Uganda: Besigye Shot, Teargas Rocks Kampala as Walk To Work Demo Grows
By Katongole Kiwanuka – Uganda capital city, Kampala has been rocked with teargas as Police was engaged in running battles with opposition leaders protesting escalating commodity prices in the country. In the same melee, three time presidential aspirant Kizza Besigye was reportedly injured by a bullet and rushed to a nearby hospital.
Dr Kiiza Besigye
Police and the military are giving conflicting accounts of the reported bullet that heat Kizza Besigye. Army Spokesman, Lt. Col. Felix Kulayigye, says Besigye was “not hurt at all”, though Police publicist Judith Nabakooba says “something else, not a bullet” glazed his finger.
Doctors at Kampala Hospital however concluded that after an X-ray examination a rubber bullet shattered the third digit of Besigye’s right arm.
Leading opposition figures in Uganda decided to start a walk to Work campaign agitating for reduction in the costs of soaring fuel prices. Kampala mayor-elect Erias Lukwago, Kitgum woman MP Beatrice Anywar, Kyadondo South MP Issa Kikungwe have been arrested.
The Daily Monitor reported in the afternoon that Police used teargas and live bullets at Kampala’s Makindye Court to disperse a crowd that has converged to protest the arrest of the politicians.
Lukwago, who is also the Lord Mayor-elect for Kampala, along with Forum for Democratic Change vice president, Salaam Musumba, have been brought to the Court where they were going to be charged for allegedly committing an, as yet, unknown offence.
The protests spread to upcountry locations with bodaboda riders (motorbike touts) in Western Uganda deciding to instead push their bikes from the slum town of Nyendo to Masaka town.
