DEAD OR ALIVE! Court Orders Security to Produce Missing Education Official!
The High Court in Kampala has issued an order directing security agencies to produce Duncan Keith Ayebare, a Technical Advisor at the Ministry of Education and Sports, alleged to have been secretly detained since February this year 2026.
In a ruling delivered on Friday by Justice Joyce Kavuma of the Civil Division, the court has ordered the Chief of Defence Forces (CDF), the Chief of Defence Intelligence and Security (CDIS), the Inspector General of Police, and the Attorney General to produce Ayebare before the court on June 2, 2026, at 11:00 am.
The issuance of a writ of habeas corpus follows a successful application filed by Ayebare through his father, Reverend Robert Kayongwe Basherura, who accused security operatives of illegally arresting and detaining his son incommunicado beyond the 48 hours permitted in the Constitution.
The Court documents indicate that Ayebare allegedly disappeared on February 13, 2026, after being summoned to Gayaza Junior School for a meeting.
According to an affidavit filed by his father, Ayebare called shortly after arriving at the school and reportedly informed family members that he had been arrested by armed plain-clothed men inside the head teacher’s office.
The family further alleged that since the arrest, they had failed to trace his whereabouts despite making several inquiries, even within the security agencies.
Additional evidence before court was provided by Wandera William, a gardener and caretaker at Ayebare’s residence. In his affidavit, Wandera stated that on February 14, Ayebare was brought home by armed men dressed in Uganda People’s Defence Forces uniforms alongside two plain-clothed men travelling in a numberless drone vehicle.
Wandera told the court that the officers allowed Ayebare briefly into the house before conducting a search, obtaining signatures on unknown documents, and later driving him away to an undisclosed location.
However, the respondents , to whom this order has been directed, opposed the application through Detective Corporal Obed Nankunda, who denied that the Uganda Police Force had ever arrested or detained Ayebare.
The police maintained that investigations and searches conducted in police detention records established that Ayebare was neither in police custody nor held in any known detention facility under police control.
During the hearing of the case, however, the lawyers representing the Attorney General raised a preliminary objection, arguing that the application lacked a proper cause of action against the respondents because the alleged arresting officers were not clearly identified as agents of government institutions.
The State Attorneys also questioned why the application had been filed nearly three months after the alleged disappearance and argued that the head teacher of Gayaza Junior School, identified as Sarah Tebugurwa, had not been joined to the proceedings despite allegedly being the last known person to have seen Ayebare before his disappearance.
Ayebare’s lawyers from Elgon Advocates, led by Henry Byansi, argued that the objections raised involved disputed facts that could only be resolved through evidence and not through preliminary objections.
The lawyers further told the court that efforts to contact the headteacher had been unsuccessful and requested the court to summon her as a witness to explain the circumstances surrounding Ayebare’s alleged arrest from the school premises.
In her ruling today, Lady Justice Kavuma noted that the right to personal liberty and habeas corpus is protected under Articles 23 and 44 of the Constitution and cannot be suspended or limited.
The judge said that while the police denied holding Ayebare, there was no evidence showing that investigations had been extended to other security agencies.
Justice Kavuma further observed that the Chief of Defence Forces and the Chief of Defence Intelligence and Security had not filed affidavits denying the allegations made against them.
“The applicant demonstrated that the respondents’ agents arrested and detained him without due process,” Justice Kavuma ruled.
She added that where allegations of unlawful detention remain unchallenged, court is entitled to infer that the detention complained of exists.
“Where allegations of unlawful detention are made and remain uncontroverted, court is entitled to infer that the detention complained of exists. The continued incommunicado detention of a citizen without trial is inconsistent with the constitutional guarantees of personal liberty and fair hearing protected under Articles 23 and 28 of the 1995Constitution of Uganda”, said the Judge.
The judge held that Ayebare had established sufficient grounds for the issuance of a writ of habeas corpus, describing prolonged incommunicado detention without trial as inconsistent with constitutional guarantees of personal liberty and fair hearing.
Justice Kavuma has consequently ordered the respondents to produce Duncan Keith Ayebare before the High Court Civil Division on June 2, 2026. She did not make any order as to costs.
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