Your source for credible news Issue no 034
June, 2021
Emotional testimony and 25 years sentence request for Callixte Nsabimana
NEWS
Could Cassien Ntamuhanga be a victim of RNC wrangles and machinations? Page 2 NEWS
Bisiika’s hypes Wrong’s book, because they both work for Museveni Page 4 OP - ED
The former spokesperson of the MRCD-FLN terrorist militia, Callixte Nsabimana, has seen the prosecution requesting that he be sentenced to 25 years in jail for his role in the terrorist organization. Prosecutors want him sentenced for forming an illegal armed group, being part of a terror group, terrorism based on political motives, conspiracy and encouraging others to commit terror, murder as an Page 3 act of terrorism. Get a free copy of our e-paper
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Ugandan propaganda machine concocts words Tshisekedi never said on Rwanda as Museveni postures that he’s going to “build roads” in DRC Page 5 OP - ED
Kampala propaganda meddles in Rwandan affairs by distorting cases of deported Ugandans Page 6
NEWS
Issue no 034 June 2021
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Could Cassien Ntamuhanga be a victim of RNC wrangles and machinations? wrangles, Diaspora sources comment.
By Alex Muhumuza Over the past few weeks some individuals in anti-Rwanda groups have been whining that fugitive Ntamuhanga Cassien disappeared in the capital of Mozambique, Maputo. If this is indeed true, who is responsible for it? There are some examples of similar cases in the circles of those individuals that have chosen to fall in bed with Kayumba Nyamwasa and his terror group RNC.
In July 2020 reports surfaced that Nyirigira had joined a breakaway group and no longer was working with Nyamwasa. But in fact the breakaway group itself, the Rwanda Alliance for Change had been formed by another former senior RNC official, Jean Paul Turayishimiye who himself had acrimoniously severed ties with Nyamwasa. The beef between Turayishimiye, the former RNC chief of intelligence based in the US, and his former boss too started with the disappearance of Rutabana.
Observers in fact are convinced Ntamuhanga is a victim of RNC’s internal machinations and wrangles. Ntamuhanga who was arrested in April 2014 on four terrorism-related crimes, charged, and convicted after a trial that went on for nine months escaped prison in April 2015 and made his way to Mozambique. There he formed a group called Abaryankuna – yet another so-called exiled “opposition party” dedicated to sowing insurrection and terrorism in Rwanda. Ntamuhanga, who was serving a twenty-five year prison term when he broke jail, then decided to join Nyamwasa in their anti-Rwanda activities. “What Ntamuhanga should have known is that things often do not end well with those that work with Kayumba Nyamwasa,” laughed an observer.
Kayumba Nyamwasa.
When fugitive Cassien Ntamuhanga escaped prison and went to Mozambique, and got entangled in RNC’s plots. But it rarely ends well with those that get in bed with RNC and it’s boss Kayumba Nyamwasa.
