Uganda’s top comedian Herbert Segujja (aka Mendo, aka Museveni, aka Teacher Mpamire), who made a name for excellently mimicking President Yoweri Museveni and other leaders, has vehemently denied being complicit in criminal activities of a group of city conmen who have lately been on rampage. They have been calling mostly judges, hearing election petitions, claiming it’s the President who is online talking.
Some of the judges targeted recently complained to higher authorities sparking off clandestine investigations, which is still ongoing. “They identify NRM MPs who have problems in Court and then approach you saying we can help connect you to the President who can call the judge and ask him or her to let you off the hook. MPs can be so desperate and you must then look for money to get out of danger.
They will even falsely cite some names of MPs who previously won election petitions claiming they helped them in the same way,” said a source adding that on getting the money, the Bafere will get a comedian to sit somewhere in Kampala or Mbale and ring the Judge involved saying so and so is our good NRM cadre please make sure you save him. The bafere will then proceed to claim their pay saying “here is audio proof we got the president to speak to the judge.” They get paid and proceed to share their loot.
MENDO SPEAKS OUT:
According to security sources close to those investigating this racket, the bafere who like hiding in Mbale each time they accomplish a mission, have been using one of the top city comedians who can perfectly imitate the President’s voice on phone.
It’s against that background that we at Mulengera news decided to contact Mendo asking how much he knows about this racket. The following is what he said: “I’m not surprised because I have been a victim of such impersonation and misrepresentation before. You know there are many people who know how to mimic the president’s voice even better than me.
For example there is one called Sendawula Kaguta and then one who used to work on KFM. Roger Mugisha can put you in touch with him. He was called Mr. President and many listeners would think it’s the president in the studio. Radio Simba also has someone very good at that and I hear there is also a one Kashilingi of State House.
So as you see we are very many. But unfortunately I’m the most known of all those comedians and this has made me susceptible to misrepresentation.” Mondo maintains that it won’t be very surprising that whoever gets conned in a situation like this one would go away saying they used Comedian Mendo “because I’m the most famous of all.” Mendo, who is also called Teacher Mpamire, recalled an incident sometime last year.
“I was somewhere in Luwero when somebody called me saying how come you came to Bweranyangi and never alerted me. I said but I’m in Luwero right now and the friend insisted I’m told you are at Bweranyangi right now. On verification, it was discovered it was a totally different comedian there and not myself,” concluded Mendo who is also a secondary school teacher in Zana.
VISTIMS MANY:
Indeed many MPs and other elected leaders facing election petitions in Court have been conned in similar ways and are now licking their wounds. There is one politician in Wakiso district who paid Shs100m to a woman who was introduced to him as a wife to one of the Justices handling his matter in the Court of Appeal only to realize later he had been conned.
The victim’s mother recently met the said Justice in Mityana during the burial of Justice Leticia Kikonyogo and almost beat him up. Justice Kituuma (a very close friend of late Kikonyogo) had to intervene calling for calmness to respect the deceased. Indeed after sometime, tempers cooled down and the two parties talked and the victim’s mother was made to realize her son had been conned because the woman to whom he gave Shs100m had never been wife to the said Justice.
In his case, the former Kyaddondo East MP Apollo Kantinti last week stormed Parliament and beat up a fellow legislator from Toro region who the baferes used to extort Shs150m from him claiming to be taking it to a Judge only to chew the cash themselves. In both cases, the paying MPs lost their cases and were made to pay very exorbitant costs; which has increased their agony. Reliable sources, who witnessed the Kantinti melee, say the former MP thumped his colleague who wailed, bled and run to lock himself in the toilet.
Other onlookers had to intervene to calm down a tearful Kantinti who had come to Parliament to follow up on his pension. “The guy had been hiding from him but that day he unexpectedly chanced on him and thoroughly thumped him,” said an eye witness. To comment on this and other Mulengera news stories, call/text 0703164755
