A song with lyrics going against the current Ugandan president, Yoweri Museveni has led to the arrest of an artist and music producer in Uganda for “disturbing the president’s peace”.
The artist David Mugema and music producer Jonah Muwanguzi were taken on Tuesday, December 5 to the capital Kampala and arraigned.
This is following the release and electronic circulation of a song criticizing the political climate in Uganda which is reported to have led the president being upset.
What charges are they facing?
The two men are being faced with allegedly composing, recording, producing and communicating through social media a song titled ‘Wumula’ from 2015 to 2017.
Their crime is that the song is a personal attack and it disturbs the peace of the president of Uganda without a purpose of legitimate communication through said song.
Gladys Kamasanyu who is the judge that presided over the case denied them bail despite their not guilty plea due to the absence of prosecutors from the Uganda Communications Commission (UCC) who were “busy at a workshop”.
Until the prosecutors attend the court hearing, the two musicians will remain locked up at the Luzira Maximum Security Prison for offending the president.
Nigerian artist in trouble over song
In 2004 Nigerian music star Eedris Abdulkareem released his third solo album which had the hit track ‘Jaga Jaga” which quickly became an anthem of Nigerians who could relate to the contents of its lyrics.
Although he did not directly call out the country's political leaders the then president of the nation Olusegun Obasanjo addressed it as saying that it was untrue and the singer did not believe in the country.
The song later went on to be banned by the federal government.
Zimbabwe bans African music group from performing
The band Freshlyground which is made up of South Africans, Zimbabweans, and Mozambicans and has a pan-African following, was due to perform a concert in Zimbabwe in 2010.
They had their visas revoked without explanation days before they were set to perform after they released a song called ‘chicken to change’ which criticized the president.
The song and music video showed Robert Mugabe as a caricature alongside other characters and condemns him for clinging on to power for 30 years then urges him to become the hero he used to be by stepping down.