RNC’s affairs are always characterized by quarrels and raptures; some that end up with disappearances, even death. Those that follow news of the terror group know that people who choose to work with Nyamwasa eventually fall out with him – with bitterrecriminations and accusations against him of betrayal, greed, or being autocratic. One of the notable internal RNC wrangles was between Nyamwasa and Pastor Deo Nyirigira the former chief mobilizer and recruiter for RNC in Mbarara District, Uganda. Nyirigira through the disguise of his Agape Church wa one of the most important RNC
officials. But then some time in early 2019, Nyirigira’s son, Felix Mwizerwa went missing. That was the same time RNC’s Benjamin Rutabana, it’s “commissioner of mobilization” disappeared. Reports indicate that Kayumba Nyamwasa, working with Uganda’s Chieftaincy of Military Intelligence (CMI) head Maj. Gen. Abel Kandiho, had lured Rutabana from Brussels, to Uganda. On 8 September 2019, Rutabana’s wife Diane lost contact with him. He hasn’t been seen, or heard of since then. Rutabana’s familyciting a lot of circumstantial evidence accused Nyamwasa of his disappearance.However Deo Nyirigira too has a serious grievance against Nyamwasa.At the time Rutabana went missing, Nyirigira’s son Felix Mwizerwa too went missing, and he too hasn’t been seen since then. Nyirigira too is certain Nyamwasa is responsible for his son’s disappearance. This caused bad blood between the two men, leading to Nyirigira bitterly breaking up with RNC to join a splinter group. Nyirigira had been the “chairman of the RNC Uganda province” since 2019 when the so-called province was formed. Nyirigira’s defection showed the extent to which Nyamwasa foments divisions and
Turayishimiye was with those people that sided with Rutabana when the latter, long before he fell into Nyamwasa and Kandiho’s trap in Uganda, began questioning Nyamwasa’s ways of running RNC. Rutabana would accuse Nyamwasa of nepotism, favoritism (like always entrusting the most important missions to Frank Ntwari his brother in law), and using RNC funds but never accounting for them. “Nyamwasa has always been corrupt and autocratic, and Rutabana was putting himself in serious danger by questioning him, and no doubt he paid for it,” a Diaspora source familiar with RNC’s internal wrangles remarked. When Turayishimiye formed his splinter group, several of RNC former members too broke up with Nyamwasa to join Turayishimiye. This pattern of events of unending quarrels or wrangles, all fuelled by Kayumba Nyamwasa’s greed and thirst for power “surely Cassien Ntamuhanga also has felt it!” one of our southern African sources commented. The question they ask is: will this pattern end with Ntamuhanga? “Negative! It will go on because a leopard can’t change its spots,” our source commented.
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NEWS
Issue no 034 June 2021
3
Emotional testimony and 25 years sentence request for Callixte Nsabimana
Callixte Nsabimana, staring at a lengthy stay behind bars.
By Jean Gatera The former spokesperson of the MRCD-FLN terrorist militia, Callixte Nsabimana, has seen the prosecution requesting that he be sentenced to 25 years in jail for his role in the terrorist organization. Prosecutors want him sentenced for forming an illegal armed group, being part of a terror group, terrorism based on political motives, conspiracy and encouraging others to commit terror, murder as an act of terrorism. MRCD-FLN launch terrorist attacks in the southern region of Rwanda in 2018 and 2019. Its leader, Paul Rusesabagina, also
on trial, had acknowledged on social media his organization’s responsibility calling for support of the terrorist acts. His message were relayed by Nsabimana Callixte who was the spokesperson and vice-president of the outfit. Court also heard from victims of the FLN-MRCD attacks. They are seeking Rwf1.6 Billion in compensation. One survivor, Alice Kayitesi, moved the court with an emotional request, she asked court to allow her to meet face to face with Paul Rusesabagina and Callixte Nsabimana. She testified about the attack and how it changed her life forever.
“They shot so intensely at our bus. I was sitting close to a girl who was about 12-years-old, and I saw her being shot in the head,” Kayitesi said, “Another man who was sitting next to me was also shot.”Kayitesi added, “When I looked at my clothes,I saw blood and pieces of flesh and I got to know that I had also been shot.” She survived with gunshot wounds and back injuries; since the attack she cannot stand for long or wear high-heel shoes. “I had a dream of studying well, make good money and live well. I am only a Rwandan child who wanted a good life. But some people took a decision to change that. They really retarded my life,”
an emotional Kayitesi narrated. As she concluded her testimony, the judge asked her for any last comment. Bravely, Kayitesi answered, “I want to meet with Sankara and Rusesabagina, and talk to them in person.” The FLN trial, in which Paul Rusesabagina and 20 co-accused are charged with terrorist related crimes, resumed today on the 16th of June. Sadly, Rusesabagina refusal to attend trial denies Kayitesi closure on the trauma inflicted by MRCD-FLN.
