Charles Mwanguhya Mpagi
14 May 2011
Shortly after the end of events at Kololo, the biggest nightmare of the security agencies that had been manning the Entebbe Road started dealing with the massive crowds that had jammed the road welcoming main opposition leader Kizza Besigye.
The dignitaries that had attended the Kololo events were to move to State House Entebbe for a luncheon and others to catch flights back home.
I arrived at the Kibuye roundabout at about 4pm, the President had by then moved through the crowd back to Entebbe. His convoy and Besigye’s apparently agreed a momentary ceasefire with Besigye being pulling over in Bwebajja.
But a bus carrying his elite guard was not as lucky as angry opposition supporters pelted it with stones shattering the glass of one of its windows. The men in dark suits jumped out pistols at the ready, gunshots wrung out as hundreds fled down into the valley near the railway line.
A PGB soldier shouted to ask what I was doing standing there and observing the incident, “press, what he is doing there? He shouted pointing in my direction,” fortunately the police ignored as I stayed put.
Shortly after a young man wearing what seemed a dirty, sweaty T-shirt was dragged from the valley by two policemen as a prisoner, they ignored the bleeding from what appeared to be a deep cut on his head even as he pleaded to being an innocent by-stander.
People were forced to use the railway line under the Makindye Bridge and explanations were not being entertained.
Fast forward to 6:30pm, Besigye’s convoy has just driven to Namasuba, a few metres from the FDC headquarters which had been ringed off by the military since morning.
Gun fire rings out, heavy blasts from of teargas canisters, smaller ones ringing off a police truck, automatic gun fire from AK47 rifles and SMGs as well as the ordinary teargas guns being carried by anti riot police.
In a split second, hundreds of people are running for their dear life in all directions, police and military carrying sticks and batons are beating everyone in sight, especially pedestrians and those riding on motorcycles.
In a minute, a pile of boda boda’s abandoned on the road and an incredible litre of shoes left by those fleeing. I am seated on a motorcycle and as they swoop together with colleague, Martin Ssebuyira, with whom we had abandoned the car in the hope that we could move faster.
A man, riding on the next bike (he didn’t seem to be a boda boda rider) is fast hit with a gun butt, as he reels in pain, police and military men descend on him kicking him in all directions, we are watching in total disbelief our pleas to spare him muffled by the focus of the soldiers on their mission.
He is kicked in the ribs, legs and hands. Then a man in a black police uniform stamps him hard on the head, fortunately or unfortunately he was wearing a helmet. He coils on the road in incredible pain but this earns him only more beatings.
Meanwhile, the police water canon is spewing various shades of water spray from the blue dye to the pink dye and the plain water.
Along the way dignitaries including Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe, Somalia’s Sheikh Ahammed Sheikh Sharif, the Egyptian delegation and Goodluck Jonathan of Nigeria who was unfortunate to be stoned by the excited Besigye supporters as they drove back to Entebbe Airport.
AllAfrica – All the Time
Excerpt from:
Besigye’s Return – How I Saw It