‘Busia Smuggler Led Armed Gang’

By Hamis KaheruGODFREY Ngolobe alias Bebe, a Busia cigarette smuggler, who was shot dead last week, was a leader of an armed gang, Special Revenue Protection Services (SRPS) said yesterday.“Bebe was wanted to answer several charges.His gang is armed and we have reported this many times. We have recovered two guns, one from Iganga and another from Mbale, from the group,” SRPS spokesman Lt. Barigye Ba-Hoku said in a statement. Ba-Hoku said SRPS shot at Bebe’s vehicle which had ignored a revenue checkpoint because past experiences had shown most smugglers to be armed. “This was not the first time that Bebe was overrunning our check point. About three weeks earlier, he overran our checkpoint at Namagunga. Several other times he had done the same,” he said.Barigye criticised The Monitor for “promoting and glorifying Bebe as a hero” and portraying SRPS as blood-thirsty bandits in its editorial.Ends