Why Omusinga's Buhikira Palace was raided

After weeks of sporadic clashes between Uganda’s security forces and Rwenzururu militants, the violence escalated on November 26, 2016 when a combined police and army force attacked Buhikira Palace, killing eight royal guards.

Government said the assault was part of an operation to neutralise militants who were attacking police posts in Kasese two weeks earlier, with the collusion of royal guards. 

The following day, on November 27, soldiers raided the palace after the expiration of an ultimatum issued by the government for the militants to surrender, resulting in the deaths of more than 100 people, including 16 policemen. Omusinga Charles Wesley Mumbere was violently arrested, frog-marched out of the palace ruins and airlifted to Jinja in eastern Uganda where he was dumped in the notorious Nalufenya police detention facility. 

Shortly thereafter, more than 200 royal guards who had been rounded up during the palace attack were also brought to Jinja.
On November 30, the guards and King Mumbere were arraigned in Jinja Magistrates Court. Upon securing bail, the king’s movements were restricted to Kampala, Wakiso and Jinja districts.

Under the charge of treason, prosecution claimed the Omusinga and group, between March 2016 and November 2016, at diverse places within Kabarole and Kasese districts, contrived a plot to overthrow the government of Uganda as by law established by force of arms. They were accused of expressing that plot through utterances and overt acts such as attacks on police outposts; killing of several police officers and robbing them of arms and ammunitions; recruitment of individuals to join in an armed insurrection, among others.

READ: Kasese attacks: Government rejects plans to bury victims in mass graves
Under the charge of terrorism, the prosecution said that, with intent to intimidate the public, the group murdered and attempted to murder police and military personnel and civilians.

At a political level, these allegations were attributed to the kingdom’s alleged, unforgotten aspirations to re-create the so-called Yiira Republic using Rwenzururu militants. Rwenzururu kingdom which straddles the Uganda and DRC border is a monarchy that started out as a separatist movement when the Bakonzo people declared their own kingdom in 1962. The declaration led to years of bloody conflicts with the central government until a settlement was reached in 1982. 

The Rwenzururu movement laid down their arms in return for a degree of local autonomy. President Museveni officially recognised the kingdom in 2009. However, unrest continued to simmer as many in the region still feel marginalised. It is partly against that background that some in Uganda, with the support of their ethnic kinsmen in the Congo, agitated for the ‘Yiira Republic’, a self-governing enclave which would cover territory in southwestern Uganda and part of North Kivu in the DRC.
Omusinga Mumbere has, however, since distanced himself from this agitation and renounced armed rebellion.

Compiled by Jerome Kule Bistwande, Alex Ashaba & Moureen Biira, Yoweri Kaguta