DPP explains why Nandutu was committed to High Court

The Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), Justice Jane Frances Abodo, has clarified claims that she fast-tracked the committal process of Karamoja Affairs State minister Agnes Nandutu to stand trial before the High Court as opposed to her Cabinet colleagues.

“So for the case of Hon Agnes Nandutu, the inquiries were 100 percent complete. We were ready to start hearing the case; there is nothing unique about it (her case) apart from the inquiries being 100 percent complete,” Justice Abodo said while addressing journalists in Kampala yesterday ahead of the sixth Joan Kagezi memorial lecture slated for next Friday.

“We made a decision that it should be committed to the High Court,” she added.

On Wednesday, minister Nandutu was committed to the High Court moments after she pleaded not guilty to the charge of dealing with suspect property in connection with mismanagement of Karamoja iron sheets.

Ms Nandutu, a journalist-turned politician, said she had been baptised by fire by the shocking developments at court.  

Justice view
She protested the manner in which she was treated differently from her two Cabinet colleagues; Mary Goretti Kitutu (Karamoja Affairs) and Amos Lugoloobi (State minister for Planning) who were given an opportunity to apply and be released on bail by the same court.

“I admit I have been baptised with fire. I am firm. However, why commit me to High Court for trial when the lower court has the mandate to handle this case?” the Bududa District Woman MP questioned as she briefly addressed journalists on her way to the court’s holding cells.
Ms Nandutu’s immediate committal to the High Court automatically hand-tied presiding Grade One Magistrate Esther Asiimwe from entertaining her bail application. 
She was instead sent on remand at Luzira prison.

Justice Abodo further explained that as the chief government prosecutor, they have the powers to commit any case to the High Court for trial and that there are set standards that they follow in doing so.

She also said the other Cabinet ministers were not committed to the High Court instantly because the inquiries into their files were not complete.

“I can commit even an assault case to the High Court and committal means; we are ready. Actually, if the court was ready to sit yesterday, we were ready. So commitment to the High Court means we are ready with the case.”

Adding:“…And the others were not committed because we still have verification with a few things before we actually commit them because once we commit, we shall not have a chance of correcting a mistake when we commit the case to the High Court, we can correct an indictment but you cannot correct the summary of the case, that is why we have to be 100 percent confident to ensure that we are done with investigations and make a decision that this particular case should be committed to the High Court.”

Other culprits
The DPP also clarified on why all the ministers and other suspects implicated in the iron sheets scandal haven’t yet been produced before court.

She explained that they bring to court a case file that is ready for prosecution and that they have more than 40 locations that they have visited as investigators to collect evidence. 

“So you are saying we are so slow, I am reading on social media, why are we so fast. Now we don’t know what to do. The investigations are too fast and then the investigations are too slow, why can’t you bring everybody together which is not possible. When a particular file is ready for court, we shall bring it… we also take different prosecutorial decisions on files basing on evidence collected,” the DPP said.

Case handling
She added: “…I don’t know, I cannot even imagine that they are asking why we are not bringing all the cases together…”  

The DPP also revealed that they will not make a similar mistake of having more than one suspect on a file like they did with the pension scam.

“…So this particular case will be one of a kind. I sat down with the director CID and investigators and agreed to open a file for each beneficiary who received…”