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Section 53 of Penal Code CAP 63: Penalty for prohibited publications

    

(1) Any person who, otherwise than in his capacity and in the course of his duties as a public officer, prints, makes, imports, publishes, sells, supplies, offers for sale or supply, distributes, reproduces or has in his possession or under his control any prohibited publication is guilty of an offence and is liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three years: Provided that no person who—
(i) forthwith on the importation of a publication being prohibited under section 52 of this code, or on the declaration of a publication as a prohibited publication, as the case may be, delivers to the nearest administrative officer or to the police officer in charge of the nearest police station all copies of the publication in his possession or under his control; or
(ii) by reason of its being sent or delivered to him without his knowledge or privity or in response to a request made by him before the importation thereof was prohibited, or before the declaration of the publication as a prohibited publication, as the case may be, comes into possession or control of a prohibited publication, and who, forthwith on the nature of its contents becoming known to him,
delivers to the nearest administrative officer or the police officer in charge of the nearest police station all copies of the publication so coming into his possession or control,
shall be convicted of an offence under this section in respect of the copies so delivered by him as aforesaid.
[Act No. 54 of 1960, s. 11, Act No. 21 of 1966, 1st Sch.]
(2) Where in any prosecution under this section it is proved that a person printed, made, imported, published, sold, supplied, offered for sale or supply, distributed, reproduced or had in his possession or under his control a prohibited publication, it shall be presumed that he knew the nature and contents of the publication, unless and until he proves to the satisfaction of the court—
(a) that he was not aware of the nature or contents of the publication in respect of which he is charged; and
(b) that he printed, made, imported, published, sold, supplied, offered for sale or supply, distributed, reproduced or had in his possession or under his control the publication in such circumstances that at no time did he have reasonable cause to suspect that it was a prohibited publication.

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