After weeks of silence, President Museveni has finally opened up on the bad relations with Rwanda, through a letter to his counterpart President Paul Kagame, denying claims that Uganda helps rebels opposed to Rwanda.

According to the letter, Museveni said he only recently came into contact with a lady Charlotte Mukankusi, who admitted to being a member of the Rwanda National Congress (RNC), an organisation that Kagame has said is hostile to Rwanda.

He says: “Mukankusi told me that he husband Rutagarama had been killed by the agents of the Rwanda state…that she had been told by those very people [who killed her husband]. I then asked her what she wanted me to do about it because it was an internal matter. She told me she wanted me to know bad things that were happening in Rwanda. She told me she had joined RNC to resist Your Excellency’s government. She wanted us to support them.”

But Museveni told her he could not support her because the African Union is against countries interfering in the affairs of other countries.

“She was disappointed with my reply and I told her that I will inform you in writing,” he writes.

In the letter, Museveni also speaks about the Rwanda businessman Tribert Rujugiro, whom Kagame accuses of financially supporting rebels. Rwanda had demanded that the businessman be repatriated to Kigali for trial.

“Mr Rujugiro..seems to be resisting the idea of selling his businesses which he had accepted to do before. He countered the idea of giving money to Kayumba [Nyamwasa] by saying that even if he sells the factories in Uganda, he still has more lucrative factories in Angola, Dr Congo..a total of eight of them. He can send money from those,” Museveni writes.

He said if Rujugiro is still a problem to Rwanda, Uganda can use courts of law to try him on charges of terrorism and then his assets can be frozen.

Stories Continues after ad

Rwandan President Paul Kagame has thrown down the gauntlet on South Africa and warned that if Pretoria does not rein in its top officials to mend relations between the two counties, there is a risk of a further fallout that could also cause political instability in the Great Lakes region.

At the centre of the dirty diplomatic tussle are several issues: South Africa giving refuge to former Rwandan army chief General Kayumba Nyamwasa and other “dissidents”; the 2013 murder of former intelligence boss Colonel Patrick Karegeya in Sandton; the expulsion of diplomats from both countries in a tit-for-tat standoff; and a South African judiciary inquest into the murder of Karegeya.

The countries also recently traded verbal blows after Rwandan Minister Olivier Nduhungirehe was accused by Pretoria of calling International Relations Minister Lindiwe Sisulu a “prostitute”, a claim strongly dismissed by Kigali as a smear.

Rwanda blames South Africa for the instability in Central and East Africa, where rebel activities are linked to Kagame’s political foes exiled in Pretoria, who were believed to come to the Great Lakes region via Uganda to recruits rebels, allegedly with the support of President Yoweri Museveni’s government.

So tense are relations between the two East African neighbours that there was even talk of war and closing borders, which would cause further instability in the region.

But Kigali is adamant the genesis of the problem is in South Africa, recently voted into the UN Security Council as a non-permanent member and the only African country there.

Speaking in an exclusive interview with The Star in Kigali, a frustrated Kagame said although he seemed to enjoy cordial relations with President Cyril Ramaphosa, it appeared that top South African officials were using their control and influence in government systems to block efforts to fix the broken relations between the two countries.

The two leaders have met on the sidelines of events such as the AU summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and the BRICS gathering in South Africa last year, where Kagame represented the AU as its then chairperson. They agreed to work together to fix the worsening relations.

The two also met in Cape Town two weeks ago, where Kagame was a guest at the Young Presidents Organisation’s event for young global chief executives, thought leaders and opinion makers.

But almost a year after they first agreed to address the fallout over South Africa’s 2010 decision to stop issuing visas to Rwandans on ordinary passports, nothing has been done, confirming Kagame’s fears that the South African system was frustrating the heads of state’s efforts to better relations between the countries, which both turn 25 next month.

“We don’t deny South Africans visas to travel to our country, but the reverse to South Africa is not the same,” Kagame told The Star. “These matters have come up and the president (Ramaphosa) was very open about it; it was public, he gave instructions. (But) nothing happened in the opposite direction somebody somewhere blocks it and doesn’t want it to happen.”

Kigali strongly believed the visa issue was used to punish Rwanda for its desire to see suspected dissidents brought home to face trial for alleged terrorist activities.

Kagame said South Africa chose his exiled opponents over a better relationship with Rwanda. “Those individuals who live in South Africa, if you trace back how they came there, there is something wrong with what they were involved in. Under normal circumstances they wouldn’t be welcome in South Africa, let alone be preferred in terms of relationship,” said Kagame.

“So here there’s a bizarre situation. Someone in the government of South Africa would rather associate with those bad groups living in South Africa who have a bad history and have done terrible things which they should be held accountable for.

“They prefer that, and use their authority to even go further to try to create problems for us.”

What has angered Kigali in the latest diplomatic skirmish was a press conference where Sisulu was asked a question by a journalist on whether the “dissidents” were willing to come home and negotiate with Kagame.

“You saw authorities of government saying they have met with those groups and that they are inclined to negotiate; they want to talk to us, coming out of nowhere. That was absolutely bizarre. If anyone finds that normal, I would be surprised,” said Kagame.

