The lies of Uganda’s Rasputin

How a fraudulent young man infiltrated State House, spread and caused the President to fire many of his staff

KAMPALA, UGANDA | THE INDEPENDENT INVESTIGATIONS TEAM | When Stephen Nuwagaba went to parliament for the first time, he was seeking an audience with the speaker, Anita Annet Among. He had called and talked to her on the phone, but it seemed Among had not understood what the young man was saying. But to Among, it seemed Nuwagaba was claiming that he had been tortured by Capt Amis Ainebyona, a soldier with the Chieftaincy of Defense Intelligence and Security (CDIS) attached to parliament.

He was taken to the office of the CID officer attached to parliament, Charles Twine, by one Joseph Sabiti. At the time, Sabiti was Among’s PA in charge of the press. But he would also handle her other errands. Nuwagaba was accompanied by a friend called Banabas Nuwahereza. Sabiti had passed through the office of the head of parliamentary security, Ezra Tugume, who went with them to meet Twine and also attended the meeting. Tugume and Nuwagaba come from the same village.

Nuwagaba claimed that he had been arrested by Aibebyona from Busega on October 12th, 2023. He said he was then taken to the headquarters of CDIS at around 8pm and interrogated throughout the night by Ainebyona. That the interrogation was based on two things: Ainebyona had claimed that an Airtel number had sent a threatening message to Hashim Magogo, husband of Among, five months to the date when they met Twine. That the same number had sent a message to Magogo threatening him only five days before this meeting. Magogo had told Among about this, and the speaker tasked Ainebyona to track the owner of that number.

Ainebyona tracked the line and discovered it belonged to Nuwagaba. During the investigation, Ainebyona found out that Nuwagaba was dating Magogo’s wife or girlfriend called Charlotte. She was 48 years old, twice Nuwagaba’s age. She was living in Bulenga, along Mityana Road, and staying in Magogo’s house with his (Magogo’s) mother. On the basis of this information, Ainebyona diverted the investigation from the threatening messages and instead began interrogating the issue of the love affair between Charlotte and Nuwagaba. Nuwagaba had pictures of himself naked in bed with Charlotte. He shared with Ainebyona. Nuwagaba told Twine that after the interogation, lasting almost 12 hours, Ainebyona drove Nuwagaba to Kireka and left him to go home. 

The next day, Ainebyona told Magogo that he had arrested the suspect. Magogo told him to take the suspect to police. It seems Ainebyona had entered a conspiracy with Nuwagaba because they drove together in the same car to FUFA House. When they reached there, they asked to meet Magogo. Apparently they wanted to extort money from him (Magogo). But Magogo refused to meet them, insisting that Ainebyona take the suspect to the police. Ainebyona did not do that. Instead, two weeks later, Sabiti, together with Tugume brought Nuwagaba accompanied by Nuwahereza, to see Twine at parliament. Twine then opened a police file, which is still at parliament. In the file Nuwagaba claims Ainebyona tortured him.

So Nuwagaba narrated his torture story to Twine. Under police criminal reporting procedures, a complainant with allegations of physical torture is subjected to a medical examination to establish the facts. They are given Form Three. However, because Nuwagaba looked to be in good medical condition, Twine asked him whether he had been beaten and injured. Nuwagaba said no but added that he had been tortured psychologically. So there was no need to give him Form Three for a medical examination. In any case, the first time Nuwagaba had met Twine, he only asked for his passport, which had been confiscated, saying that his travel to Qatar was due.

Twine now went with Tugume and Nuwagaba to the aforementioned home of Magogo in Bulenga, along Mityana Road. They reported to the nearest police station and got a female officer to accompany them to the home of Magogo. At Magogo’s home, they left Nuwagaba in the car and went into the house to talk to Magogo’s wife/girlfriend. They interviewed Charlotte and recorded her statement. She said she had had marital issues with Magogo, and she quit the relationship. She added that she had decided to date another young man called Stephen Nuwagaba. 

According to police records, Ainebyona had told Magogo that Nuwagaba had slept in Magogo’s bed with his wife Charlotte. Police inspected the bedroom and noticed that the pictures Nuwagaba had of himself naked in bed with Charlotte did not match the room.

Nuwagaba later changed the story and now told police that he had never slept in Magogo’s bed. Instead, he claimed that he always met Charlotte at a flat in Rubaga.

Then something happened. While still inside Magogo’s house interrogating his wife, as Nuwagaba remained outside in the car, a Twitter account in the name of Kakwenza Rukirabasaija tweeted, saying police were searching the home of Magogo. Nuwagaba had also taken a picture of Twine wearing a red shirt as they drove to Magogo’s house. A few minutes later, the same picture was posted by this Kakwenza account on social media. Twine realised that Nuwagaba was colluding with Kakwenza. Whether the account is run by the exiled author or this is a pseudo account is not yet clear. What is clear, however, is that Nuwagaba has always claimed to be in direct contact with Kakwenza.

