Only in Uganda: Besigye arrested again

By Mubatsi Asinja Habati

The drama between opposition FDC’s President Dr Kizza Besigye and the Uganda police resumed this morning. Barely a week court ruled that Uganda’s opposition leader Dr Kizza Besigye has freedom to walk and police abused his rights by confining him in his home not a gazzated police cell, the Uganda police arrested Besigye this morning as he attempted to resume walk-to-work protests. This time the police whisked Besigye to unknown place just to avoid criticism of ignoring the Kasangati magistrate’s court’s ruling.

 

Policemen shroud Besigye (in a purple shirt) at his Kasangati home

Ann Mugisha, deputy foreign envoy for the Forum for Democratic Change, said his exact place of detention was unclear after being moved from different police stations. "Besigye ... was taken in a police vehicle and his driver chased them but he lost them as they entered a police barracks. Up to now we don't know where he is and we're calling it an abduction," Mugisha said.

Besigye was arrested alongside other protesters notably students from Makerere University, Uganda’s biggest institution of higher learning who were marching to Nakawa court to show solidarity to protesters imprisoned last week on treason charges. Several human rights activists including the Catholic archbishop of Kampala have opposed charging demonstrators with treason. Meanwhile for two weeks Besigye had been held in his home where the police could not allow him move beyond his compound using the British colonial law of Preventive arrest. The colonialists used this law on politically active Ugandans who challenged their repressive rule over Uganda.