'UPDF not exploiting Congo'
Nov 11, 2000
THE Army Commander, Maj. Gen. Jeje Odongo, has denied allegations of the UPDF's involvement in illegal exploitation of natural resources and other forms of wealth from the Democratic Republic of Congo.
By Richard Mutumba
THE Army Commander, Maj. Gen. Jeje Odongo, has denied allegations of the UPDF's involvement in illegal exploitation of natural resources and other forms of wealth from the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Odongo made the denial yesterday during a meeting with a delegation of United Nations experts probing the exploitation of natural resources from the DRC.
The experts, led by Ms. Safiatou Ba-N'Daw, are on a fact-finding mission. They will also travel to Rwanda.
The meeting was also attended by the Minister of State for Defence, Steven Kavuma, and other defence and foreign ministry officials.
Other members of the UN team included Mr. Francois Ekoko, Maustapha Tall and Mathew Conway.
Odongo told the UN experts that Uganda was only in the Congo for security reasons.
During the UN panel's meeting with the parliamentary committee on presidential and foreign affairs, chaired by Johnson Toskin Bartile (Kongasis), the MPs said there was no official policy to allow Ugandans to go to DRC and exploit natural resources.
"The only resources we are aware of are the wives of the soldiers and for whom we hear that dowry was paid by the respective officers and men. Even the wives in question followed the soldiers long after," Reagan Okumu(Aswa) said.
The MPs, who included Gerald Obedmoth-Ofungi (Youth), Paul Etyang (Tororo), John Eresu (Kaberamaido) and Okumu said Parliament was looking forward to the speedy implementation of the Lusaka accord so that Uganda's forces are withdrawn from the DRC.
They said Uganda's economy was in a bad shape because of the war in the Congo.
Ends.