Rise of home-grown bombers in Uganda

Police, in explaining images in a Closed-Circuit Television (CCTV) camera footage that they showed to the media on Tuesday, said the explosives were packed in backpacks and detonated.

It remained unclear whether the bombs were blasted remotely or activated by the carriers. 

Earlier, on October 25, an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) exploded on a moving bus en-route to western Uganda killing Isaac Matovu, a man police posthumously named as an operative of the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF).

Investigators, without specifying the destination, alleged that he was transporting the explosive but they were unsure whether he detonated it intentionally or it went off accidentally.

In the late 1990s, ADF and its founding commander and ideologue, Jamil Mukulu, operated covert cells through couriers and close-knit family members to hurl IEDs in different parts of Kampala.

However, many of those who were arrested in 2001 said money, rather than indoctrination, motivated them.

In July 2001, Yusuf Fred Nyanzi, Salaamu Namakula and Sarah Nabanja, alias Fatuma, were accused of planting bombs that exploded in the eastern Jinja City. Nyanzi trained the duo accomplices in bomb-making skills in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, for four weeks, according to their confessions barely after they were arrested.

Nabanja revealed: “He [Nyanzi] gave us money and said ‘find me in Jinja’. We later separated and each of us had our own car. At about 8:30pm, he (Nyanzi) came with a bag and in a dark alley, he told me sit there and he gave me the bag and handed me Shs5, 000. I left the bag, he later told us that it [bomb] exploded.”

Yusuf Nyanzi confessed, according to Nabanja’s account to interrogators, that he ‘got instructions from my boss to take it (bomb) to Jinja’.

Nabanja said the total pay promised to her was Shs2m, which had not been paid by the time of her arrest.

Tuesday’s attacks, security analysts proffer, symbolise the deeper embrace between the ADF and ISIS, and the adoption of the arsonist methods of terror where home-grown cells can radicalise youths to take part in suicide bombings.

For the first time ever, Uganda has now served as a sanctuary to train and radicalise its own nationals to take part in suicide bombings at home.

Highly-placed sources in security indicate that the ADF has gradually transplanted this radical teaching after Arab fighters began making trips to the DRC to preach the radical brand of Wahhabism to ADF fighters and try to make a ‘plausible case’ for establishing a caliphate in central Africa.

In one of the grotesque videos recently seen by Daily Monitor, a young boy who is a son of one of the ADF fighters, is handed a blunt panga and ordered to decapitate a Congolese man, a copy-cat of beheadings by the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq.

During his Tuesday evening address, President Museveni confirmed the identity of the two bombers as Mansoor Uthman, who allegedly detonated his bomb at the Central Police Station (CPS) and Abdallah Wanjusi, who allegedly blasted himself on Parliament Avenue.

“The real pigs are people like Nsubuga, the so-called Sheikh that confused young people at Lweza. If blowing oneself up will send one to Jaanaa, let him blow himself up as an example instead of manipulating young children,” read a message on President Museveni’s Twitter handle.

“They have exposed themselves when we are more ready for urban terrorism. They will perish.  Rural terrorism was defeated in 2007 in the Semliki National Park.  I am referring to the dead terrorists as manipulated victims of confusion,” Museveni said.

Whereas Uganda has registered demonstrable success in fighting terrorism, suicide terror tactics could present a complex matrix to deal with given the spontaneity of attacks.

In the aftermath of the attack, Islamic State’s “news agency”, Amaq, reported that Uganda was “one of the countries participating in the war against Islamic State fighters in Central Africa” - its justification for targeting the country.

Security minister, Maj Gen Jim Muhwezi, a former domestic spymaster, in a number of tweets revealed that the attacks were a handiwork of home-grown terror cells. He, however, suggested that perhaps some of those lured did not willingly embrace ‘martyrdom.’

“We have noted through several interrogations that these terror groups have been radicalising our young people by either persuasion or coercion. Therefore, I am appealing to our young people not to be persuaded to join such anti-people groups because they’re illegal and violent,” he wrote.

He added: “These extremists have several tricks of executing their mission, one of them and the most common is the delivery of packages. They will approach you and pay you to drop their package at their target destination. There is a likelihood that some of these suicide bombers were duped to just deliver, but they were blown up as they neared the target destination.”

Under the new command of Sheikh Musa Baluku and his acolytes, the ADF have gravitated towards embracing ISIS and its radical tactics.

