Col. Muzoora’s death

In South Africa, intelligence sources say, he went to Cape Town where there is a Ghanaian doctor known to Winnie Byanyima, wife to FDC president Dr Kizza Besigye. Muzoora stayed there for long before travelling to Uganda in May this year.

Col. Muzoora’s death was first reported when his  wife publicly claimed that on the night of May 27 an unidentified car drove to her home and dumped her husband’s body at her doorstep.

But intelligence reports claim that what actually happened on that night is that Col. Muzoora’s body, which was already in the house, was moved out and put in front of the house where it was found by the residents after Muzoora’s wife made an alarm.

Muzoora’s wife, according to intelligence, had asked her brother to come and drive a car to the house and drive away to create the impression that a mysterious vehicle had dropped Muzoora’s body. This is what was later reported that a strange car had dropped Muzoora’s body at his house at night.

William Mukaira, the FDC Bushenyi district chairman, former soldiers Didas Atunga-Bantu alias Col. Bendera, Iddi Kibwama; Boniface Mumbere Kinyambila alias Ivan Musinguzi, a development analyst in Kasese; Abel Kacwano and Aggrey Byamukama alias Happiness Akasigazi, a pharmacist in Mbarara; Simon Matte Mwesige, a builder in Hima town in Kasese and Esau Muhwezi alias Tugumisirize Rwafafa, a businessman in Kasese were arrested and have since been charged in connection with treason and Muzoora’s death.

Intelligence records, claiming to quote testimonies from some of the arrested suspects, say that after the Dar es Salaam meeting in April, Muzoora’s wife visited him.

They allege that on May 3, Muzoora’s wife travelled to Dar es Salaam by bus and stayed with Muzoora for two days. According to the intelligence, the wife claims that Muzoora told her that he intended to seek amnesty. Muzoora then left his wife in Dar and entered Uganda through Mutukula border. Here the intelligence has contradictions on the date Muzoora is said to have entered Uganda. While the intelligence now says Muzoora entered Uganda on May 9, in July a senior intelligence officer told The Independent that Muzoora had entered the country on May 5. The Minister of Internal Affairs Hilary Onek reiterated this claim at a press conference in Kampala on June 22. (see story: Col. Muzoora’s Death Shakes Security, The Independent, July 01-07, 2011).

Other intelligence information has also been discredited. For example, it was alleged that while in Dar es Salaam, Muzoora called his wife Vasta and told her that he wanted her to baptise their 11-year-old son and even suggested the godparents. The baptism took place on May 2. The intelligence says the boy was baptised Bemba, former DR Congo vice president and rebel leader who was a close friend of Muzoora when the latter was commanding UPDF operations in Equatoria region, eastern DR Congo in the late 1990s and early 2000. But Muzoora’s neighbours in his village of Nyanga, Kyeigombe in Kyabugimbi, Bushenyi district, told The Independent that the son was baptised Kevin Mujuni. This account seems to disprove the intelligence claim that the boy was baptised Bemba.

Whatever the case, the intelligence sources say that upon crossing the border Muzoora proceeded to Bushenyi and was received by FDC Bushenyi District chairman William Mukaira who hosted him in his house until he died.

At Mukaira’s house, Muzoora reportedly started meeting Kacwano, Atukunda and others. He then fell sick. The intelligence say doctors were invited to treat Muzoora from Mukaira’s home. One of the doctors, the intelligence say, was Dr Kasande from Ibanda district. The Independent could not contact Dr Kasande and Atukunda for a comment as their mobile phones were off air.

While Muzoora was at Mukaira’s house, his wife returned from Tanzania and visited him.

Finally, when Muzoora died on May 25, they did not know what to do with his body. According to statements reportedly recorded from people who were involved, Mukaira proposed that they secretly bury Muzoora in his [Mukaira] banana plantation and keep quiet. Muzoora’s wife refused. Then Mukaira and Kacwano decided that the body be taken to Muzoora’s home and claim it had been dumped there by strange people. In the meantime, Muzoora’s carers went to the neighbouring Mbarara town and secured formalin, a chemical used to embalm bodies and treated the body. Those were the signs seen on the body that some claimed were torture marks.

This information is based on statements, the intelligence say, were recorded from Kacwano, Muzoora’s wife and the doctors and nurses who treated Muzoora. Mukaira refused to talk.

After Muzoora’s death on May 25, the body was taken in an Ipsum vehicle to his home in Nyanga, Kyeigombe on May 26. The body was put in the Boys’ Quarter for a night.

Meanwhile before his death, on May 8 a group of Bushenyi elders led by Mukaira’s brother Kekuruso had reportedly met President Museveni at his country home in Rwakitura and told him of Muzoora’s intention to seek amnesty. Museveni had agreed. Did these people know that Muzoora was in the country? Had he passed on some information to them? Was he killed to guard against him “selling out” or did he die of natural causes? What was the cause of death?

A senior intelligence source told The Independent that Muzoora could have been killed after falling-out with his colleagues. The source said before he came back, his contacts inside Uganda had told him they had acquired enough guns to start an armed struggle and what they needed was his strategic and command leadership. But upon meeting them in Bushenyi, the intelligence source said, Muzoora was so disappointed that there were no guns as he had been told and the commanders he was supposed to plan the rebellion with were former junior soldiers most of them below the junior rank of lieutenant.

The intelligence source claimed that it’s at this stage that Muzoora realised he had been tricked into a hopeless venture and decided to abandon rebellion. He reportedly sent someone to talk to a senior person in government to contact Museveni for amnesty. The source says the information leaked to Muzoora’s colleagues and they decided to kill him.

However, in the absence of the post-mortem findings (police have not released them), this claim could not be corroborated. Its credibility is further undermined by the fact that Muzoora’s wife strongly believes her husband died of natural causes at the hands of “his people” because if Muzoora had been killed, she would be among the few or first people to have a clue.