Ms Michela Wrong (what a name?) wrote a book titled ‘Do Not Disturb’. It is on the death of Col Patrick Karegeya in a South African hotel room. Col Karegeya was former director general of Rwanda’s external intelligence agency. Ms Wrong is a British national.
Col Karegeya’s death or assassination or murder or killing was widely covered in Uganda’s media. Karegeya was born and studied in Uganda; needless to say, his Ugandan ideological, military and political heritage is a given.
Ms Wrong was graceful enough to send me a copy via her publicist Naomi. I have read two pieces on the Wrong book; one by Andrew Mwenda and the other by Albert Rudatsimburwa. None of these two pieces were a review or a rebuttal or a defence of Paul Kagame or the government of Rwanda.
Albert’s piece on the Wrong book brought out the element of the poor Uganda-Rwanda relationship. Then I saw a tweet by Ms Wrong alluding to accusations (by what she called Rwandan trolls) that she was under the pay of Mr Museveni. According to the said tweet, Ms Wrong seems to have also been framed as a genocide denier, an operative in France’s Operation Turquoise in Rwanda.
The Rwandan media can be brutal. One outlet published a story accusing me of having committed amarorerwa (genocide?) in Rwanda and that I had been deported from Rwanda because of ruswa (corruption).
I know Albert. He is an ok guy. When I was deported and declared persona non grata in Rwanda, Albert collected The Rwanda Herald’s debts from a corporate organisation and sent it to me (I don’t know how many Rwandan laws he broke by that act).
But then Albert joined the media; he personally told me he owns and runs a radio station in Kigali. And then he joined the commentariat; he writes regular commentaries in very fine and admirable syntax. For a man whose first foreign language of formal instruction (I think) was French, I have had to pull off my heart and hat for his fine writing. Only problem is that he doesn’t want to miss an opportunity to situate Uganda in a position of belligerency against Rwanda.
My dear Rwandan brothers and sisters, I invite you to comment on or discuss Ms Wrong’s book without dragging Uganda and Mr Museveni into it. The book has so much content to comment on without creating a situation of belligerence between our two countries. Most Ugandans know that Mr Museveni and the government of Uganda do not have the cognitive attitude to even dream of a PR strategy (least said of hostile propaganda) involving the publication of a book by a celebrated western journalist. Therefore, very few Ugandans would believe that Ms Wrong’s book project was underwritten by Mr Museveni or the government of Uganda.
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I first learnt of Col Karegeya’s death through a Rwandan refugee whose wife is a close relative of the wife of Rwanda’s ambassador to South Africa. I don’t need to accuse anyone of killing or assassinating or murdering or killing Col Karegeya. But I know fingers were pointed some direction. I can only say that when I suggested (in this very column) that Col Karegeeya should be buried in Uganda, there was a lot of resistance from Kigali.
Rwanda, will soon host the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (Chogm). In normal situations, one would think it is diplomatically advisable that RPF cadres don’t create situations that put Rwanda at loggerheads with her neighbours. What a diplomatic nightmare it would be if all the three East African Commonwealth countries absented themselves from Chogm in Rwanda? Peace!
Mr Bisiika is the executive editor of the East African Flagpost. abisiika@gmail.com
Source: https://www.monitor.co.ug/