By Mulengera Reporters
PFF Deputy Secretary General Harod Kaija, who was at radio one premises Friday evening as Kampala political pundit Ronald Egesa was being picked by four plain clothed security operatives, has narrated what he saw. Egesa was taking part in the Kyogereko program on Radio2 which shares premises with Radio1, when the four men stormed in.
Jude Bukenya, who received some beating as he tried to shield Egesa’s phones, was moderating the program and Harold Kaija, who also serves as the PFF deputy Spokesperson, was the other guest. According to Kaija, the four men first strayed into the office of Radio1 ICT officer who they forced to lead them to the studios where Egesa was talking from during the 8-9pm radio program.
The ICT officer, a female, walked in first and told Bukenya there are guests who wanted to be let into the studio and deliver a message to one of his guests. As Bukenya reflected on this, the men, who had been peeping as the IT lady engaged the moderator, forced their way into the studios. One of them straight away walked to Egesa and declared “let’s go we are here to take you.”
Kaija says that he and Bukenya declared readiness to shield Egesa not to be arrested like chicken thief. The man besieging Egesa brandished a pistol saying they were ready to shed blood. The other three did the same and the Kaijas concluded the situation was overwhelming and now signaled Egesa to just surrender. The panel had been discussing Prof Ogenga Otunnu and Gen Salim Saleh’s Consociational Dialogue Agreement, which Egesa dissed as deceptive and unserious.
He sarcastically portrayed Gen Saleh as a man who assembles kiosk owners along Gaba road and praises himself to have held a meeting with the richest men in Kampala. He said the Friday meeting at Kirema farm in Nakaseke, which big opposition parties boycotted, was like a top government official meeting kiosk owners and subsequently demanding a newspaper headline indicating he met the richest property moguls in Kampala.
Kaija says they realized from the men who took away Egesa, during the scuffling that preceded his grabbing from the studios, that the political pundit’s arrest related to his earlier content during a social media interview, and had nothing to do with what he said at Radio2.
Kaija says he thought he was the one they had come for and even after Egesa being taken, he remained apprehensive that they would return to pick him too. Egesa had earlier on been on Radio1 Spectrum along with lawyer Sam Muyizi, Sarah Bireete and a Rtd UPDF Major Polly Awich who is a Director at NRM Secretariat. From there he joined Kaija and Bukenya for Radio2’s Kyogereko.
Kaija says as he sat in the lobby waiting to be led into the Radio2 studios, one of the men who eventually was part of the arresting party, had approached and tried to engage him into a conversation criticizing government. The man pretended to be a regular listener who is a fan of Kaija and engaged in some flattery of his political punditry.
“I was busy trying to work through my thoughts ahead of the radio show and I told him please let me concentrate on something,” Kaija quoted himself to have rudely told off the man who reluctantly walked away. During the scuffle inside the studio, Kaija was able to recall this man was one of the four who eventually extracted Egesa from the studios. To his credit, Jude Bukenya left the program on, which enabled millions of Radio2 listeners to hear the scuffling that preceded Egesa’s extraction from the studios.
Kaija says it’s clear the men had taken time preparing for this operation because they evidently knew even the small details of what happens at the Radio1 premises’ entrances once it gets to night time. The main entrance is closed and guests and staff all use the behind door leading to the parking, once it gets dark after 7pm. This happens every day.
Kaija says that Egesa’s arrestors even had time to park their vehicles in the same parking and faced them strategically so as to make it easy for them to exit the drone, in which he was carried, without much difficulty. He says they lay in waiting for several hours, having come to the parking much earlier on in the day.
The local premises’ security couldn’t even suspect them because they can’t be aware of each and every guest or client coming to one of Kampala’s most powerful broadcasting houses to transact. Kaija says the way they conducted their operation, Egesa’s arrestors seemed to have had adequate understanding of the premises from where the outspoken MK critic was arrested.
Kaija, who was meeting Egesa for the first time face to face, says the Friday evening events caused him to scan social media to understand what exactly caused Egesa to be picked. He believes those Tik Tok videos despising Gen MK’s credentials as someone capable of leading Uganda as President must have caused trouble for Egesa.
“All that notwithstanding, I was shocked they came for Egesa and not for me because for him isn’t in politics like us. He is just a pundit giving his views on how his country ought to be ran. I didn’t realize we had reached that level.”
Kaija also explained that the arrestors got to know how Egesa’s day would look like, and especially that evening part 7-9pm, through the social media flier the radio1 and radio2 production teams prepared publicizing the two radio shows he would be on. That flier enabled them to confirm that Egesa would be at radio1 and radio2 and accordingly planned to get him there.
Kaija, who has been arrested countless times over the years by the Ugandan state, revealed that he and Egesa were grateful that, being the host on whose premises the Friday fracas occurred, Jude Bukenya conducted himself very professionally and did all he could to be there for his guests as the State agents extracted Ronald Egesa, who had remained one of the very few, if not the only one, who could appear anywhere on social and conventional media platforms and overtly call out Gen Muhoozi Kainerugaba.
Kaija, who says where things have reached no one is safe anymore in Uganda, gave his version of events during a Saturday recorded interview with YouTuber Kwezi Robinson of Kwezi Media Group. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
