By Alex B. AtuhaireGovernment has instructed its London based lawyers to sue China Keitetsi, a former Uganda girl child soldier. The instructions to sue Keitesi in the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands, have been dispatched with a government delegation that left for London Wednesday. Sunday Monitor has established that Minister of Defence Amama Mbabazi and the Director of Civil Litigation, Deus Byamugisha, left with the instructions. But no government official could confirm this action on record. Attorney General, Francis Ayume said ��I know nothing about that�� when contacted Saturday. Keitesi, now resettled in Denmark by the United Nations wrote a book, My Life as a Child Soldier In Uganda. The book paints the National Resistance Army (NRA) bush war led by President Yoweri Museveni (1980 �V 85) in bad light, and casts the president as an ��orgre�� who has turned against its children. Museveni had earlier appointed a team jointly headed by Senior Presidential Advisor on the Media, John Nagenda, and Army spokesman Maj. Shaban Bantariza to prepare for government a dossier about Keitesi��s work. The team is supposed to produce a documentary to be used to back the case and be part of a planned charm offensive, sources said. Nagenda confirmed last week that he was heading the team but declined to give details. ��We have done some good work and are working the best way forward to counter the many lies told by Madam China Keitesi following the unfortunate success of her film. We are making good progress,�� Nagenda said. Other members of the team include Faustian Misanvu from the ministry of information, and Sylvia Nakabugu who replaced Misanvu as secretary. Nagenda said the team whose number Sunday Monitor couldn��t independently verify is cutting across three to four ministries. ��I may have to inform you that it has taken too long for government to come out to do this and it��s rather been unfortunate,�� he said. Keitesi had earlier in a documentary ��China, war child�� made by South African journalist Susan Puren, that won the CNN African Journalist of the Year Award last year, alleged the NRA committed atrocities in the bush. On her website, www.xchildsoldier.org, Keitesi says: ��I'm sorry about all the bad stuff I write about Uganda, but I'm fighting for a cause against betrayal and destruction of an innocent child. �m. for me right now the bad memories overshadow nearly everything. When I look back, the first thing that crosses my mind is pain.�� Bantariza Friday told Sunday Monitor Keitesi is ��a stupid liar who doesn��t know how to lie��. ��She made [up] very many lies and it��s unfortunate that those Europeans believed her. How could she have lost colleagues in 1985-86 when she joined the army in 1987, at Kamukuzi?�� Bantariza asked. Bantariza cites another example where Keitesi claims to have joined the army in Ibanda at the age of 11. ��She says she was born in 1970 so she was 11 in 1981 but you all know that NRA was not in Ibanda in 1981,�� he said. Bantariza said that the team has interviewed former schoolmates of Keitesi, family, relatives, and friends and would include this in their evidence. The Mulindwas
communication group
"With Yoweri Museveni, Uganda is in anarchy" |
