The National Public Prosecution Authority (NPPA) received the file of former minister Evode Uwizeyimana and are analysing it for and he will potentially be charged with a crime of causing unintentional bodily harm. Uwizeyimana was until last week, the state minister in charge of Constitutional and Legal Affairs, The case was submitted to prosecution last week by Rwanda Investigation Bureau (RIB). RIB Spokesperson, Marie Michelle Umuhoza told The New Times that after investigating Uwizeyimana’s case, they submitted his dossier to the prosecution. However, she said that he is not in custody. “The file is no longer in our jurisdiction. It is in the hands of the prosecution,” she said. “We received his (Uwizeyimana’s) case last Friday, and we are analysing it, then we shall consider the facts and possible charges so that we decide whether to file the case to court or not,” Faustin Nkusi, NPPA spokesperson told The New Times. On February 3, 2020, Uwizeyimana was criticised on social media for allegedly pushing a female security guard at a city shopping mall where he had bypassed the security checks at the entrance. An eyewitness reported that, during the incident, Uwizeyimana did not want to walk through a metal detector as is required of all people accessing public buildings. When the security guard asked him to go through the detector, he instead pushed her, and she fell to the ground then he went passed. He indicated that, normally, the decision on a dossier should be made within six months. On February 6, Uwizeyimana wrote to the Prime Minister resigning from cabinet. Generally, Nkusi said that the charge Uwizeyimana faces is unintentional bodily harm, which is provided for in article 118 of the law Determining Offences and Penalties in General, which was enacted in 2018. Unintentional bodily harm entails that any person who, through carelessness, inattention, negligence, lack of precaution and foresight, causes bodily harm to another person but without any intention of endangering his/her life commits an offence. Upon conviction, the offender is liable to imprisonment for a term of at least three months and not more than six months and a fine of at least Rwf500,000 and not more than one million Rwandan francs Rwf1,000,000) or only one of these penalties. If the offence referred to under Paragraph One of this Article results in death, the penalty is imprisonment for a term of six months and not more than two years and a fine of at least five hundred Rwandan francs Rwf500,000 and not more than two million Rwandan francs Rwf2,000,000, or only one of these penalties.