Police then recorded a statement from Magogo, where he talked of the Airtel number that had sent him offensive messages. He said he asked his wife, Anita Among, to help. After Twine had recorded Magogo’s statement, Nuwagaba went to Twine’s office with a changed tone. He now said that he had been tortured on the instructions of Magogo and Among. He also added that he is willing to abandon the case if the couple pays him. Twine found this strange. He felt Nuwagaba was hungry and impatient to get money from Among and Magogo. From then Twine blocked him from his office.

In the statement, Nuwagaba alleged that Ainebyona, a CDIS officer attached to parliament, had put him at gunpoint and asked him to claim that Among was threatening his life. The aim of this claim was to extort money from the speaker. The next thing people at parliament heard was that Nuwagaba was on Spaces, a live podcast on Twitter (now X) with a human rights and anti-corruption civic group called Agora. In it, Nuwagaba was claiming that he was tortured on the instructions of Among

Twine informed CID about the case of Nuwagaba. CID decided to go and talk to CMI, and they met Abdul Rugumayo. He was briefed about how Ainebyona had confiscated Nuwagaba’s passport. Rugumayo promised to call Ainebyona and take action. Twine then informed Nuwagaba about these developments.

Almost a year later, in September 2024, when Twine was dropping his son off at school and on his way back, he got a message asking what he had done to Kakwenza. When he opened his twitter account, he saw a message from an account under the name of Kakwenza with many pictures of himself downloaded from Facebook. He also sent an audio message downloaded from his Facebook.

But who is Banabas Nuwahereza?

He was a close friend of Ainebyona and was working with Shell Bugolobi but living in Kireka. On October 23rd, 2023, Ainebyoma came to visit Nuwahereza with a young man called Stephen Nuwagaba. Ainebyona stepped out of the car and asked Nuwahereza to help him investigate whether Nuwagaba talks to exiled author Kakwenza Rikirabasaija. He also wanted to know if Nuwagaba uses a page in the names of Kakwenza. Nuwahereza accepted, taking on the assignment. Then Ainebyona introduced Nuwaherea to Nuwagaba, and they became acquaintances. Nuwahereza got close to Nuwagaba, and they would meet regularly at a hotel called Sebyangu in Natete. During this time, Nuwahereza asked Nuwagaba how he came to know Ainebyona. Nuwagaba replied that he is a cyber expert who came looking for a job at CDIS and was handed over to Ainebyona to deal with him.

Now, there was a page on Twitter in the name of Kakwenza Rukirabasaija which was regularly posting pictures of Ainebyona in military fatigues.

The page would accuse Ainebyona of being a CDIS agent responsible for torturing and murdering people. Nuwahereza’s job was to find out if Nuwagaba was the one handling that Twitter account. During their interactions, during which Nuwagaba even went and spent four days staying at the house of Nuwahereza, Nuwahereza found out the Kakwenza Twitter account was being run by Nuwagaba. Whether this was in collaboration with the exiled author was not clear. Nuwahereza reported to Ainebyona these facts, including phone numbers Nuwagaba was using. 

Ainebyona told Nuwahereza that Nuwagaba fakes chats, talks to Kakwenza and uses him to get money from people. How? Nuwagaba had told Nuwahereza that he could teach him how to make money.

Nuwagaba had four phones and would use them to fake chats between people. And then he would take the chats and use them to demonstrate that he has internet skills to hack into other people’s phones. Depending on whom he was duping, he would make money. It is in this context that Nuwagaba convinced Nuwahereza to take him to parliament and give a proposal to the speaker, Anita Among.

When they arrived at parliament, the proposal turned out to be a way to make money. Now, Nuwagaba told the police officer in charge of CID at parliament, Charles Twine, that he was in love with a lady called Charlotte who was also Magogo’s wife. He said he was seeking for help from Among to fund him to marry her. Twine recorded a statement from Nuwagaba in which he also claimed that he had evidence that Ainebyona talks to Kakwenza.

Nuwagaba claimed he had been tortured by Ainebyona on the orders of Magogo. He said that Magogo’s wife, called Challotte was in love with him (Nuwagaba). He wanted Among to give him money to marry Charlotte, thereby knocking out the speaker’s rival from the competition for Magogo’s heart. During the course of the meeting, Nuwahereza asked Nuwagaba for the proposal he had brought to the speaker. There was no proposal except to marry Magogo’s other wife. Twine was later arrested in 2024.

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