|
|
Uganda: Gadaffi, Museveni's Endless Guard Fights
 |
 |
|||||||||
|
||||||||||
|
|
|||||||||
|
||||||||||
The Monitor (Kampala)
21 March 2008
Posted to the web 21 March 2008
Rodney Muhumuza and Grace Matsiko
Kampala
THE Presidential Guard Brigade and Col. Muammar Gadaffi's security detail were involved in a string of supremacy clashes during every public event that the Libyan leader attended, it can now be revealed.
During the clashes, security officials on both sides just fell short of pulling guns on each other, but both presidents seemed to be aware of the goings-on between their security outfits.
Matters came to a head when, during the opening of the Gadaffi National Mosque on Wednesday, President Museveni was pinned against the wall as his men fought with the Libyans to control an entrance to the mosque.
For about two minutes, a shocked Mr Museveni looked on as the security officers exchanged blows and threw each other to the ground.
The ensuing melee caught some reporters and diplomats, and for a moment it was difficult to tell who was in charge.
Mr Museveni managed to enter, but it was minutes after Col. Gadaffi had made his entry.
Earlier, at Nakivubo War Memorial Stadium, where Col. Gadaffi was a chief celebrant at a function to commemorate the birth of Prophet Muhammad, his security detail and the PGB fought to determine who got close to the presidents.
The Ugandans and the Libyans disagreed on risk-assessment and type of guns to be carried, according to a PGB officer who was involved in the scuffles. The officer, who did not want to be named because of the sensitivity of his job, said the Libyans were control freaks.
At the stadium, as at the mosque, the Ugandans appeared to get the better of the Libyans, who spoke in Arabic and often used sign language to communicate.
Security and protocol officers, speaking on condition of anonymity because they are not authorised to talk to journalists, said Col. Gadaffi came with close to 200 security guards, most of them armed. From Sunday afternoon, when Col. Gadaffi arrived, there were early signs of the scuffles to come when PGB officers stopped some travelling Libyans from entering State House, causing a stampede at the entrance.
That stampede was to be replicated in at least three other places, often in full view of photographers desperate to take snap shots of the presidents.
PGB spokesman Edison Kwesiga said there was no fallout from the clashes, but failed to explain why Col. Gadaffi failed to attend the proposed unveiling of a war monument in Katonga, a ceremony that President Museveni had hoped his Libyan counterpart would honour.
Col. Gadaffi left on Thursday morning, around the time he had been expected to be at the Katonga event, prematurely ending a visit that most Ugandans will remember for the traffic disruption and the resultant jams.
News of Col. Gadaffi's departure was broken to ministers and senior army officers who had already converged in Mpigi to attend the event, district officials said.
Col. Gadaffi, who in the past travelled with an all-female security guards called the Amazonian Guard, was in Uganda to close the Afro-Arab Youth Festival and open the Gadaffi National Mosque, his gift to the Muslims of Uganda.
But his men, who always surrounded him as human shields whenever he was in public view, were apparently untrusting of the PGB, and the attendant uneasiness often gave way to clashes.
Officials on both sides disagreed on who was supposed to stand at the podiums where the heads of state were speaking, or who should stand behind which president.
"The Libyans are sensitive about their president's security, and it has been like that since Sunday [March 16] when they arrived," said one protocol officer.
In some cases, as the Libyan officers struggled to take control of security during events, blows were almost exchanged as PGB officers shouted on top of their voices that the Libyans should back off.
|
The Libyans, though they spoke some English, preferred to reply in Arabic, deliberately confusing the Ugandans. To avoid a confrontation, it was agreed that the Ugandans and the Libyans deploy their security in equal numbers around their presidents. But that was before the mosque melee.
And there was more drama to come when, after opening the mosque, Col. Gadaffi travelled in one of the heavy duty Land Cruisers instead of his green limousine.
Six of his guards, acting as human shields, jumped on the Land Cruiser's windows to block hundreds of people from having a clear view of the Libyan leader as his convoy left the complex.
|
If it was that simple the rest of Africa would be getting oil at a discount from their oil rich brethren instead of Mosques. Who eats a Mosque? Besides Asian countries have done better than the OPEC countries despite having no oil. This has always been about manipulation of "the poor." What is more at stake here is that Africa's soul; certainly more important than the fleeting prices of oil. What is even truer is that oil has run its course to the dusk of history that is why the oil barrons have a bleaker future. Only fools keep... [Read Full Text]
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Make allAfrica.com your home page | RSS Feed | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Top | Site Guide | Who We Are | Advertising | Search | Subscribe | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Questions or Comments? Contact us. Read our Privacy Statement. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
