By JOACHIM BUWEMBO

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It seems God is answering the prayers of the criminals in Uganda. Or is it Mr Devil who is giving covering fire to his evil servants in the civil service? Whoever is pulling the levers, the criminals have cause to smile, for an industrial war has erupted between the public prosecutors and the government.

Unless the government capitulates and gives its prosecutors a pay rise within 14 days counting from June 23, the learned brothers (and sisters?) will lay down their tools indefinitely.

Now Ugandans are used to strikes by teachers and health workers. The teachers’ strikes happen about three times a year while the health workers’ are a bit less frequent. They usually get to meet the minister responsible, are given some promises and back to work they go. If the stand-off takes longer than the usual few days, a few ringleaders are arrested, accused of organising and taking part in an illegal strike and prosecuted.

Now when the prosecutors strike, who will prosecute the prosecutors?

The quarrel between the government and its prosecutors must be music to the criminals’ ears. They must be praying to God, or to the devil, that no settlement is reached. So police will keep arresting suspects but cannot take them to court within the required 48 hours because there will be nobody to prosecute them. So the suspects will stay in police cells where they will be joined by more suspects who cannot be taken to court because there will be no prosecutors.

As the police cells get crammed with suspects standing or sleeping on others, one of two things or both will happen. Either human-rights activists will start raising hell or police will start releasing the suspects on bond as fast as new ones arrive.

A pattern will be established with criminals realising that you can commit a crime and once arrested, the worst that can happen to you is to spend a night or two at the station, get released and life goes on.

The emergency action government can take is to mobilise other qualified judicial personnel to prosecute suspects. Will these be magistrates and judges? Then who will hear the cases? Will the government hire private lawyers to prosecute, even though they cost much more money than the public prosecutors are demanding?

Everybody is in for confusing times. We have always known the public prosecutors to be a tough lot who use an axe to kill a fly.

You make a small careless statement and they say things like “bringing the lawfully elected and constituted government into disrepute”; go looking for jobs and they say you were “idle and disorderly”; join a melee of fellows protesting something you believe in and they say you are trying to “overthrow the government by force”; you briefly stop your car to buy something through the window and they accuse you of “reckless use of a motor vehicle.” And they menacingly demand the maximum penalty to make you an example for others.

But behind all that toughness are a bunch of hapless, underpaid legal experts. The senior-most of the lot earn the equivalent of $400 a month while the lowest ranking get $150. Sometimes they have no transport and are offered a lift by the lawyer whose client they are prosecuting.

Now these tough but vulnerable fellows have turned their guns on their own master. What will happen?

Joachim Buwembo is a social and political commentator based in Kampala. E-mail: [email protected]