Kusasira, Namubiru's manager under probe

By Isaac Baligema                                      

Local musician Catherine Kusasira of Eagles Production and singer Iryn Namubiru’s manager Thadeus Mubiru are under investigation over drug trafficking queries, according to the director of Interpol in Uganda Asan Kasingye.

Kusasira, who was contacted by Japan-based promoter Kim Tumwesigye to perform last December, publicly declared that she ‘unknowingly carried drugs’ to him.

Hers was the same experience Namubiru faced recently, which saw her being incarcerated in Japan and later released by court.

And it was the same promoter – Tumwesigye – that was involved in the two circumstances.

Tumwesigye had contacted Namubiru for a performance in Tokyo, Japan before she was nabbed by Japanese police over possession of drugs upon her arrival at Narita International Airport.

“Kim asked me to take the same stuff and I believe I carried drugs to him! Why does he keep on asking the same things?” Kusasira said on the day Namubiru arrived from Japan.

And Interpol is not taking her words any lightly.

The security body has launched an investigation involving Kusasira and Namubiru’s manager in a bid to seek unanswered questions.

The probe is a development to Namubiru’s statement on Sunday that her manager was aware of the presence of the drugs before he delivered the parcel to her.

Interpol Boss Asan Kasingye, Iryn Namubiru (and fellow artist Dr. Hilderman) addressed the press shortly after her interrogation by Interpol in Kampala. PHOTO/Abou Kisige

And Mubiru also confessed that he ‘held some vital’ information. That’s why he is under investigation.

“Yes, both Kusasira and Mubiru are under investigation and we are interested in knowing what they know about this matter” said Interpol Uganda director Asan Kasingye.

He further vowed that the culprits involved will be brought to book and their system be destroyed.

Kasingye said that if Japanese authorities want Tumwesigye, they will hand him over to them but he maintained that they cannot hurry to make any arrests before they reach to the bottom of the matter.

“The public should be patient because the investigations are ongoing,” he said.

“We have not been contacted by Japanese authorities to arrest Kim [Tumwesigye] but if they need him, we shall get him.”

Efforts to reach the implicated promoter were futile as his known phone number was off by press time.

But on Monday this week, he maintained that he is innocent and that no-one is looking for him here in Uganda or in Japan.

“I am a businessman, I came back here to receive my cars and boats and I will go back to Japan to join my family,” he pointed out.

“Nobody is looking for me here or in Japan. Iryn and Mubiru know better where they got the drugs from,” said Tumwesigye, who is married to a Japanese woman with whom they two children together.