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NEWS
Issue no 034 June 2021
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Bisiika’s hypes Wrong’s book, because they both work for Museveni dist against Rwanda in organs like the Guardian of London. Museveni, who has long plotted to destabilize Rwanda by any means, saw her utility as a Western journalist with a name, and commissioned her to write the hit job. Michela Wrong’s book in fact is hers only in name. It is Museveni’s project. In this way, Wrong has become an intelligence operative of Museveni’s, and by extension of other countries that happen to share their anti-Rwanda animosity.
British journalist Michela Wrong (left) was commissioned by Ugandan ruler Museveni to write her hatchet job against the Rwandan leadership. Asuman Bisiika of Daily Monitor dances to the tune.
By Alain Mucyo One Asuman Bisiika, an individual that masquerades as a journalist but in fact is an agent of Ugandan intelligence, and of Museveni’s State House, has posted on his Facebook a piece of propaganda that serves to advertise British author Michela Wrong’s hit job of a book against the Rwandan leadership. Bisiika has long made a career in Kampala by pretending to be “a Rwanda expert”, something that his intelligence handlers in the Ugandan capital always are trying to exploit in their campaign of misinformation against Kigali. With his most recent Facebook, Bisiika has joined the list of Ugandan propagandists hyping up, and advertising Wrong’s book. He in fact says he himself is selling the book! Touting a book with claims that “it reads like fiction but it’s real” while at the same time advertising that he is a vendor of the same book isn’t the only bizarre thing going on. Bisiika also tells his audience that he was “great
friends with Karegeya” (whom he calls CPK). Bisiika adds, “In fact CPK who created me a Congolese citizen.” Who knew that Karegeya also had such powers!
Karegeya to be weaponized against the Rwandan leadership. The British woman had had a relationship with Karegeya that turned her into a bitter propagan-
The subject of her book, Karegeya – whom she paints as some spotless saint – is the same person that was an agent serving Uganda’s (read Museveni) interests even while still in Rwanda. So it wasn’t a coincidence that the Ugandan ruler would offer her the contract. With Bisiika’s bizarre Facebook sketch, one can see that Karegeya is the common thread, going from him, through Wrong, up to Museveni.
Bisiika implies he is communicating a joke. But his claims are no joke for any Rwandan. In amplifying the anti-Rwanda fictions of Wrong’s book, he is part of a wider pattern of Kampala media and propaganda organs ensuring the book, Do Not Disturb, attains as wide an audience as possible. It is no accident that the Daily Monitor man is making a sales pitch for the book, and that he has a pile of copies of it. The fact is that Bisiika in this instance is not a mere reviewer of the hatchet job work. He is on the same team as Wrong – with both on Museveni’s payroll in his long-running anti-Kigali propaganda campaign. It in fact was Museveni that got in touch with Wrong and commissioned her to write a book on
Ugandan ruler Museveni
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OP-ED
Issue no 034 June 2021
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Ugandan propaganda machine concocts words Tshisekedi never said on Rwanda as Museveni postures that he’s going to “build roads” in DRC By Alex Muhumuza Trumpetnews, another outlet of misinformation controlled by Ugandan Military Intelligence has published an anti-Rwanda article full of distortions, most remarkably a completely made up quote attributed to DRC President Felix Antoine Tshisekedi. The article was published this Thursday, 17 June with the headline: “We need more bridges than walls in EAC, Tshisekedi slams Kagame.” “The desperation of the Kampala regime is such that now they are fabricating words even against heads of state,” said a Facebook commentator. “Everyone knows Tshisekedi never said such a thing. But with Uganda’s trolls no lie is too great!” DRC’s president on Wednesday in a goodwill gesture met Museveni who, according to his propaganda is “building roads within Congo to facilitate trade.” According to this propaganda, “Uganda also is building the roads ‘to bypass Rwanda which has closed the border.’” CMI-controlled media of misinformation is using Museveni’s posturing in Congoas another opportunity to attack Rwanda, for problems created by Museveni,
Fugitive Cassien Ntamuhanga.
