Where the comments on this from the Lutimba Matovu's et al?
y
From: "Y Yaobang" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: ugnet_: UGANDA GOVERNMENT IS TRYING TO SHUT ME UP
Date: Wed, 12 Feb 2003 18:11:34 +0000
Mulindwa,
China Keitetsi's letter below raises the question of whether some NRM leaders might be "Pedophiles". If this proves to be the case, a serious case could be made in The Hague to have such leaders arrested if they ever venture outside Uganda.
y
From: "Mulindwa Edward" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
CC: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, "Rwanda" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: ugnet_: UGANDA GOVERNMENT IS TRYING TO SHUT ME UP
Date: Tue, 11 Feb 2003 18:33:10 -0500
China Keitetsi; the NRM Quest to shut me up
Dear Editor,
I write to make a few comments on a commentary sent to you by Hussein Kashillingi that appeared in your paper sometime last week.
The government of Uganda have for some time been trying to make me keep quiet about my experiences as a child soldier. They have used many tricks in their attempt to make the world believe that my book is nothing but lies. After the first lies published by Government-owned News paper "New Vision" I wrote one article ( see The Monitor of 17 February 2002 ), which I responded to. New Vision refused to publish this article of mine, but The Monitor accepted to. New Vision kept on writing and I knew (of cause) that I am not as big as the NRM government of Uganda, who can print a new article every day, besides, I didn't see it necessary to reply to all the government machinated attempts in its quest to shut me down.
In the best of my knowledge, Afande Yoweri Museveni's government still uses children, just see the Global Report of 2001. January 2001 700 children were taken from Democratic Republic of Congo to Kyankwanzi in Uganda for military training. UNICEF managed to rescue 163, this even managed to reach CNN. The way it looks here is that Afande Yoweri Museveni and ministers Amama Mbabazi and Nagenda have forgotten the hundreds of children they marched with in 1986 when taking over Kampala. If Afande Museveni has forgotten let me remind him of a friend of mine who was his bodyguard as a 9-years-old until he died: F. Kayanja. For me it is not a new thing. Anyone who talked ill of the NRM government is an `Adui´ (meaning enemy). When you are a girl or woman, they will use words such as: Malaya (whore) or/and a liar. Imagine your name being associated with such words o n a newspaper headline; maybe you will be part of the many who say no more. For me I cannot, because NRA (UPDF) took away my dignity, my childhood and much more. For this reason and for the sake of the little children, I will never keep quiet, I will keep on, that no child goes through the same long road I have walked. The NRM government cannot abuse me anymore. I am safe now, but there are many like the 700 kids from the DRC who were taken away from their country and their parents to train for war. This is a mark for life, a scar that I will always feel, and it can't be washed away. This is one of the reasons that I refuse to enjoy this freedom alone. No matter how many international courts the NRM government threaten to take me to including the Hague, I'll keep on being the free voice of those children still forced into wars.
I challenge Afande Museveni's Team of lawyers and ministers to bring their "evidence" to Den Hague. But remember my friends, fellow Ugandans; there are still a few of my comrades left who go further back in NRA history than me (I got there in 1984!). They know me, as well as you. I must say to Afande Shaban Bantariza that I joined the NRM/A in 1984. I still wonder where you got the false information. I wasn't born in 1970. If you have read the book, then you have chosen to say the opposite. Bantariza chooses to forget that I rejoined the army, and that was in Nyakyishara, and not in Ibanda or Kamukuzi, as he happily lies. He is just like many other dishonest intellectuals who have been telling a lot of lies in order to protect their job. Just like them, Bantariza is being paid to turn the truth into lies. I am so scared because four ministers an d their ministries are after me, as if I had committed a crime against humanity. All I did is to tell the truth on what happened to me and other children-comrade. If Afande Museveni has a heart he would have appointed a team of lawyers and soldiers to bring the person who have been terrorising children for the past 17 years in the north. If anyone should be taken to court, it is Afande Museveni and other Afandes of NRM/A that should be taken to Court for having abused me and other children of my generation or the hundreds taken from the DRC for military training in Uganda. After the pain and the dignity they took away from me as a woman, I thought of taking them to court but I was scared because I had the fear that the NRM with all the team of intellectuals trained in telling lies was stronger than me.
