Innocent individuals executed

Because they were in the wrong place at a wrong time, the security agencies could not differentiate the guerrillas from good citizens.

It should be noted that not all the 11 people executed were Fronasa guerrillas as Amin propagandists and the media recorded it. There were some unlucky innocent individuals who were also summarily executed on that black Saturday of February 10, 1973; simply because they had been found in company of the guerrillas.

Because they were in the wrong place at a wrong time, the security agencies could not differentiate the guerrillas from good citizens. This was also precipitated by the fact that the accused were tried in a military court which did not give the accused a fair hearing.

For instance, in his book Sowing the Mustard Seed , President Museveni, on page 85, wrote: “Not all those executed that day had necessarily been involved in guerrilla activity.” He adds: “Abwooli Malibo, arrested in a tea room in Kampala, was executed in Fort Portal. He had maintained some contact with us although, after training in Frelimo camps, he had drifted away from clandestine work. Masaba and Namirundi were killed in Mbale. Masaba had nothing to do with us, but Namirundi, a schoolboy aged 17, and a relative of the Maumbe Mukhwana’s had helped cook for our people at Maumbe’s home.”

Museveni does not recorgonise Phares Kasoro, Malibo’s co-accused. Another victim of the circumstance was Phares Kasoro, an Assistant Superintendent of Police. His crime came because he was a friend of Malibo and he occasionally accommodated him at his home in Kampala. The military tribunal heard that while Kasoro gave accommodation to Malibo he did not know of his clandestine work for the guerrillas.

His pleas and explanation fell on deaf ears. Mzee Richard Baguma, one of the elders of Tooro Kingdom witnessed the execution of Kasoro and Malibo at Nyakaseke football pitch, now the famous new taxi park in Fort Portal Municipality. He told this journalist that while Kasoro was so bitter and angry, Malibo was unbothered. He even managed to have a grin on his face in spite of torment from the executioners.

Baguma also adds that every one in Tooro Kingdom was touched by the public execution of the two. “It was a sad day in Tooro to see one of them killed in such a way. It was horrible,” he said. Their bodies were taken and buried inside Muhote Military Barracks. However, after the 1979 liberation war, the two were given a befitting burial by their relatives. Today, there is Malibo Road in Fort-Portal Municipality and a monumental of the two.

The Sunday Monitor has since established that on February 6, 1988, when the National Resistance Army (NRA) commissioned its officers and men with rank, Abwooli Malibo was posthumously given the rank of Lieutenant.
Indeed, not everyone called a guerrilla was one. Sometimes, thugs would be called guerrillas. Ambassador Wanume Kibedi, who in early 1973 was in the ministry of Foreign Affairs and is now the Chairman National Citizenship and Immigration Board, told the Sunday Monitor that Amin used the guerrilla pretext to eliminate those opposing him.
UTV parading.

He said: “I remember once some young men were paraded to the public at the UTV claiming to rebels. I was perturbed by the whole act. When I made a telephone call to my colleague, William Nabirra, minister for internal affairs, to inquiry about it, he told me that President Amin had telephoned the UTV staff and the soldiers, instructing them to tell the captives to say that indeed, they were guerrillas who had come from Tanzania with a mission to assassinate the Uganda President, ministers Wanume Kibedi, Edward Rugumayo, Colonel Francis Nyangweso and others.”

The six allegedly guerrillas; Yosefu Rubagumya, 30, from Sheema County in Mbarara District, Alifunsi, 30, from Bukedi District, Farasisiko Haberumana, 32, a Rwandan, Tirwakunda,28, from Kigezi, Tom Odong 20, from Acholi and James Bwona, 21, a Rwandan, were paraded on UTV on February 4, however, they were not publicly executed as other rebels captured before them were. Why they were not executed by firing squad in public, is the question.

In a related story on Page 22, read about how Amin tracked the Fronasa rebels

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