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Cols Samson Mande and Anthony Kyakabale on Wednesday called Tonight with Andrew Mwenda Live on 93.3 KFM radio and spoke on a wide range of political issues in Uganda. Emmanuel Gyezaho recorded it.
�It is an organisation launched in Kampala. Iam not part of it�
Andrew Mwenda (AM): Col Mande you are being accused of recruiting, organising and training an armed rebellion called the People�s Redemption Army to fight the constitutionally constituted government of President Yoweri Museveni. And some of your rebel commanders and collaborators have been arrested, paraded and you are being accused of orchestrating treason from exile. What do you have to say?
Mande: You may remember this is not the first time you are going to hear other allegations against me. Right from1995, I have been politically persecuted by that government and they have used such words like terrorism, treason, but the only worrying thing is that the persecution is extended to my family, my relatives and my colleagues. I don�t know whether you shall be involved by the fact that you have also talked to me now. But, I don�t know the existence of the People�s Redemption Ar
my. It
is an organization that was launched from Kampala by the government. I am not part of it. I don�t know whether it does exist and if it exists may be it is a government organization.
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Col. Samson Mande |
AM: I have a report from the Chieftaincy of Military Intelligence here. It is addressed to the Army Commander, and it is dated 24th October 2001 and this is what it says. �This report is meant to acquaint you with subversive activities by Besigye group of renegade officers supported by Rwanda. The details: we have received reliable information to the effect that Lt Col Mande has been shuttling between Rwanda and DRC.
They have a camp in Goma which is under Lt Col Kyakabale. He stated that UPDF intends to attack it but they are prepared for it. They don�t mind about the UPDF troops build up in the western part of the country because after they have wiped out these troops, other areas will easily be attacked. That they have been improving their propaganda documents in Kigali,� This is what they are saying.
Mande: This is sheer nonsense. They should back it up with evid
ence. If
I have been shuttling between Kigali and Kisangani and Sweden, there should be evidence of flights, flight numbers, tickets, I mean I don�t move like a ghost. I should be moving through airports where other people should see me. These are allegations that are not substantiated. You prepare your ears for more trash like this. But always ask these people to back up their allegations with credible evidence.
AM: But this is the credible evidence they say...
Mande: That is just a paper written by them. I would like them to produce documented evidence from a third party say an airline, which booked me a flight into Kisangani.
AM: They are saying that you have been calling UPDF officers and men who are still in active service, with other civilians whom you are trying to lure into subversive activities using Rwandese intelligence officers to coordinate the subversive activities against Uganda. And that a networ
k of
Rwandan intelligence has been deployed in Kampala for purposes of destabilizing the country and to carry out assassinations or exploitation in some areas.
Mande: that is not true Mwenda. If I have talked to any body, they know I have brothers and colleagues in the UPDF, they know I have brothers, friends and comrades in Uganda and I talk to them. I have never talked to anybody to mobilize him into rebellion. One time remember they also accused me of talking to Kony. That they taped me talking to him, and I challenged them to bring the tape to your radio, have they ever done so?
AM: when you ran out of Uganda, I got a fax of your resignation letter and in that you said that Uganda is a tyrannical dictatorship and that you shall not sit by to watch the rights of Ugandans trampled upon. What did you mean by that?
Mande: That is very true. I mean that the government in Kampala is tyrannical. They are killing
our
people. Don�t you remember how they killed my nephew Patrick Mamenero in Mayombo�s office? The evidence is with you. I sent you a copy of the postmortem reports to your paper and you actually printed it. What other word can I use other than tyrannical when an innocent person is murdered in cold blood and this is not only one individual. We have seen so many dead bodies. The Baronda, these people who were crushed in Namanve for just an election, for expressing views divergent from the incumbent. What other name can I call the regime that has thrown me out of my mother land?
AM: Why did you in 1981 join the NRA to fight the government of Uganda?
Mande: If you listened to what Gen Mugisha Muntu told the country last week when he said we even regret having gone to the bush. Actually I don�t regret, but I think that the revolution is being betrayed. We had a cause to go to the bush. The cause has been betrayed. We went to the bush b
ecause
there was election rigging, there was mayhem and we see similar things happening.
AM: Doesn�t it therefore follow logically from your argument, that now you are also going back to the bush to fight those evils if they are being recreated.
Mande: Fighting does not only mean fighting in the bush.
AM: So what form of fighting are you involved in?
Mande: You can fight using so many other methods. But now the battle we are in is a democratic battle. We had fielded a candidate in 2001 and you saw what happened.
AM: What happened?
Mande: Electoral violence, rigging, mayhem, what didn�t you see Mwenda?
AM: This is what a December 4th report of 2002, an analysis by CMI, it says collaborating information from different sources has continued to indicate that our enemies PRA, RCD Goma, ADF, and the Besigye-Kyakabale group
are
under serious operations to attack Uganda. Preparations, which include recruitment, training, deployment of troops and arms, importation and modification of ammunition and arms are some of the signals, which are being seen in Eastern DRC via Goma, Rushuru, Masisi, Butembo areas and inside Rwanda. What do you say about that?
Mande: These are serious allegations but I am glad that they have technical connotations like importing arms. You must import arms from a source and those arms must have an end user certificate and a destination. Have they shown you documents like bills of lading or even agreements when we imported arms? They should not just start rumourmongering that so and so is importing arms. From where, when? The evidence should be paraded.
AM: Let me give you the evidence. They are saying credible information pertaining to the purchase of weaponry from Ukraine...
Mande: It can only be credible w
hen they
show you a bill of lading, when they show you an end user, when they show you an agreement between me and the country that I am importing the guns from.
AM: they are saying that you are importing them through Rwanda and I have a bill of lading for what the Rwanda government has imported.
Mande: Rwanda government has a right to import their arms...
AM: And then they pass them on to you?
Mande: Uganda also imports arms every now and then and you know it. but I shall not be used for the problems that existed between Rwanda and Uganda before I came on the scene. They have their own problems, which they know how to sort out. Some of us are just used as scapegoats. If they have a problem with Rwanda and Rwanda is importing arms...Uganda has ever been importing arms, even when we had not run out of the country. Let them justify that these were my arms.
AM: Col Ma
nde what
are you doing these days?
Mande: I study and write and mobilize.
AM: Mobilize who and for what purpose?
Mande: Mobilizing for democratic change, for a peaceful democratic transition our country deserves.
AM: So, are you a member of FDC?
Mande: Definitely yes.
AM: Col Mande, the government recently arrested people accused of being PRA rebels and these people gave testimonies and they said that you are their leader.
Mande: I�ve read many allegations of that nature. I have seen many people paraded saying so, but those who were paraded say two years ago and are in government prison after having survived safe houses, some of them have never been tried to conclusion. Therefore that is not credible evidence. Am very well informed that some of them have been tortured, beaten, blackmailed to give statements that shoul
d
support the government allegations against us.
Until the case they have been accused of is driven to conclusion, they remain suspects. They are just extorting false confessions from them.
Col Anthony Kyakabale also participated on the show and denied all the allegations that he is orchestrating subversive activities against the government.
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