To me it seems like that Museveni's government knows that there are a lot of comrades who'll begin to talk. I am relieved that some people have begun to tell what happened during the struggle. I think the rumour of suing me in court is an attempt to scare more people who may want to talk. The government know very well that I have opened the Pandora's box of NRM /A. You can choose to break the silence and get mud thrown at you and save thousands of children, or take cover and protect your own wings.
Having a tight schedule, I will not talk on many false and uncoordinated pieces of information. Nonetheless, I will hereby respond to Hassan Kashillingi who referred to me as a lair. Hassan, you have never been my friend. I know you as a son of Afande Ahmad Kashillingi. You are the only son with a mother who was living in Rukingiri, the home Town of Kashillingi. The other children, about 50 or so, never had their different mothers near Kashillingi, be it in Kampala or in Rukingiri. When I worked as a bodyguard to your father, you spent most of the time with your mother in Rukungiri and studies. We were therefore not close to one another. Being a child of an Afande, you too ordered us around. Have you forgotten that we the little children made fire, slaughtered animals and cooked for you on Idi day in Rukungiri while you played, as a normal child should.
Hassan, your father never cared or tried to give us education, as you try to say. Afande
Kashillingi never employed us. Your father instead of giving us life, he took it away by sending some of his Kadogo bodyguards to the frontline in Kitgum simply because they fell in love with his daughters. Do you remember when Silas came back shot on the legs and arms. After he was released from Mbuya military hospital he came back to us but your dad didn't allow him to stay. Silas had to stay in the officers' mess. I watched him as he became thinner and thinner, but you couldn't see this because you were busy as normal children studying. Silas was sent to the north because he revealed to your mother the secrets of your father's girl friend. Your father never financed us in any way. We, his bodyguards, were on the payroll of the ministry of defence, which paid us with packets of Suppermatch cigarettes. While we smoked away our blood earned cigarettes, your fat her who didn't smoke, never cared to find out where we got the cigarettes. Although he had the possibility, your father never made the slightest efforts to take us (the Kadogos) to school. By the way, I was not the only Kadogo bodyguard of your father. Where are Katumba, Bisaso, Makumbi, Silasi, Jamil Nsubuga, "Sharp"(RIP) and many others. Did your father make any effort at all to take any of them to school? "Sharp" my God, the poor young boy died in an ambush in the north.
You spread lies that your father built a house for my mother. That is utter nonsense. Go back to my book on page 135 and you will find the source of the money for putting up a house for my mother. Rumours had it that Col. Gaddafi gave to Afande Museveni some money adding up to monies collected from changing the national currency that was used to pay the soldiers, each of whom received between 35000 to 50000 Shillings. On page 137 of my book, I stated that: "A week or so went by. I tried to figure out what to do with the money. I thought of my mother who didn't have a home of her own.". So Hassan, I used that money and not Kashillingi's to acquire a house for my mother.
The sexual abuse of your father towards me is covered in my book. I do not intend to go into that again here. It would have surprised me if you knew about your father's sexual abuses to me before. For I know that an African father never talks about his personal sexual life with his children. I can feel your pain now Hussein as you try not to believe it. But true to the point as written in my book, your father abused me sexually. Do you know why your father has many children with different mothers. Have you ever blamed him for making his niece (Ms.) Regina pregnant whom he had sex with while she was half-legged recovering from the amputation following the gun injuries from a kadogo soldier who loved Regina as much as your Dad did. I suggest you take your father and Regina's child for a DNA test before you try another game of lying for the NRM.
For my own reasons, I will not talk about Lt. Col. Drago Kaima here. He is the father of my child. I have read in some papers that Lt. Col. Drago (RIP) was a crook, a thief and all kind of things. Why then did the NRA promote and gave him (a crook) an entire Brigade under his command? However, no one talks about how old he was when he became apart of NRA in 1982. No one talks about the many battles he fought.
