By Our Reporters
The Leader of Opposition in Parliament (LoP) Betty Aol says she has (through her informal contacts in security) been reliably informed why Dr. Kizza Besigye isn’t being allowed to have uninterrupted radio talk shows on the upcountry stations.
Appearing on NBS Morning Breeze this Thursday morning, Aol told moderator Mildred Tuhaise that Besigye’s insistence on using the indictment of Chinese politician-turned philanthropist Patrick Ho Chi-ping to incite the population against President Museveni is the sole reason why police won’t be letting him speak anywhere on radios upcountry.
“You know I’m a very prayerful person and together with like-minded colleagues in FDC we said let’s pray for God to reveal to us why they are doing all this to Doctor [Besigye] all of a sudden. And as I was out there interacting with some of these policemen involved in those operations, they told me ‘look here honorable, we are being instructed to block Doctor because he wants to use these talk shows to incite the upcountry people against the president. He is demonizing him by explaining the US court case in which he says the President and Foreign Affairs Minister Sam Kutesa were partly being investigated along with the Chinese man.’ It’s strange but that is what those senior officers confided in me,” Aol said during the 8-9am talk show.
The discussion was themed along her plans to lead opposition MPs to boycott Parliamentary sittings as a way of showing solidarity with MP Bobi Wine and Dr Kizza Besigye who are the victims of the latest brutal crackdown by the police.
Aol further explained: “I told them that’s okay. It can’t be justification to prevent Doctor from appearing on radios to express himself because it’s his right under the Constitution. I told them that’s why we have courts. If he commits an offence in his utterances, he isn’t above the law. You can pursue him for criminal prosecution thereafter. They didn’t listen. They said they have orders.”
THE CONTEXT
It will be recalled that, in his harsh criticisms of Dr. Abed Bwanika & Group coalescing under DP Bloc, Dr. Besigye has been wondering why they concentrate on demonizing him instead of riding on Patrick Ho’s trial which was based on the fact that he offered bribes to Ugandan political leaders and those of Chad in return for favorable business treatment.
Besigye’s argument has been that the manner in which President Museveni and Sam Kutesa were referred to during the American criminal trial proceedings provides a lot of privileged fodder on which the opposition can ride to rally the population to rise up against the NRM government.
He says, ideally it should have been the job of Parliament to ride on the same to even initiate impeachment proceedings against both Museveni and Kutesa. He says since Parliament hasn’t acted, it becomes incumbent on him as an opposition leader to sensitize the population about the same and use it to call on people to treat the two leaders with total contempt over the Patrick Ho trial in the US Courts. In fact, his declared strategy is to make the same a debate/campaign issue in the hope that Museveni will eventually be prompted to publicly respond.
Aol now says that Besigye (whose radio talk shows have been brutally blocked in Jinja, Kabale, Mbarara and more recently Mubende) remains committed to use whatever platform he gets to make upcountry people aware of the implications of Ho’s criminal trial and eventual conviction-and how the same globally impacts on the image of the two Ugandan leaders.
She says the Besigye she knows won’t be relenting on this. Her revelations come only days after the American government issued written condemnation castigating the GoU for constraining Besigye and Bobi Wine’s enjoyment of basic rights prompting government spokesman Ofwono Opondo to furiously respond.
DON BRANDS AOL
‘RELEVANCY SEEKER’
Reached for a comment, Don Wanyama the President’s Senior Press Secretary furiously dismissed Aol’s claims calling them “rubbish and cheap talk.” He said Aol should find better things to do with the LoP office “rather than riding on the President’s name to seek political relevance.”
He said the big man “is too busy and has no time for them.” He went on: “How can he even know what Besigye intends to say on a radio upcountry? Is he even aware of Besigye’s programs going to radios upcountry? Clearly those people don’t even have a slightest understanding of the man they are commenting about. He is simply too busy for the trivial things they accuse him of.”
He said his boss’ track record is well known when it comes to tolerating criticisms and Aol’s efforts to paint him differently won’t succeed. He advised Aol & Co to engage the regulator UCC to resolve whatever problem they have encountered in getting Besigye speak on radio talk shows upcountry “rather than seeking political relevancy on public media.”
UCC SPEAKS OUT
The UCC ED Godfrey Mutabazi told Mulengera news that the Commission wasn’t formally aware of anything yet they can only act upon being formally petitioned by an aggrieved party. He implied whatever problem Dr Besigye has encountered so far trying to access public media upcountry is a matter of Police and UCC hasn’t been involved at all.
“I’m not even aware by the way. Where has UCC been involved? We can’t speak on behalf of the police. We aren’t involved,” he said adding that UCC always operates through written instructions even when it’s to block anybody from using the radio airwaves. “I challenge anyone accusing UCC of being complicit in this to produce any written instruction to that effect regarding Besigye’s talk shows.”
