Five workers of Nile Gate Company Limited (NGCL), a Ugandan recruiting agency taking maids abroad are facing charges of aggravated trafficking after one of their clients lost her right kidney while on job in Saudi Arabia.
The company which was licensed by Ministry of Gender and Social Development (MGSD) has so far been closed pending a pre-trial at the International Criminal Division (ICD) court in Kampala.
According to the charge sheet, the company and five accused persons on bail are: Abubakar Sulaiman Kato 33, a company director, Muhammed Mariam 31 treasurer, Salmah Muhammad 43 an agent and Ali Hassan 38 accused with three counts of which is aggravated trafficking contrary to section 3(1) (a) and 4 (I) of Prevention of Trafficking in Persons Act, 2009.
Another accused person is Milly Jennifer Nalunga 32 a supervisor who also handles the Saudi Arabia warehouse locally known as ekiyumba.
In one of the counts, Prosecution led by Joseph Kyomuhendo alleges that the five accused and others still at large, between December 2019 and October 2021, in Kampala and Saudi Arabia, recruited and/or transported Judith Nakintu by means of fraud an abuse of power of position of vulnerability for the purpose of exploitation and as a result, Nakintu suffered mutilation or suffered a life-threatening illness.
According to court documents, the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP) avers in another count that these acts were allegedly committed by a syndicate.
Court documents indicate that all the accused persons represented by Counsel Caleb Alaka plainly deny all the charges.
A pre-hearing was meant to kick off on December 17th 2024 was adjourned to February next 2024 over unavailability of the presiding judge.
How Nakintu’s fate unfolded
The court record indicate that Nakintu revealed that one time her boss in Saudi Arabia, Shafer Muhammed Alamaameri in the company of his family members took her in a hospital for Covid 19 testing and it is the last thing she remembers.
Victim later woke up in King Fahad hospital in Jeddah with injuries and partially paralyzed. She had tubes and machines all over her body and had a deep wound on her abdomen.
Victim underwent the surgery at King Fahad hospital and stayed there as an in-patient for several weeks. Their medical findings were that the victim underwent general surgery, operatory and splenectomy.
She was later transferred to Azan hospital in Thallic town due to the high scourge of Covid 19 at the former hospital.
From Azan hospital, the victim [also known as Kadaama was transferred to the ware house or accommodation facilities of Tail Al Huthl under the care of Jennifer Nalunga who is accused number six (A6) in this case.
Through her stay at the facility, the victim alleges that she had no access to proper medical treatment neither was she allowed to communicate with her family back home. She currently can’t talk properly due to the surgery that was performed on her.
Nakintu repatriated back to Uganda.
Following the pressure for her return from the family led by her mother Angella Mere Kiguli a resident of Luzira Kirombe, Nakintu was repatriated back home.
Nakintu’s family told us that on arrival in October 2022, they did not access their Nakintu because she was picked by a female doctor known as Aisha Ismail from Mulago referral hospital. She picked her from the airport in a vehicle with government number plates.
When we called Dr Aisha for a comment, she did not pick our repeated calls nor did she reply to our WhatsApp message.
Another Doctor lies about the kidney removal.
While in Uganda, evidence available indicate that the victim was subjected to a CT scan at Mulago National Referral hospital in November 2021 conducted by a radiologist Dr Sharif Kikomeko and in his findings both kidneys were present.
This prompted the accused persons to write a formal report dated November 2021 to MGLSD indicating that the two kidneys were intact.
When the victims’ family contested the results given by radiologist Kikomeko, he decided to re-do the examination on the same day and from the same hospital. To the surprise of Nakintu’s family members, results by the same Kikomeko indicted that the victim’s right kidney was actually missing.
This prompted the family members to report to police accusing the company and filing a complaint about “Dr Kikomeko’s lies”.
When contacted for a comment about his contradictory two medical reports on phone, Dr Kikomeko had this to say;
“The matter of Nakintu’s kidney was investigated by police. Go and find out from the police headquarters, yes, I gave them a wrong report at first, but I called them for the right report.”
Family rejects peanuts compensation.
When Uganda police also subjected the victim to medical examination on police form 3, it also confirmed that Nakintu’s right kidney was absent.
The accused sensing trouble devised a tactic of silencing the matter by offering the victim and her family Shs30m intended to make the already vulnerable family submissive.
When the victim’s family rejected the offer, the accused instead came up with a theory that the victim had gotten involved in an accident on March 4, 2020 in the city of Jeddah in Saudi Arabia.
They further alleged that in that accident, the victim’s boss lost two children namely Itin Sad Dhufar Al-Asmari aged 10 years and Said Dhafar. Faiza Nosir Abdullah Al- Shihri, Nura Saad Dhafar Muhammed Al-Asmari injured. They allege that the condition was as a result of the accident and not the illegal organ harvest.
The accused and their accomplices advanced their theory further by alleging that court in Saudi Arabia had compensated the victim to a tune of over UGX 70m.
“We see justice delayed. We have spent a lot of money in treating Nakintu but her life continues to deteriorate. As a family, we had given powers of attorney to Abdullah Kayonde, the president of Migrant Workers to join the DPP’s investigating team in Saudi Arabia but he was not been accepted by the DPP yet we are rarely updated about their new findings,” said Nakintu’s mother.
Apart from the ongoing criminal case against the accused, Nakintu’s relatives have also filed a civil suit from which they intend to demand costs for this grave mistreatment.
Police investigations.
Police findings in their investigations found out that Nakintu was recruited in 2019 by the accused persons and was subjected to medical examinations three times before her travel to Saudi Arabia in December 2019 under the protection of a demotic work.
“The modus operandi of the accused persons and other people in organ trafficking to do that high level action on syndicate operations necessitated the recruitment company in Uganda to send all pre-operative workers to hospital often chosen by the external recruiters for their medical examinations. With the assistance of medical teams in Uganda, the accused persons and others at large as prospective organ donors through medical examination took blood testing,” the investigations partly reveal.
Police also contend that the investigations were properly conducted ensuring that these workers were health and able to undertake domestic work, those whose blood matched with the recipients in the destination market/demand would then be included in those selected and the results were always sent directly to the external recruiters of the destination country.
According to further instigators, the first medical examinations were a prerequisite for all the markets and were always sent directly to the external recruiters of the destination country.
“The medical examinations were a prerequisite for all domestic workers prior to leaving for Middle East or Gulf. The destination company would identify who had ‘passed’ their criteria and facilitate. Nakintu was therefore recruited in the same way and on 12th November 2019 externalized to Saudi Arabia,” the investigations state.
Our investigation also indicate that the money Nakintu worked for the two months was not remitted to her Ugandan personal account and her bosses blamed the inaccurate names used.
By; Siraje Lubwama,
Senior Investigative Journalist in crime, court land matters, human Rights.
Freelance Journalist, with Alternative Digitalk