SA Ambassador Barred From Bush Intruder

Jul 14, 2003

Patrick Fello Lithekol, an intruder from South Africa who was arrested and interrogated by the US security on Friday, was yesterday handed over to the International Security Organisation (ISO).

By Emmy Allio
Patrick Fello Lithekol, an intruder from South Africa who was arrested and interrogated by the US security on Friday, was yesterday handed over to the International Security Organisation (ISO).

The South African ambassador to Uganda, Vilakazi Bavumile, says he has been denied access to him. Lethol flew to Uganda on the press plane accompanying US president, George W. Bush and was arrested in the compound where Bush met President Yoweri Museveni.

The SA envoy said, “If it is true that the man is a South African citizen then I have the right of access to him.” He said he had complained in vain to Ministry of Foreign Affairs about the issue.

But the Second Deputy Prime minister, who is also the minister of foreign affairs, James Wapakhabulo, said the citizenship of the man was yet to be established.

He said his permanent secretary, Bakayana Kityo, was co-ordinating with security agencies to brief the envoy on whether the intruder was a South African citizen. “What disturbs us is how this man could escape the scrutiny of the security agencies in South Africa when Bush’s plane and his entourage took off from a highly guarded military base,” a source said.

Police spokesman Asumani Mugenyi told AFP that Lithekol who posed as a journalist covering Bush’s Africa tour, was evasive as interrogators tried to dig information from him. One of the policemen who questioned him said it took two hours to extract a name from him and was not even sure whether this was his real name.

South Africa’s Star newspaper yesterday reported that a reporter from the American Urban Radio network, April Ryan, said she met the man on Friday at the hotel used by the press in Pretoria but had lost track of him until she saw security officers at the Ugandan complex drag him away. In South Africa, police spokesman Senior Superintendent Selby Bokaba blamed the security lapse on the US. US Secret Service agents searched the plane after the intruder was detained and removed from the compound where the two presidents met.
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