LRA denies deputy chief Otti is dead
Oct 31, 2007
VINCENT Otti, the deputy leader of the LRA, is down with cholera and seriously ill, according to Yusuf Adek, a member of the LRA team.
By Chris Ocowun and Charles Ariko
VINCENT Otti, the deputy leader of the LRA, is down with cholera and seriously ill, according to Yusuf Adek, a member of the LRA team.
“Otti is badly off to the extent that he can not talk and his satellite phone has been taken away from him,†Adek said on Radio Mega FM in Gulu on Tuesday night.
He added that cholera had already killed two people in the LRA camp and affected 70 others, among them a major.
Adek, who just returned from Ri-Kwangba assembly point in South Sudan, was reacting to persistent reports in and around Gulu that the LRA’s second-in-command is dead.
Otti is said to have either been executed or put under house arrest after falling out with his boss, Joseph Kony, over the peace process and the funds for the consultation.
The LRA peace team has vehemently denied there is any disagreement between Kony and his deputy.
But Opiyo Makasi, the LRA operations commander who escaped from their camp in eastern Congo on October 2, confirmed there was a split within the LRA top leadership. “There is a big rift between the LRA leaders,†Makasi said during a brief press conference upon his arrival at Entebbe airport last night.
“It has been going on for one-and-a-half years and it had spread to the other senior commanders.â€
Otti has not been heard of or seen for several weeks. People close to him, whom he used to call almost daily for the last two years, have not been able to establish contact with him for the last three weeks.
When The New Vision tried calling his satellite number last night, a voice in English, Arabic and French said the phone was not in use.
Neither the UN special envoy, Joachim Chissano, nor the LRA peace team could see Otti during their visit to Ri-Kwangba last week.
“He was sick. We did not see him,†Santa Okot, who was part of the visiting LRA team, told The New Vision. “Those with dysentery had been isolated and taken to a separate location.â€
She, too, dismissed reports that Otti was dead. “These are complete rumours. I don’t know anything,†she said, adding that her team had taken medicines to Ri-Kwangba. Appeals by Gulu Mega FM radio, where Otti was a regular caller, to have his voice recorded in order to dispel the rumours, have been futile.
Other sources said Otti was being treated in a hospital in Khartoum but this could not be confirmed by press time.
Kony has a record of killing commanders who disagree with him.
In December 1999, he had his army commander, Otti Lagony, killed. He accused him of plotting to escape.
In 2003, he ordered the execution of James Opoka, a former aide to FDC leader Kizza Besigye, whom he suspected of trying to take over the leadership of the LRA.
VINCENT Otti, the deputy leader of the LRA, is down with cholera and seriously ill, according to Yusuf Adek, a member of the LRA team.
“Otti is badly off to the extent that he can not talk and his satellite phone has been taken away from him,†Adek said on Radio Mega FM in Gulu on Tuesday night.
He added that cholera had already killed two people in the LRA camp and affected 70 others, among them a major.
Adek, who just returned from Ri-Kwangba assembly point in South Sudan, was reacting to persistent reports in and around Gulu that the LRA’s second-in-command is dead.
Otti is said to have either been executed or put under house arrest after falling out with his boss, Joseph Kony, over the peace process and the funds for the consultation.
The LRA peace team has vehemently denied there is any disagreement between Kony and his deputy.
But Opiyo Makasi, the LRA operations commander who escaped from their camp in eastern Congo on October 2, confirmed there was a split within the LRA top leadership. “There is a big rift between the LRA leaders,†Makasi said during a brief press conference upon his arrival at Entebbe airport last night.
“It has been going on for one-and-a-half years and it had spread to the other senior commanders.â€
Otti has not been heard of or seen for several weeks. People close to him, whom he used to call almost daily for the last two years, have not been able to establish contact with him for the last three weeks.
When The New Vision tried calling his satellite number last night, a voice in English, Arabic and French said the phone was not in use.
Neither the UN special envoy, Joachim Chissano, nor the LRA peace team could see Otti during their visit to Ri-Kwangba last week.
“He was sick. We did not see him,†Santa Okot, who was part of the visiting LRA team, told The New Vision. “Those with dysentery had been isolated and taken to a separate location.â€
She, too, dismissed reports that Otti was dead. “These are complete rumours. I don’t know anything,†she said, adding that her team had taken medicines to Ri-Kwangba. Appeals by Gulu Mega FM radio, where Otti was a regular caller, to have his voice recorded in order to dispel the rumours, have been futile.
Other sources said Otti was being treated in a hospital in Khartoum but this could not be confirmed by press time.
Kony has a record of killing commanders who disagree with him.
In December 1999, he had his army commander, Otti Lagony, killed. He accused him of plotting to escape.
In 2003, he ordered the execution of James Opoka, a former aide to FDC leader Kizza Besigye, whom he suspected of trying to take over the leadership of the LRA.