Ugandan ruler Museveni
analysts point out. The alleged plan by Uganda to build a road in Congo merely is another lie (selling air in Kampala’s conman language) by Museveni however, analysts say, citing the fact Uganda has no money to build its own roads. Museveni only is trying to wriggle out of paying US$ 10 billion, and interest – which the International Court of Justice ordered Uganda to pay DRC over a decade and a half ago.
Museveni’s army was guilty of plundering and looting Congolese natural resources, and of widespread human rights abuses against Congolese civilians.
NTV and others became fixated on misinforming the public that “Rwanda had closed the border causing untold losses”, echoing the country’s authorities.
“The Congolese are not stupid; they know that the roads in Uganda are terrible, potholed wrecks in complete disrepair,” astute observers point out, adding: “so how can they believe that someone who can’t build his roads will build theirs? They are just giving Museveni time to hang himself with his own words.”
But the facts debunk these blame games.
But there is another well-known cause for why Kampala propagandists are feverishly spinning misinformation around the alleged roads, and dragging Rwanda into their lies. It is the losses in hundreds of millions of dollars brought to the Ugandan economy, and Ugandan businesses following closure of Rwandan borders to heavy Ugandan commercial trucks on the First of March 2019. Ugandan businesses were impacted, from the borders at Katuna, Kyanika, all the way to Kampala’s factories and wholesalers in places like the Kikuubo trading area. Ugandan ruler Museveni promises to build roads in Congo (and Burundi), but Ugandan roads are in ruins. Who is he fooling, especially when his propaganda drags Rwanda into his empty promises?
After Museveni got into bed with Kayumba Nyamwasa’s RNC and other negative anti-Rwanda group in a mutual goal to destabilize Rwanda’s security, Uganda’s security organs, CMI foremost, launched a sustained campaign of harassment against Rwandan nationals – either those traveling to Uganda, or those already resident there. Museveni has always harbored dreams of installing a puppet regime in Kigali. When he and groups such as Nyamwasa’s went ahead with their plots to export violence to Rwanda through rebel terrorists based in the jungles of eastern DRC, they devised a forcible recruitment strategy for RNC, facilitated and coordinated by CMI. It involved indiscriminately singling out Rwandans either on buses headed to Uganda, and abducting the victims who would
Uganda’s media, including the mainstream New Vision, Monitor,
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OP-ED
Issue no 034 June 2021
>> From page 5 end up in the torture dungeons of Mbuya Barracks (CMI headquarters), of CMI police station Kireka, or any number of “safe houses” – ungazetted places of detention. CMI worked hand in hand with agents of RNC. CMI agents would hurl concocted accusations of “spying” or “illegal weapons possession” at these Rwandans as they dragged them awayto detain them, incommunicado, with no formal charges. Together with Kinyarwanda-speaking RNC agents, they would subject their victims to torture including severe beatings, electrocution, starvation, and
sleeping in filthy conditions. The objective would be to break these innocent Rwandans, the able bodied among them, into accepting to be recruited into RNC rather than endure sustained torture. Very many refused to, and would be subjected to further severe torture. The lucky few that CMI released would be brutally dumped at the borders.Others died. There were countless incidents when Ugandan security forces abducted Rwandans of financial means – businessmen and women, wealthy farmers, and the
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like – on the same accusations of “spying for Rwanda”, illegal weapons possession, kidnap, for which they never produced any evidence.
Following was the closure of the border to heavy Ugandan commercial trucks, though all other traffic was free to come and enter from Uganda.
Rwanda had been protesting through diplomatic channels to Uganda, for a period since early 2017, these brutal abuses of its citizens. The notes verbale to Uganda’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs repeatedly fell on deaf ears. Kigali then took the step to issue a travel advisory to its citizens against travel to Uganda since their security and wellbeing could not be guaranteed once in Uganda.
Rwanda’s position was that there could be no free trade without freedom of movement of people. But Museveni, rather than holding himself accountable for the huge losses he has caused his country opted for blame games. “Now he is conning Congolese and Burundians that he will build roads for them, yet still dragging Rwanda in his lies!” laughed Kigali social media accounts.
