Author: Asuman Bisiika. PHOTO/FILE
My cousin Hamza Abbas was a suspect in a murder case. He is alleged to have killed a UNLA (so-called Obote army) soldier.
In a typical situation of the time, the UNLA soldier had forcefully grabbed Hamzas live-in girlfriend in a night club in Muhokya (that is my childhood hometown). But that alone didn’t give the soldier enough satisfaction: he also wanted to humiliate Hamza with a beating.Hamza (Munyarwanda mother and Nyamwezi father) was not the kind of man who takes such things lightly.
In a blink of an eye, he disarmed and badly beat up the soldier (who is said to have died three days later).With murder hanging on his head, Hamza sought refuge at our fatherless home. Being a DP activist during the 1980 General Elections (the old man was sub-county DP vice chairman), dad had run across the border to the DR Congo for fear of his life. Hamza had had some military training (gun use) when he worked as an army driver with the Wakombozi (Tanzanian occupation army). He had also been trained in martial arts by a rogue Italian engineer working with Stirling Astalidi, the company that constructed the airbase at Nakasongola in the 1970s.
At Muhokya, he was known as “the commando”.With a Tanzanian father and a Munyarwanda mother, Hamza passed himself off as a Tanzanian; and no one challenged him on that because his father Abbas Juma was a Tanzanian.
Needless to say, the Wakoombozi were comfortable working with him (using Stirling Astalidi dump truck) poaching animals in Queen Elizabeth National Park.When Kasese fell to the NRA rebels, Hamza disappeared from our home only to appear a month later in tattered and ill-fitting combat fatigues. He was now an NRA rebel soldier. He was merely passing by home on his way to appropriate (steal?) a lorry belonging to Mutanywana Secondary School. I joined him.
So, my main contribution to the Luweero thingie is that I participated in the stealing of a school lorry.With this lorry, Hamza returned to his earlier job of army driver (and yours truly was his unofficial conductor or turn-boy). As turn-boy, my first assignment was to steal coffee stocks of Nyakatonzi Co-operative Union in Kasese.Yes, NRA had something for the smell of coffee. I hear this was common in many other places.*************
In 1994, I was in Kigali (Rwanda) minding my own business. Kagame and his Inkotanyi boys were also minding their own business stopping the genocide.And then some NRA people were also minding their own business in Kigali. With NRA in Kigali, I had the opportunity of witnessing another incident of NRA smelling out some coffee.
The story is that there was ready-for-export coffee in Rwandex in Gikondo (Kigali’s Industrial Area). As earlier said, NRA persons were in Kigali minding their business. Trouble though is that NRA is alleged to have also minded the ready-for-export coffee in Rwandex.Then the coffee stocks in Rwandex was disappeared. A certain Paul was an NRA intelligence officer in Kasese when Nyakatonzi Co-operative Union coffee stock was disappeared.
Paul, to whom NRAs smell for coffee was known, immediately suspected the NRA persons to be responsible for the disappearance of the Rwandex coffee.So, when I heard that certain Ugandans associated or linked to the NRA were involved in planning the disappearance of Uganda Coffee Development Authority, I smiled knowingly, a sense of déjà vu.My 10 Congolese Francs worth of advise is: the Ministry of Agriculture should do agronomy and leave agribusiness to the private sector. And the UCDA should retain its agency status for regulation.
Mr Bisiika is the executive editor of the East African Flagpost. [email protected]
