This could be yet another hallmark of cheap faulty journalism. Is it not amazing how amoebic the perception and interpretation of President Musseveni's mourning speech has become!?!
Quite stupendous. Yet, not atypical. Some media folk, those!!!
The president merely opened the door for the experts to clear the air. Suddenly, there are ghosts every where. And, the experts are humans!!
rgds
noc'l gaumoy
--- On Sun 08/07, Matek Opoko < [EMAIL PROTECTED] > wrote:
From: Matek Opoko [mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [email protected], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Sun, 7 Aug 2005 10:57:07 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Ugnet] Uganda says cause of Garang death unclear
Uganda says cause of Garang death unclear
By Katie Nguyen Fri Aug 5, 3:55 PM ET
YEI, Sudan (Reuters) - The cause of a crash that killed Sudanese Vice President John Garang in the Ugandan presidential helicopter is unclear, Ugandan leader Yoweri Museveni said on Friday on a trip to mourn his friend.
"I myself will not rule out anything. It may be an accident, it may be something else. I am looking at all possibilities," Museveni told mourners in the southern Sudanese town of Yei.
Garang's supporters have said they do not suspect foul play but still want an independent, international inquiry into the death of the former rebel leader, which triggered three days of riots killing at least 130 Sudanese, most in the north.
"Either the pilot panicked in spite of the plane having good conditions, or there was this side wind, or the instruments did not work, or there was an external factor," said Museveni.
The Sudanese government said they were worried by Museveni's comments, and urged the Ugandans to hand over all the evidence they had to the commission President Omar Hassan al-Bashir formed earlier this week.
"We are very worried that this information is not at all part of any investigation and it might affect the investigation," Information Minister Abdel Basit Sabderrat told Reuters. "We are asking the Ugandan government to provide all the information they have."
Garang's death came just three weeks after he was sworn in as first vice-president under a north-south peace deal in January that ended Africa's then longest-running conflict.
He led the Sudan People's Liberation Army/Movement (SPLA/M) in a bitter 21-year war with the northern Islamist government.
The violence Garang's death caused was between Arab northerners and animist or Christian southerners.
Garang's coffin is being flown around southern Sudan before burial in the regional capital Juba on Saturday.
In Yei, near the border with Democratic Republic of Congo, thousands lined the streets, many of them beating the red dirt road with their hands in grief as the body was carried past them to the main square teeming with SPLA and Ugandan troops.
CRASH PROBE
Speaking in public for the first time since the death of his close ally Garang, Museveni pledged solidarity and continued Ugandan support for the people of southern Sudan.
"The comprehensive peace agreement was a result of your struggle and the agreement is your entitlement. This is your land. You have every right to live there freely," he said.
Uganda's president had been holding talks with Garang at the weekend and used the same helicopter for a short journey before sending it back to take the Sudanese leader home.
Sabderrat said the first information the government had heard about the crash came from Museveni himself, adding he doubted foul play was involved. He said the joint SPLA-government commission, to start work soon after the funeral, would make sure.
"We are pretty sure as we are told from the U.N., the Americans and from many sources that it was an accident due to bad weather," he said.
Museveni's comments sparked fears of fresh violence in the capital Khartoum, where SPLA and government officials had been quick to say the crash was an accident.
Garang and Museveni met at university in Tanzania in 1968, and aides say the Ugandan president has been inconsolable.
On Friday he said it was a "paradox" he was making his first visit to southern Sudan only to pay his respects to Garang's body, which was hidden from view by a white sheet in the coffin.
Ugandan officials have blamed bad weather for the crash that killed Garang, but many people have questioned why the recently upgraded helicopter had not been able to land safely.
Uganda's government says the aircraft was fully refueled in southern Uganda after it left Museveni's ranch in the west of the country for Garang's base at New Site in southern Sudan. (Additional reporting by Opheera McDoom in Khartoum)
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