A computer forensic expert hired by Bbaale County parliamentary election petitioner Arthur Kiiza has admitted that he could not establish the chain of custody of TikTok videos he examined, raising further questions over the authenticity of electronic evidence presented in the election dispute.
Richard Emuye, 52, a freelance computer scientist specialising in forensic examination, made the admission over the weekend while being cross examined by lawyers representing Bbaale County MP Charles Tebandeke at the Mukono High Court Circuit.
The petition is being heard by Justice Phillip Mwaka and challenges Tebandeke’s victory in the Bbaale County parliamentary election in Kayunga District.
Emuye’s testimony came after the court had earlier rejected several videos tendered by Kiiza, ruling that the electronic evidence had not been sufficiently authenticated and that the devices used to record the videos had not been subjected to forensic verification.
The court had also raised concerns about the movement and handling of the electronic material before it reached the expert.
Emuye told court that he received a Tecno phone and a Samsung phone from Kiiza and Lawrence Muwonge for forensic examination.
The Tecno phone contained videos downloaded from TikTok, while the Samsung phone contained recordings allegedly made during one of Tebandeke’s campaign rallies.
However, Emuye admitted that he was not present when the TikTok videos were downloaded.
He said some of the videos had been downloaded on November 6 and another on December 14, while the phones were only delivered to him on March 24 this year.
He subsequently prepared his forensic report on March 30.
Under questioning by Tebandeke’s lawyers, Emuye acknowledged that he had no direct knowledge of what happened to the videos between the time they were allegedly recorded or downloaded and when the devices were handed over to him.
“I don’t know the chain of custody from the time of recording to when I received them,” Emuye told court.
The admission comes against the background of the defence’s earlier argument that the petitioner had failed to establish an unbroken chain of custody for the electronic evidence.
Emuye also acknowledged that he did not know who owned the TikTok accounts from which the videos had been downloaded.
He agreed that any person can create a TikTok account and upload material to it.
The expert nevertheless told court that he considered the videos original because they contained metadata and information showing the account from which they originated.
He initially expressed uncertainty over whether a TikTok video could be altered but later acknowledged during questioning that technological advances make it possible to alter videos.
Emuye also agreed that the videos had been encoded.
The defence used the concessions to question whether metadata showing information about a TikTok upload was sufficient to establish that the material was an untouched recording of the original event.
Emuye said he examined approximately five videos contained on the Samsung phone but only examined three of them.
He told court that he had no direct interaction with the person who originally recorded the videos.
Instead, the material was handed to him through Muwonge, while Kiiza provided him with verbal explanations about the circumstances surrounding the recordings.
Emuye confirmed that he subsequently prepared a formal report based partly on the information provided to him.
He also acknowledged that he was paid to carry out the forensic examination.
The defence questioned whether the expert’s examination could independently establish what had happened to the recordings before they reached him.
Another issue that emerged during the testimony was the duration of the recordings.
Emuye told court that the videos he examined amounted to about 18 minutes.
The testimony appeared to contrast with evidence previously given by Stella Nakamoga, the woman who allegedly recorded the rally at Kisalizi Trading Centre.
Nakamoga had told court that she attended the rally from its beginning until about 7pm and initially said she had recorded the proceedings in three sequences.
When asked about the duration, she estimated that each recording was nearly an hour.
The difference in the accounts has placed further focus on how the original recordings were handled before being presented to the forensic expert.
Emuye defended the methodology he used to examine the electronic material.
He said he used Oxygen Forensic software to extract data without altering the original material.
According to him, the process involved creating a working copy of the material on a forensic computer, which he described as a laboratory environment.
He then used another forensic tool, FF Prop, to examine metadata.
He further said he used MD5, SHA-1 and SHA-256 hash values to assess the integrity and authenticity of the material.
The expert maintained that the forensic tools enabled him to examine the metadata and other digital characteristics of the files without altering the original evidence.
However, under cross examination, he accepted that the forensic examination could only establish the characteristics of the material that was presented to him and that he had no personal knowledge of the circumstances under which the videos were originally recorded or downloaded.
Dispute over electronic evidence
The evidence forms part of Kiiza’s attempt to prove allegations that Tebandeke made statements during the campaign that targeted him through references to his identity, origins and alleged involvement in land grabbing.
Kiiza has maintained that Tebandeke referred to him as “Goliath”, a name he says was commonly understood in Bbaale to refer to him.
Tebandeke’s lawyers have disputed the interpretation, noting that the MP did not directly mention Kiiza’s name in the recordings.
The defence has also challenged the admissibility and reliability of the videos because some were downloaded from TikTok accounts that do not belong to the petitioner or the witnesses.
Justice Mwaka previously ruled that the videos tendered on flash drives were inadmissible after finding that the petitioner had not sufficiently demonstrated their authenticity.
The hearing continues before Justice Mwaka this week, with Tebandeke’s lawyers expected to continue testing the evidence relied upon by Kiiza to challenge the election result.
English 