RCC To Arua Youths: You Have No Right To Peaceful Protests Without Police Permission

ARUA. Charles Ichogor, the Arua Resident City Commissioner (RRC) has told the youths in the city that they have no right to peaceful protests without securing permission from the police.

Ichogor made the assurance following a heavy security deployment to quell a planned protest by a section of the youths in Arua City on Thursday, July 25, 2024.

The youths, who mobilized themselves on social media, had threatened to march to Arua City Council in protest of the high rate of corruption in the country.

The move comes days after police in Kampala arrested and jailed over 70 youths who attempted to march to Parliament over the same.

But in Arua, heavily armed police and UPDF soldiers shielded off the roads leading to Arua City Council and subjected everybody entering public offices in the city to thorough security check-up, prompting the youths to temporarily call off the protest.

However, when contacted over the matter, Ichogor said as security, they couldn’t allow the youths to continue with the protest without getting permission from police.

“Yesterday, we got wind from our intelligence that some disgruntled youths, some idle youths were planning to march to Arua city offices demonstrating their annoyance over corruption in the country and for us as security, we didn’t take that for granted. For us we prepared ourselves, I mobilized as chairman security, my security team for a meeting because marching is not the way for sorting out issues,” Ichogor said.

He added that: “Uganda as a country, is one of the countries that is well governed in the whole world. So, there are structures where you can relay your grievances. We are not going to tolerate anybody who is going to destabilize the peace we have now got here in Arua city. Anybody trying to infiltrate Arua city will not be tolerated. We are on standby class one!”

Much as Ichogor acknowledged that it is a Constitutional right to peacefully protest, he argued that police never permitted the Arua youths to demonstrate by marching to the City Council at all.

“Before you demonstrate, you are supposed to ask for permission from the police and to the best of my knowledge, nobody asked for permission. So, it is going to be an unlawful demonstration which we are not going to allow. The deployment you have seen today is going to continue from Genesis up to Revelation,” Ichogor stated.

According to Ichogor, the deployment is even intended to protect the public offices in the city which he said are being targeted by the protesters.

“There are very few people who want to access our offices now but we are protecting the majority outside. Arua city is a business hub, we want to protect the majority who are doing their businesses and that is why, we have decided to put checkpoints everywhere because their target, according to intelligence, was to attack the Office of the President here in Arua City. That is why we have that surveillance, then attack the office of the mayor, attack police and you know we are very close to each other,” said Ichogor, adding that we are going to inconvenience the few until we are sure that the situation is now normal and under control.

Ichogor maintained that police didn’t arrest anybody in connection with the foiled protest in Arua city, contrary to social media reports indicating that one of the protest mobilizers only identified as Ayiko has gone missing from his home after being put under house arrest by police early in the morning.

Mercy Grace Munduru, one of the Anti-Corruption crusaders in the country said: “Young people in Arua are right to get concerned about corruption and this has affected service delivery. The security forces should allow the youth to engage and instead listen to them. We stand with the young people, and we shall not relent! We shall peacefully express our dissatisfaction.”