New Vision, Kampala, 17 June 2002

Ten Strokes for Insulting Woman

Business in Malaba market on May 2 came to a standstill when an old woman undressed in public and started cursing a young man who had annoyed her. The drama started when a young man called Obbo Nyausi asked Anna, 55 if she had knickers on. Anna at first treated it as a joke but when Obbo repeated the question several times, Anna got very annoyed and first removed her gomesi and threw it aside. She went ahead and removed a kind of shorts and threw it into Obbo's face.

Obbo got scared and entered a kiosk and locked himself inside. But this could not stop Anna from cursing and abusing him. Anna moved closer to the door and continued waving her knickers at the door of the kiosk. People in the market got scared and took to their heels to avoid seeing the woman's nakedness. The LC 1 chairman, Okware Ismail intervened and a meeting was called immediately.

Obbo was forced to come out of the kiosk and the defence secretary, Emmanuel Osuna was ordered to give Obbo 10 strokes of the cane. Obbo was also warned never to insult old people again. Obbo was also made to raise sh5,000 to placate the old woman. he was told in no uncertain terms that young people these days had no manners at all and this was impacting negatively on African culture. He was warned that if he repeated such behaviour he would be heavily punished. But 10 strokes of the cane were punishment enough and he screamed at the top of his voice.

Business in the market resumed two hours later after the meeting. Several people complained of having lost merchandise in the market as other people took advantage of the drama to reap where they did not sow.