Kampala propaganda meddles in Rwandan affairs by distorting cases of deported Ugandans speak ill of the Uganda government, and of President Museveni. ”The website then claims that “maybe Kigali is no longer interested in seeing Ugandans work in Rwanda.” Kigali has always been clear on this point: any Ugandan lawfully in Rwanda can live and work in Rwanda. The same applies for any Ugandan that wants to do business in Rwanda. As long as they go through the lawful channels, use gazetted border crossings, (rather than sneaking in through porous border points in the night), they will be welcome.
By Jean Gatera Ugandan Chieftaincy of Military Intelligence (CMI), through its online propaganda outlets like the Softpower website, managed by Sarah Kagingo, has continued with its attempts to create false equivalences between Rwanda and Uganda, though only the Ugandan regime has been abusing the rights of Rwandan nationals living in Uganda. Softpower together with Chimpreports – which has become notorious for the sheer fictions against Rwanda – now have turned Ugandan smugglers into traders, and illegal immigrants into lawful residents. In their latest piece of propaganda, titled: “Rwanda deports more Ugandans in less than a week, declares them prohibited immigrants”, Softpower issues a string of fabricated claims around 6 Ugandans lawfully deported from Rwanda. Two of them, Byamukama Alex and Himbisa Duncan were casual laborers that had been sneaking into Rwanda from Kabale, and four were said to be teachers. The Ugandans were caught sneaking out of Rwanda illegally. The CMI propaganda outlets deliberately omitted the fact that the Ugandan High Commission is organizing repatriation for Ugandan nationals in convoys. Why would some sneak out
Commandonepost and Chimpreports are distorting facts to fit the narrative of their masters in CMI, and State House Kampala. One of the Rwandans brutally dumped at the borders following torture in Ugandan dungeons received medical care in the recent past. Despite all CMI propaganda, no Ugandan has been mistreated in Rwanda in any way.
instead of traveling in a legally organized convoy, free of charge?, one wonders. In addition to the propaganda that Ugandans are being persecuted in Rwanda, Commandonepost laced its narrative with a series of other claims that do not add up. For instance, quoting from the illegal immigrants caught sneaking out, they claim that, “for a Ugandan to comfortably work in Rwanda, you are required to
On the other hand, unlike the thousands of innocent Rwandans dumped by Ugandan authorities at the border withno due process, the 6 cases of deported Ugandans that Softpower talks of in fact were all lawfully processed. Immigration officials issued letters explaining to the concerned what violations the Ugandans committed and what sanctions followed. But in its determination to mudsling Rwanda, Softpower even resurrects an older case hoping to mislead its readers about their deportations. In April, Birungi Monique and
Kansiime Lillian, for example, were caught sneaking into Rwanda and were lawfully deported. But no country with rule of law would tolerate blatant violations of its national laws, yet that’s what CMI propaganda is advocating in the case of Rwanda. Earlier in 2019 in was Kampala’sunending harassment and persecution of Rwandan citizens in Uganda that led to Kigali issuing an advisory against its nationals crossing to Uganda. Continued harassment against Rwandans in the form of arbitrary arrests, illegal detention, incommunicado, torture and other abuses mainly by CMI is what ledto thebreakdown of trade between Rwanda and Uganda. Hit with economic hardship, Ugandans resulted to smuggling to survive, on the advise of Museveni himself. This advice of the Ugandan ruler to his own citizens to resort to criminality or illegal means of doing things clearly has been heeded by a number of Ugandans, smugglers, those looking to cross into Rwanda illegally, and the like. “But when Rwanda takes lawful measures to curtail the illegality, suddenly you get theses fictitious articles in Softpower, Chimpreports, and others,” a Rwandan official said on request of ano-
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OP-ED
Issue no 034 June 2021
7
