FDC secret files stolen

By Jude Etyang and Adam Alagiah

FDC is in shock from the alleged theft of confidential documents carrying minutes of the party’s secret meeting.

The documents of the National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting, on a flash disk, two digital recorders and a cheque book were stolen from office administrator Louis Otika’s car in Ntinda.

Vice-president Salaamu Musumba said the theft was reported to the Police.

Musumba said they were surprised that NRM spokesperson Ofwono Opondo quoted from the documents in his column in The New Vision on June 9, and saying he was in possession of the documents.

She said the case at Kira Road Police Station is SD/20/21/05/06.

“As this matter was being investigated, Ofwono Opondo confessed to being in possession of the stolen property, he (Ofwono) has publicly availed himself as a suspect… we call on the Inspector General of Police to take action against Ofwono Opondo to recover the party’s property and restore law and order,” Musumba told a press briefing.

She was flanked by deputy spokesperson Sarah Eperu.

The alleged theft took place on May 21 at 7:00pm. Asked why Otika was moving with party confidential documents in his car, Musumba said he was going to edit the minutes from home.

Ofwono yesterday said FDC accusations were a desperate move because the leaked document had exposed their plot to frame the Government.

Hinting that NRM had infiltrated the party, Ofwono said: “I obtain information from all types of sources, professionally without breaking the law. If the NRM can convince (Eriya) Kategaya to leave FDC, why do they think we don’t have a source in there to obtain documents, or through political infiltration.”

He said, “Salaamu Musumba is a desperate woman. Louis Otika is generally lousy. He is just finding an excuse to give his bosses a credible reason for the loss of the property.”

The Divisional Police Commander Kira Road, Patrick Echegu, said Otika reported to the Police on May 21 and said someone broke into his car and took two ATM cards, four cheque books and two keys to his office.

Echegu said Otika did not report loss of a flash disk or digital recorders.

He said no statement had been written implicating Ofwono but that yesterday Otika went to the Police station with a copy of the newspaper article written by Ofwono. Otika had wanted to write a statement saying the person who stole the keys accessed his office and gave them to Ofwono but by 5:00pm, he had not reported.

Ofwono wrote in his column titled, ‘All dressed up but with nowhere to go’: “So far minutes obtained by this columnist indicate that on May 5, 2006, at their Najjanankumbi offices outside Kampala, FDC president Kizza Besigye chaired a NEC meeting in which dirty schemes were plotted.” The gist of the column was the minutes had exposed FDC’s strategy of portraying itself as an opposition party persecuted by government.

“Yet under minute 5/NEC/050506 of the same meeting, FDC laid out a disturbing scheme to discredit government institutions in an effort to turn Besigye’s rape and treason trial into an FDC group affair,” Ofwono wrote.

Musumba admits that the meeting took place but that Ofwono twisted the minutes to suit his interests. “We in FDC don’t plot, we plan. It’s the Ofwono Opondos who plot to break into people’s cars, supermarkets. Many of our documents are the target of high trade in this country.”

Ofwono’s article
The first plot was: “Launch an aggressive offensive especially on the Police and courts as being used to settle political scores. FDC must create a way of checking the Police, eg by sighting Abedo, a confessed criminal absolved by the Police, as a freeman in society.” Abedo is a prosecution witness against Besigye.

“Turn the intended evidence of Onen Kamdulu as political and debase as possible because he was never tried or given amnesty yet he has been on the LRA high command committing all sorts of inhuman atrocities, and now being protected by Police.”

Also “maintain aggressive attack on the CID director “Kutesa (Elizabeth) as having sworn an oath that she altered documents framing Dr. Besigye in the rape case to discredit her and the entire Police Force.”

FDC needs “to formulate a sustained response to Police and the whole range of activities they are carrying out such that they become issues on a weekly basis.”

“Tell the public that our lawyers, who are now full time on this apparent endless trial, may have their firms collapse or closed by Government. So far, Ali Gabe has dropped out from the team.”

Although they tried to make Gabe’s withdrawal political, it was in fact because Besigye failed to pay his fees!

“Launch an aggressive campaign to document cases of human rights abuse to win recognition and action from international bodies. FDC needs to stimulate action internally and develop programmes that systematically attack human rights violations, corruption and mismanagement, and must highlight the case of 1,000,000 people killed, and sh400b mismanaged,” the minutes stated!

Lamenting on the inadequacy of the media platform it has been enjoying, FDC said, “Communication only through the press does not go far. Write to Government and copy to international bodies and involve diplomats

Communication packaging and solution should be improved with the local press and websites to expose issues.”