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Heads to roll over Kasese school attack
Security minister, Maj Gen (rtd) Jim Muhwezi (2nd right), inspects Mpondwe-Lhubiriha Secondary School in Kasese District on June 22, 2023. PHOTO/YOWERI KAGUTA
What you need to know:
- The death toll from last Friday night’s attack by elements linked to the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) has risen to 43.
Heads will roll in the army’s field units deployed around Kasese District if an ongoing inquiry confirms security lapses led to the June 16 terrorist attack on Mpondwe-Lhubiriha Secondary School, a senior minister said yesterday.
Security minister, Maj Gen (rtd) Jim Muhwezi, told a media briefing that for now, there is no proof of an intelligence failure. But quickly hinted on an undefined action to be taken against individuals in local command positions, if found to have dropped their guard.
“What we have heard from the meeting is that there were no intelligence loopholes. But that matter has been subjected to investigation. If we find any mistake on anybody, you know our government; actions will be taken on them,” he said after meeting district security officials at Rwenzori International Hotel in Kasese Town.
Since Thursday morning, the minister has been engaging local officials as part of efforts to strengthen intelligence-gathering operations in the district and elsewhere, he said. He was accompanied by Director of Internal Security Organisation (ISO), Col Charles Oluka.
The death toll from last Friday night’s attack by elements linked to the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) has risen to 43. Thirty seven students, a school watchman and four locals were either hacked, bludgeoned or burnt to death by the attackers.
In the morning after the harrowing incident, UPDF Mountain Division commander, Maj Gen Dick Olum told the shell-shocked border community of Mpondwe that the militants stayed in the area for two days before raiding the school.
Maj Gen Olum, who also spoke in his capacity as commander of the army’s ongoing Operation Shujaa inside the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), said the militants had local collaborators who aided them to carry out reconnaissance before the massacre.
Maj Gen Muhwezi called for vigilance amongst the population, which he said helped thwart earlier attempts by the ADF to strike inside the Rwenzori Sub-region -- in order to draw the army away from the Congo where they are under pressure.
“We now have to be prepared to get them so that if they come here again, they don’t go back like the other ones who went to Ntoroko. About 51 and almost all of them did not go back,” Maj Gen Muhwezi said.
It added: “these are desperate moves by the terrorists, stupidly thinking that if they attack here, the UPDF will divert attention to here so that they can have peace which they don’t have since Operation Shujaa started [in November 2021],” he added.
In December 2022, more than 40 ADF militants crossed the Ssemiliki River from DRC into Ntoroko District. Local authorities alerted the army to their presence, who then engaged them, killing 20 and capturing 15.
A veteran of the Bush War which brought the National Resistance Movement to power in 1986, Maj Gen Muhwezi said the “very unfortunate” tragedy at Lhubiriha serves as a bad lesson to the security forces.
As the government tightens security along the DRC border, the minister said, he has issued directives to all internal security agents at the sub-county level to intensify monitoring of human movements and activities in Kasese.
There has been an influx of Congolese refugees, streaming into the district following a recent upsurge in ADF activity across the border, a situation which increases the risk of infiltration by wrong elements hiding amidst genuine refugees.
It is for this reason that the junior minister for ICT, who is also Bukonzo West MP, advised local leaders to always make a note of strangers in their area.
“Register all new people coming as visitors,” Mr Godfrey Baluku Kabbyanga advised a few days ago.