Rugaba Hassan Kashillingi; I am terribly disappointed by your attempt to talk sweet about Afande Museveni. You wrote ". President Museveni had and has a soft heart for the children. He never exposed them directly to the frontline and constantly gave them lectures and comforted them that they will soon be re-united with their families." You were not a Kadogo and you never joined the NRA. Re-read my book and you will find out how dangerous Museveni is. While he kept his children in safety abroad, Museveni used us to fight his war. If Afande Museveni loves children, why did he give Fred Kayanja a gun instead of a pen? Many kids fell, especially at the battle of the Katonga Bridge. Who talks about them now? The sweet words that we would soon re-unite with our parents and families turned out to be lies. What did Museveni say when the NRA army council at a meeting in the State House. He saw an entire battalion of us kadogos who came with different officers. Did Museveni ask the kadogo bodyguard girls team, how `Suicide´ treated them? Tell me, which kid got re-united with his/ her parents after the fall of Kampala? In fact some are still fighting in the North, of course now no longer Kadogos. (Go to www.xchildsoldier.org and read what Kevin Aliro wrote on such kids). You stated clearly that your father went into exile (and was arrested) for a reason that you might not be told in the whole of your life. Your father was a very good combat and/ or frontline commander. If Museveni loves kids, how many days did he take to throw you (kids) out of the Kololo House and give it to Afande Nanyumba? Didn't you sleep in a hungry stomach for days in that small house in Entebbe as Afande Museveni left you (kids) go hungry?
Your father was later rejected by the NRA/ NRM system. He was arrested by Kyakabale, then an NRA darling, and detained. It never took long Kyakabale had to suffer the same fate of arrest and torture. You now speak sweetly about this system, perharps in the hope that you are given a job by that government. I wish you the best in your endeavour. I only pray that it should not happen that just like your father, you one Day end up in Makindye - a used condom, which is to be discarded. Hassan, I am defeated to see that you bring Olara Otunnu's name here. I mentioned the name Olara Otunnu in context and what is wrong with that? Olara Otunnu is too busy to invite people like me. Please before you write get your information right. Olara Otunnu was not in the bush with us, but must have seen us in the streets running with our guns behind our Afandes. It is in my forewor d of the book and reads as follows: ". My story reaches all people, regardless of their rank in society. So far I have met UN secretary General Kofi Annan, Olara Otunnu of children in Armed conflicts, Nelson Mandela, Bill Clinton, Whoopi Goldberg, Harrison Ford, Nobert de Niro, even Graca Machel and Queen Sylvia of Sweden.." My story reached Olara Otunnu and the people listed above and it has reached you now. It will continue to reach other people. Olara Otunnu has nothing to do with the publication of my book. Do not pretend to know and talk about things that are not clear to you. If you want to know whoever helped with the publication of the book, please ask me. In any case, books always carry names of their publishers and my book is no exception to this. In my view Olara Otunnu loves children more tham Afande Museveni. Olara Otunnu has never abused children, but he protects them. Go ask the children in Mozambique, Sierra Leone, DRC, Sudan, Afghanistan and many other count ries about his personal love and official responsibilities towards children. I have respect and love towards anyone who loves, protects and cares about children! This, I have always thought, should at least be within the grasp of a lawyer. Please address your question of political expediency to Afande Museveni and probably this way: How comes you sacrifice the children for political expediency? I am now strong as Afande Museveni said once: a soldier doesn't cry nor give up, only women cry. For the sake of other children who are still fighting, I am not giving up despite the mud thrown at my face. I mean it.
Finally, you wrote to me and gave me your telephone number. I phoned you and you tried to trap me with leading questions, hoping I would say things that would contradict what I have written in "My life as a child soldier in the NRA". You failed and the miserable result is the disjointed commentary that one reads in the monitor of 01.02.2003. If you ever wanted to help me get my son, how come you have turned around to discredit the mother (me) of the child you want to help re-unite with her son? I do hereby reproduce your mail for the attention of the public so that who ever need to find the truth may read my book or contact you for Ugandans to decide who of us is telling the truth.
First Name : Hassan
URL : Kashillingi
e-mail : [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Comment : Hi China, I pray God gives you the energy to continue fighting.Fred Kayanja died and so did Sharp.Regina stays in the village.I need to talk to you very urgently.Call me on 256 71 415577.Ill help you get your son.Am now a lawyer and married. I rema
Finally, I am grateful to everyone who has showed sympathy with me and continue to support me. I am busy in trying to draw the attention of the western world to the rights of children in Africa and the world. I will not answer back to any further discussions on my book in a public forum.
Greetings to everyone,
For God and My Country,
China Keitetsi (Copenhagen, Denmark)
The Mulindwas communication group
"With Yoweri Museveni, Uganda is in anarchy"
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