How bomb suspects were arrested

ARRAIGNED: Mr Hassan (L) and Mr Magondu being escorted to Nakawa Court on Friday. PHOTO BY JOSEPH KIGGUNDU

Kampala

The three Kenyan terrorism suspects who were charged on Friday over the two bomb attacks that killed at least 80 people in Kampala were arrested after they made mistakes in their operations, senior security officials say. According to our investigations, the arrests of the trio--Idris Magondu, 42, Hussein Hassan Agade, 27, and Mohammed Aden Addow were effected after the suspects left a huge trail that security followed to net them.

The biggest trail was the bomb that failed to explode at a night spot in Makindye Division. Intelligence sources who declined to be named in order to speak freely said, after attacking football fans at Kyadondo Rugby Club and Ethiopian Village Restaurant, the terrorists wanted to blow other entertainment places days later.
However, this did not happen after their bomb failed to explode in Makindye. It is this unexploded bomb that provided security with the clues.

“They left a trail and using the unexploded bomb, we were able to track them,” a source explained. The suspects had reportedly planned to execute their mission by use of suicide bombers and remotely activated bombs. The bomb in Makindye was to be remotely activated using a mobile phone.

Impossible mission
The explosive devices were attached to the phone battery. After planting the bomb, the suspects made repeated calls to the cell phone but the bomb never exploded. “It didn’t go off because the battery was low,” explained a security source familiar with the ongoing investigations, “that was a blunder on their part and it gave us a clue.”
“We were able to track back and anybody who touched the phone was identified. We even tracked where the phone was bought.” The police did all the tracking while the FBI provided technical expertise.

The trail led to Kenya where the trio had returned after their mission. Mr Agade was the mastermind of the Kampala twin bombings, security said. He reportedly helped establish terrorists cells in Kampala, hired the suicide bombers and provided logistical support to the collaborators in Uganda.

After the Ugandan police established that the suspects came from Kenya, they notified their counterparts there who conducted the arrests. Days before the Kampala bombings, the suspects had made incessant calls to Kenya including calls to their landlords telling them how they would soon settle the unpaid electricity bills.

But a day to the explosions, the suspects reportedly discarded their cell phones and stopped communicating. They later acquired new phones and sim-cards which they also disposed off after returning to Kenya. Security says that the suspects had earlier made several trips between Kampala and Nairobi by bus. “We have their original bus tickets,” said an intelligence officer.

This back-and-forth movement, security believes, was to ferry their explosives in bits disguised as electronics. After arresting the suspects in Nairobi, the Inspector General of Police Maj. Gen. Kale Kayihura and his Kenyan counterpart put in place a joint interrogation team.

Attempts to reach Gen. Kayihura failed but the Coordinator of Intelligence Services, Gen. David Tinyefuza, yesterday declined to divulge details but said arrests were made possible by intelligence work. Two of the suspects reportedly did not deny their involvement in the grisly attacks in Kampala. This is when the Kenyan authorities handed them over to the Uganda security apparatus.

A source close to the investigations said that Mr Agade, who reportedly appears calm and humble, was the most radical as he accepted everything in his statement. In his statement to police, Mr Agade, a preacher in one of the Nairobi mosques, reportedly said: “Everything I do, I do in the name of Allah. It’s Allah’s will.” According to intelligence sources, the suspects’ confessions also enabled security agents to arrest another 27 Ugandan suspects mostly Muslims from the eastern region.

The majority of the Ugandan suspects have reportedly confessed that they hosted the Kenyan terror suspects as Muslim brothers without knowing their mission in Kampala. These Ugandan suspects, according to police sources, are likely to be paraded in court tomorrow to face different charges.

Security also says that some agents of the al Shabaab were still hiding in the country and have issued threats to attack some places. “Some agents are still in the city and still communicating in Kisenyi and Mbale,” an investigator said. Some of them have fled the country to Juba in South Sudan.

But Gen. Tinyefuza said the arrest of anyone from any region should not be localised to that region. “ It’s not an eastern problem and it should not be localised,” he said. “If they are in Kampala, we shall neutralise them, that is not a problem.
People should give us security information and keep alert,” he added, saying by being in Kampala, the terrorists were like people visiting a lion’s den. “When you go into a lion’s den, lions do not complain. People should not think the danger is over but be firm because we shall neutralise the enemy.”

Somalis blackmailed
According to investigators, the al Shabaab suspects had contacts with some wealthy Somali nationals in Kampala. However, while some could be collaborators, some Somali businessmen were being blackmailed by al Shabaab that if they do not support them, their businesses would be blown up.

After arresting the executors of the grisly Kampala attacks, security operatives are now focusing on tracking their financiers. But the government is trying to avoid giving an impression that Somalis are being witch-hunted, therefore detectives are investigating on who is being blackmailed and who is a willing financier.