|
Police say Okello could be tried soon
KAMPALA - Mr Fox Odoi has said he doesn�t regret recommending Capt. Fred Okello to head the Timber Monitoring Unit under State House.
Odoi is the acting principal private secretary to President Museveni.
Okello who is under detention at the Central Police Station, Kampala, wore a smile as he walked in the building yesterday.
He was quickly dashed into a room when policemen saw photographers.
Okello is at the centre of a row with the Minister of Lands, Water and Environment Col. Kahinda Otafiire.
He accuses the minister of being involved in illicit timber trade.
�There is nothing to probe about me. I have pleaded guilty for recommending Okello to the permanent secretary of the ministry of lands. I am very unapologetic and unrepentant,� Odoi said.
�I have no apologies because I have not sinned. What crime under the Penal Code have I broken? Zero,� said Odoi.
Odoi said that he only recommended Okello but did not deploy him.
�I plead guilty to that,� he said. Odoi claims that the former Presidential Advisor on Political Affairs �Major� Kakooza Mutale introduced Okello to him.
Mutale was sacked last month at the urging of the Inspector General of Government.
Mutale allegedly failed to declare his wealth.
Odoi said that he recommended Okello to work in the Forestry Department because he had useful information about senior government officials involved in illegal timber trade.
Police spokesperson Assuman Mugenyi said that the Okello investigation is in high gear.
�We haven�t yet finished the investigations. You know that there are a lot of civil servants we have to question. We have to wait and get their statements,� Mr Mugenyi said.
Said he: �We shall then take his file to the DPP. He could be tried in court within a few days.�
But the embattled Col. Kahinda Otafiire yesterday said that Okello is a private in the army.
�The man is not a captain he is a private,� Otafiire said.
Okello, who was until last week, the head of the Timber Monitoring Unit was arrested on Thursday night at his home in Mutungo, a Kampala suburb for allegedly impersonating another army officer.
| 
