The Minister of Defence and Veteran Affairs, Vincent Bamulangaki Ssempijja has presented a statement on the suspected Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) attack in Kasese that has prompted MPs to raise pertinent questions.
The attack on Lhubiriha Mpondwe secondary school also known as Peter Hunter SS Nyabigando School left 42 people dead including, 37 students, a security guard, and 4 other civilians.
In his statement presented before plenary this afternoon, Minister Ssempijja labelled the ADF rebels as a weak force that carries out such heinous acts as a diversion strategy to detract the Uganda People’s Defence Force (UPDF) from attacking them in Congo and to also show the world that they still exist.
He also says the attack was well planned out as each of the about 10 terrorists entered the country individually and not as a group.
Ssempijja however said investigations are ongoing to establish and get answers as to why they were not seen by both citizens and security and why there was no identification or suspicion of new/strange faces.
However, a number of MPs from Kasese including Florence Kabugho, the Kasese woman MP accused the minister of telling lies and demanded to know where the security officers were at the time the school was attacked.
“Minister, I respect you so much but the report you have just presented has made me feel like; what is this? We don’t need to cover these issues, if you really love your country you need to talk the truth so that your juniors can learn that they have been sleeping on duty. You just said that you cannot allow the enemy to cross the border, how did the enemy cross?” Kabugho asked.
Ferigo Kambale, the Kasese municipality MP, has equally demanded for more UPDF deployment in the district.
“A Major General who is commanding our forces in Congo informed us that they heard about the attack when they were in Congo, they attempted to come back to rescue our people but the Congo border could not allow them to cross to Uganda quickly to rescue our people. The Major General confessed that. It took over an hour when our students are being killed. Rt. Hon. Speaker, it is my request that UPDF considers serious deployment on ground,” Kambale said.
In his response, Ssempija said “In this case of Kasese, the information was late, inaccurate and the small group was able to infiltrate with the assistance of some collaborators. That is why some of them have already been arrested to help in investigations,”