“Although ADF remained secretive, since 2016 it released increasing numbers of social media videos showcasing its training, military capacities and clashes with FARDC (the Congolese army), preaching and internal discussions. The release of the videos began after the arrest in 2015 of [of its founding commander Jamil] Mukulu and served opportunistic and propaganda purposes that bolstered the external outreach and regional recruitment of ADF, while strengthening the group’s discipline, unity and morale,” read the 2021 UN panel of experts report.

“The Group [UN panel of experts] analysed over 45 videos from 2006 to 2020, showing a clear attempt to project alignment with ISIL, including radical interpretation of Islam, such as the killing of non-Muslims, and underlining the shift from the original objective of ADF to fight the government of Uganda,” reads the document addressed to the president of the UN Security Council.

Baluku’s pledge of allegiance to ISIL in a July 2019 video is illustrative. Baluku went further in a September 2020 video, stating that ADF no longer existed and was now an Islamic State Central African Province (ISCAP).

An ex-combatant confirmed a similar statement by Baluku during an early 2020 preaching in Madina, which aimed at boosting ADF morale during FARDC operations, reads the report.

“He and other ex-combatants said several ADF videos and other videos of ISIL affiliates in Mozambique and West Africa, were regularly displayed in ADF camps. In parallel, ISIL continued to claim responsibility for ADF attacks in Beni territory and Ituri, with a substantial spike in claims in December 2020 and February 2021. Those communications were mutually beneficial, complementing and amplifying ADF local propaganda, and suggesting increased global reach for ISIL,” read the report.

Modest advancements in improvised explosive device construction techniques were attributed to the involvement of ADF combatants from abroad, in particular from Burundi, Kenya and the United Republic of Tanzania. Former abductees and ex-combatants named Abwakasi and Seka Kahumi as bomb-makers.

Security agencies will also need to study the profiles of the Ugandan suicide bombers and establish their journey towards radicalisation.

For instance, could they be part of the young fighters in the ADF ranks, who were born in the early 2000s inside the deeper recesses of DRC’s jungles and have subsequently become ‘stateless’?

A highly-placed source in intelligence says this cohort could be more radicalised than the older generation.

As a new wave of insecurity sweeps across the country, the rebel group ideologue and founder, Jamil Mukulu, remains locked up behind the iron-curtain walls of Luzira Maximum prison, where he is occasionally shackled and driven to the High Court for his trial on terrorism and crimes against humanity charges, among others.

But does he remain the gaffer who is able to run covert operations of the ADF or has power gradually gravitated to Mukulu’s former surrogate, Musa Baluku, who is keen to please ISIS and attract a financial war-chest?

An ADF splinter group of about 30 combatants, led by Muzaya, a former military commander in Mwalika camp, Benjamin Kisokeranio, a close advisor to Mukulu and Yasin Hassan Nyanzi, Mukulu’s son, since 2019 are operating mainly in Virunga National Park, near the Semliki River inside the DRC.

Yasin Hassan Nyanzi studied Information Technology in London and joined ADF fighters in their DRC safe haven where he got married.

He was later arrested in Nairobi on the offence of forgery after he was found with fake passports. After nine months in a Kenyan prison, Nyanzi was extradited to Uganda in 2011.

“I denounce what I was doing earlier. That is why I seek amnesty,” he told a news conference in 2013 after his involvement in rebel activity between 2008 and 2010, where he lost one eye a during battle.

Nyanzi later sneaked out of the country and re-joined the ADF.

IGG KAMYA RECOUNTS BOMB BLAST

Additional reporting by Amos Ngwomoya

Kampala. The Inspector General of Government (IGG), Ms Beti Kamya, yesterday recounted the Tuesday mid-morning horrifying twin bomb blasts, saying the incident left her traumatised.

The blasts happened near the Central Police Station (CPS) and at Raja chambers on Parliament Avenue.

Jubilee Insurance House too is located on the same avenue and it is where the IGG’s offices are located.

Speaking to NTV, a sister station to this newspaper, Ms Kamya said the sudden blast paralysed operations at the inspectorate and left at least six workers affected.

“I had just entered my office and as I was preparing for a meeting, I heard a loud sudden blast which almost threw me off my chair. Six of our security team were affected and are admitted to hospital but four of them have been discharged,” Ms Kamya recounted.

Some of the buildings on the Parliament Avenue have been closed since Tuesday.

Ms Kamya said they await a directive from police before they can access the building.

She revealed that in the meantime her team will be working from home.

Police yesterday took all the vehicles which were parked near the scene of crime to Naguru Police headquarters for examination.

Police spokesman Fred Enanga said owners of the vehicles would have to present their documents before they can have them back.

Security operatives were by yesterday still deployed at strategic places of the city centre to ensure safety.