media. We are still looking for many other people(who shared that information). Together with Crime Intelligence, we are looking for those people.”
