The Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) has strongly condemned and warned opposition National Unity Platform (NUP) presidential candidate Robert Kyagulanyi Ssentamu aka Bobi Wine against hate ,tribal speech ,inciting violence and promoting anarchy especially among the youth.
This after last week’s similar warning by the Inspector General of Police , (IGP) Abbas Byakagaba who called upon Kyagulanyi’s group to stop provoking security forces and violating the set presidential election rules and regulations.
The UPDF and police boss’ warning follow numerous incidents where Bobi Wine and his supporters have confronted security forces deployed on duty and inflammatory language geared at rallying the young people to engage in unlawful acts of violence and destruction . forces.
The UPDF refered a specific case where at a campaign rally in Wakiso district, Bobi Wine said, “Aa we speak, all the security forces are here – nowhere else, not in Mukono, not in Kampala. I want you to know that they are not enough to overpower us. This constituency alone has 52 villages; Uganda has about 77,000 villages. The total number of police officers in Uganda is under 50,000, and all security personnel combined are fewer than 80,000. This means that even if they were to deploy one police or army officer in every village, they still wouldn’t have enough.”
UPDF acting spokesperson, Col Chris Magezi condemned Wine’s comments as toxic, shallow in logic, and dangerous.
“This type of rhetoric by the NUP Presidential candidate is very unfortunate indeed. It is ill advised, toxic, shallow in logic, and dangerous. The security forces strongly condemn the spirit and message behind the applied language, and we contend that this must stop henceforth,” he said.
Magezi said that Bobi Wine’s rhetoric undermines the credibility of the Uganda’s security forces and misleads young Ugandans into confrontations with authorities.
“In the worst case scenario, those who incite violence and promote anarchy in the country by misleading the young of Uganda to violently confront the security forces will themselves not escape the outcome. The net effect will be a zero-sum game with no winners, and there are contemporary examples in the world arounds us and beyond .
Magezi said that Uganda’s armed forces, and the UPDF in particular are highly capable, organized, and lethal, adding that “there is no threat we cannot deal with, and it will be very bad news for those who do not heed the warnings.”
“If the NUP leader is in doubt, he should consult the al-Shabaab in Somalia, the ADF and CODECO in DRC, or Joseph Kony and his defunct LRA in CAR and other violent groups in the region. Therefore, modern day Alice Lakwena’s, or the Kirumira Mutimas of the Ruwenzori region recently (who similarly confuse young people into reckless misadventures) have no place in Uganda’s progress and transformational journey.”