Ugandan Intelligence, and its propaganda manufacture crisis after unruly Ugandan soldier strays into Rwanda By Jean Gatera When Private Bakuru Muhuba of the Uganda People Defense Force (UPDF) strayed into Rwandan territory over the past weekend, there was an avalanche of Kampala propaganda attacking Rwanda with claims that “Rwanda had abducted a Ugandan soldier.” It all looked coordinated, down to the language or terminology that the websites, blog sites, or social media accounts known to be outlets of Ugandan intelligence misinformation were using. The Ugandan soldier was intercepted by a Rwanda Defense Force patrol on Saturday, 12 June. A statement RDF released on the incident, yesterday, Sunday 13, said: “On 12 June 21, at approximately 14:45 hrs. an RDF day patrol intercepted the UPDF soldier on Rwandan soil.” That was in Majyambere village in the Cyanika Sector of Burera District, Northern Province. The RDF statement described Pte. Muhuba as being dressed in a UPDF camouflage uniform, armed with a Medium Machine
Gun (MMG) with its 100 rounds, 01 Binocular, 01 cellphone, and his military Identification documents. Rwanda would hand Uganda’s soldier back to them, safe, and together with all his equipment and weapon. But well before any facts on the case came to light Kampala propagandists were in full flight, with misinformation that “Rwandan forces had crossed into Uganda ‘to abduct’ the Ugandan soldier,” embellished in various ways to paint a situation as if Rwandan troops have a brief “to kidnap soldiers in Uganda.” At the forefront of the misinformation attacks were notorious websites of misinformation run by Uganda’s Chieftaincy of Military Intelligence. These were Commandonepost, which is edited by one Bob Atwine, and Chimpreports of Giles Muhame – who has in the past published outright fictions such as the one in April 2019 that “Rwandan soldiers crossed to Kisoro looking for food and drink.” Following suit was Kampala Post which is affiliated to Special Forces Command, and is managed under the office of Lt. Gen. Muhoozi Kainerugaba.
These were being echoed, word for word, by anti-Rwanda Facebook trolls like Obed Katureebe, a megaphone for Kayumba Nyamwasa’s RNC propaganda who is based in the Uganda Communications Commission (UCC), and who goes by the pseudonym “RPF Gakwerere”, as well as others like Sulah Nuwamanya the RNC Kampala resident agent, and others. They were clamoring with their fictitious “kidnap story” of the UPDF soldier that “had been taken with all his documents.” They claimed that “Pte. Muhuba was patrolling with his colleague but left his patrol to ‘ease himself’ when he disappeared.” That was how they built the story that “Rwandan soldiers crossed the border to ambush and kidnap him.” But as usual the story was a complete fabrication. “They were merely manufacturing a crisis, for their own reason,” said a security official in Kigali. Another observer, an experienced commentator on issues since the Museveni government embarked on its policy of hostility against Rwanda said that CMI was manufacturing this crisis for purposes of provocation.
When the full facts came out, it was disclosed that the Ugandan soldier had said he got lost and found himself in Rwanda. When RDF intercepted him, he acknowledged that he was on Rwandan territory. “I am sorry, let me go back to Uganda”, Muhuba is said to have pleaded with members of the RDF patrol. The fiction woven by the CMI propaganda machine continued to unravel when a Ugandan delegation, led by the Kisoro RDC Capt. (Rtd) Peter Mugisha, came to receive the stray soldier and apologized to Rwanda in the process. In a news bulletin on Rwanda Broadcasting Agency (RBA), the Kisoro RDC blamed Pte. Muhuba’s straying into Rwandan territory and admonished him to “use GPS next time.” By the time Muhuba was being handed back to Uganda, the CMI lie machine was already spinning a new fiction: that “Kigali had done so because of pressure from Uganda.” They are indefatigable, shame-proof liars, laughed a Rwandan social media account.
Rwandan military authorities hand over Ugandan soldier, Pte. Bakuru Muhuba (center with a bald head) to the RDC of Uganda’s Kisoro District. Kampala outlets of misinformation have been trying to smear Rwanda with falsehoods that RDF “abducted Muhuba”.
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