Picture: Capital Radio (2001). A Saturday morning before the "Capital Gang"
political Talk show. (I was the technical producer back then, on the phone
with my father. Can't exactly remember which colleague took the picture)
If Idi Amin hadn't existed, Uganda's first ever democratic presidential
debate couldn"t have been held. At least not at the Conference Center.
My father built the venue and the adjacent Serena Hotel (then Nile
Mansions) in a record nine months so as to have befitting brand new
premises to host the African Union Heads of State Summit (1975). However
after Amin, the Tanzanians and the Ugandan exiles senior officers (i.e
Oyite Ojok, Paulo Muwanga, Museveni, Tito Okello...etc.) took free rooms in
the hotel for themselves. Some for months and others for years. They also
reportedly turned the place upside down.
An article in the Independent Magazine says "It's hard to believe the once
beautiful gardens suddenly became littered with bodies by Obote's regime.
The basement of the conference centre became a torture chamber, and rooms
211 and 233 were the offices of Obote's dreaded Military Intelligence and
National Security Services."
Their governments operated from the hotel from 1979 after the "Amin war"
until 1986. Even today a few rooms are still government offices. But at the
time it was built, Amin had intended for an exclusive venue for foreign
dignitaries and State guests. These included freedom fighters from Southern
Africa, doctors from Cuba and African American teachers whom Amin had
invited back to Africa (plus my late African American friend Chris Boyle,
RIP. A black teacher from Queens, New York who in 1976 first made the
T-shirts with Amin being carried by the British. They were distributed free
to every citizen back then. Everyone scrambled to get one.
During Amin's presidency, though the venue was exclusive for guests, he had
also ordered that the vast plush gardens remain free to the Ugandan public.
Cultural dance groups and music bands featured as entertainment on weekends
back then.
But the so-called "Ugandan liberators" who came with the Tanzanian forces
decided to enjoy the place themselves, ruining it in the process.
Today, as the venue hosted Uganda's first ever presidential debate in
preparation for voting day February 18th, and as Museveni historically
dodged the event ("El-Chapo"), he might have had a nightmare about how, as
Military Council Defence Minister 1979-1980, this was once his
interrogation center, and whoever he would invite there for questioning,
would forever remain grateful if they came out alive.
One day God willing if I join the presidential debate. I hope my good
friend Allan Kasujja, last Fridays debate moderator, will be linient on me
then. I might remind him pleadingly how we know each other since our radio
days. How I first met him when he was a radio dj at Kampala's Power FM, and
his gospel show at Radio Sanyu. He is a born again christian by the way, so
maybe he might have mercy on me during "interrogation".
#UgDebate16
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