By Our Reporters
The Wednesday of the week preceding his arrest, besieged Gen Kale Kayihura hosted an influential Ugandan pastor and shared with him fears of the impending arrest he believed the President had sanctioned. The ex-IGP was finally arrested last Wednesday barely seven (7) days after his dramatic encounter with the Pastor. The preacher is a big name man of God (so-called) in one of the central region districts in the greater Luwero triangle where he is a renowned influencer. He is a Ugandan of Rwandese origin and, having been prevailed over by the Museveni handlers manning the big man’s Kyambogo office, we won’t disclose his identify for now. Why the Kyambogo office? The Pastor, who is understood to have been prompted by Gen Kayihura, late last week drove to Kyambogo and confided in Milly Doka Babalanda (the President’s PA in his capacity as NRM Chairman) the extent to which Gen Kale was very remorseful for his past omissions and commissions as IGP. The Pastor assured Babalanda that he has a secret message for the President from Gen Kayihura who sources say has been trying and failing to secure any private audience with the H/E since his knifing from the juicy IGP office. After listening to the Pastor, a sympathetic Babalanda who has lately been distinguishing herself as powerful and very efficient (because of the many people petitioning her office) offered to consult and secure an appointment for the pastor to meet the H/E and convey to him Gen Kayihura’s message.
OUR STORY;
It’s from our interactions with officials close to Babalanda’s Kyambogo office that we corroborated our story originally given to us by the same pastor who called on our feedback line always shared at the end of our stories. The pastor had called to ask if we could help link him to Gen Kayihura’s lawyers of KAA specifically Peter Kabatsi. He said he had wanted to go through the lawyers to make some consultations with Gen Kayihura r his wife Angela. In the process he told us what transpired in his last Wednesday meeting with the ex-IGP. “I think I’m of the last people to have met Gen Kayihura before he was finally arrested because he had clearly been shunned by many former allies who feared associating with him in his last days,” the Pastor said. He said he had no problem having the story published because “all I’m looking for is building bridges between the President and Gen Kayihura.” He repeatedly said “I’m an emissary of peace with a special message to carry to the President from Gen Kayihura.” He was cagey when asked whether Kayihura had sent him to deliver that message. We then verified his identity by speaking to MPs from the district he operates his church and they confirmed knowing him as a minister of the word. He referred to these MPs himself without any prompting. When contacted, the Babalanda Kyambogo office publicist Faruk Kirunda too confirmed their office had been approached by the Pastor though were still determining the prudence of getting him direct audience with the President.
THE LYANTONDE MEETING;
The pastor told us he travelled to Lyantonde Kashagama farm in a V8 vehicle (UAZ) that Gen Kayihura sent to pick him. On arrival, he found Gen Kayihura seated in one of the three tents in a huge compound overlooking a temporary house/structure in which the ex-IGP has been sleeping. One of the tents housed his body guards, another was store for his farm produce and other implements. The 3rd tent was where Kayihura has been meeting his guests. The pastor recalls finding 6 posh vehicles in the compound and seeing escorts/guards freely moving around. “Until I got to meet and sit with him in the visitors’ tent, I had the illusion that he was still powerful as he was as IGP but what transpired in the discussion, the body language and the nervousness he exhibited gave me the impression he was very vulnerable,” the pastor recalls. He says he had previously sought to meet Kale when still IGP but failed only to get a chance when Kayihura sent for him months after losing his job. “Having seen all this coming I had a message for him to mitigate things on good time but I wasn’t being successful with the meeting,” says the Pastor when asked what he wanted to tell Kayihura all along before even being fired as IGP. He says the way the general ceaselessly sweated, during the Wednesday meeting, betrayed the nervousness he was living with. “He carried cold water in a huge flask which he kept taking as we talked. He also had a spear besides him and he told me this was the only protection he now trusted. It seems he feared and didn’t trust the gun anymore. Neither was he trusting the guards anymore,” says the Pastor who previously worked with international human rights organizations in which capacity he says he did lots of work amongst Rwandan refugees in Uganda. He says Gen Kayihura told him he was suffering because he had been misunderstood by the President after his enemies maliciously accused him of many things yet here he was very vulnerable without means to freely access the President anymore. “He told me he was in a big dilemma because his country Uganda doesn’t trust him anymore and yet even in the neighboring country, which he is accused to have spied for, they don’t trust him. He said they see him as a traitor and told me some of his relatives who are under detention in that country because of him. He repeatedly said he was between a rock and hard place and had no body to explain himself to. He seemed too scared and I told him to stop being worried lest he develops heart problems. He told me the stress was simply too much on him because everybody has deserted him,” the Pastor explained via telephone link. We asked him about the absence of any information about him on the internet yet he has previously worked with international organizations and he said “I have had to withdraw all the professional information about myself to be able to play this mediation role between Gen Kayihura, the President and the neighboring country as a neutral arbiter.” Saying he has deep knowledge of the political systems between the two countries, the Pastor said he was hopeful he would meet the President on 28th June for an interface Milly Babalanda was working on. “I have a serious message to deliver and it would be imprudent for me to leak it to the media now,” he repeatedly said when asked what exactly he would be telling the President. The pastor said as he left Kashagama, Kayihura who had premonition he would be arrested anytime called him closer and told him “Pastor pray for me because I’m going to die for nothing: I have been misunderstood and I have nobody to plead my case to.” Faruk Kirunda, who speaks for the Museveni Kyambogo office, said they were expecting to host and interact with the Pastor one more time, an encounter during which they would further assess the suitability of taking him for direct audience with the President. He confirmed they get the impression the pastor could be someone trying to meet the big man to plead for Gen Kayihura. For comments, call/text/whatsapp us on 0703164755.