He added that South Africa had not spoken to Rwanda about meeting them and the alleged bid to negotiate with Kigali until they saw it at the media briefing.

“When we saw it, we were taken aback. And of course, at the same time, these individuals were busy in the media, making all sorts of statements.

“It is as if they are energised by statements made by officials of the South African government. They are really hyped up.

“And so I don’t know where that leads us. But we are patient enough. We have been trained by our history and our problems to be very patient, almost inexhaustibly patient, so that we don’t get diverted from doing what we want to do for ourselves and our country, and move on.”

But Kagame felt that South Africa had not shown a keen interest in patching things up and that the attitude towards Kigali, especially coming from another liberation movement and with both countries sharing a history of a painful past, showed contempt for Rwanda.

“We remain steadfast and calm and appreciative of what a good relationship should entail, and embrace it. The door is open when South Africa finds it more appealing to deal with us than with those groups.”

Stories Continues after ad

Rwanda continues to be desperate as Uganda continues to keep businessman Tribert Rujugiro Ayabatwa in the country as he does his business.

The government through the RPF owned paper The New Times online version claims the businessman is a fugitive even though it presents no evidence to that claim.

The regime in Kigali says Rujugiro Ayabatwa is involved with ‘a group’ that has declared war on Rwanda’s legitimate government and to tarnish the leadership of Rwanda in a string of unchallenged claims and allegations.

The regime seem not to be happy with Sunday Vision of March 17, for running the businessman’s interview. “In a question and answer newspaper interview, normally the journalist interjects with probing, insightful, researched questions as a check against a subject using a newspaper – or magazine, or other news medium – as a platform to air their misinformation,” says Grace Kamugisha who wrote what seems to be a paid-up article and yet claims Sunday Vision’s article was paid for and planted by Ugandan state actors.

“The man merely says everything that serves him (and his partners in the highest levels of the Ugandan government) to misinform the public about the true nature of his; and by extension his Kampala partners’, problems with Kigali. We shall come to that. A good interview strives to show there are two sides to a story. In this one the Sunday Vision has thrown balance completely out the window,” he cries.

The writer who seem to be writing on behalf of the Rwandan government seem to have other reasons why Rujugiro left Rwanda other than on principle and mistreatment where government took over his commercial properties and the like.

“The facts are that Rujugiro left Rwanda because his business practices – the ones that have made him successful in a number of African countries including Uganda where he has a tobacco processing plant in Arua – were completely incompatible with Kigali’s anti-corruption and graft-intolerant ethic in running its state affairs,” he says.

The record shows that wherever Rujugiro has worked and his businesses succeeded, those countries are characterized by high levels of graft. It is the kind of countries that regularly score poorly on Transparency International indices, he alleges.

He alleges Rujugiro left Rwanda in 2010 after repeated issues with the administration because of his ‘shady business practices’. “He did not like to pay taxes. He expected that because he had contributed to the liberation struggle he would be exempted from paying taxes. When that did not happen he became very unhappy,” he says.

The website says he would constantly offer kickbacks to policy makers to exempt him from the rules of doing business that applied to all other businessmen and women. “He found out that graft like that had no place in Rwanda,” he says.

“Rujugiro’s methods had worked well in Burundi – where he cut his teeth in the business world – and other places like Uganda where stories of monstrous scams have dogged Museveni’s rule from day one,” he alleges.

He alleges that as a smuggler of cigarettes in Bujumbura, and then rose during the administration of Jean Baptiste Bagaza from the mid-1970s to late 80s. Rujugiro corrupted a number of officials to, among other things, avoid taxes and kill competition. “When Pierre Buyoya took power, he locked the Rwandan up for three years in Bujumbura central jail for the offences,” he says.

He says another country where Rujugiro’s corrupt practices landed him into big trouble was South Africa. In November 2006 South African Revenue Services (SARS) officials barricaded his cigarette manufacturing company in Wilsonia, Eastern Cape amid a 57 million Rand fraud case against Tribert Rujugiro Ayabatwa and his senior employees, he says.

News reports said agents of SARS swooped on the premises of the company, Mastermind Tobacco Company, sealing all its entrances.

Rujugiro, knowing SARS was on his case for his fraudulent activities had already fled SA, and couldn’t go back there. He was in Rwanda at the time. Reports are that President Kagame repeatedly advised him to clear his issues with South Africa and “to not tarnish Rwanda’s good name like that”.

He alleges that on October 13, 2008 London Police (Scotland Yard) arrested the Rwandan businessman at Heathrow Airport. “They acted on an Interpol red notice following an international arrest warrant put out by South Africa,” he alleges.

Scotland Yard would release Rujugiro – with a leg bracelet to monitor his movements – after he agreed to pay the South African taxman US$ 7.I million in arrears.

“But journalism was not the aim of the paper’s interview. The politics of Kampala’s antagonism against Rwanda was the aim,” he cries.

He alleges Rujugiro left Rwanda in 2010 with a vengeful heart, to fund dissidents fighting Rwanda including Kayumba Nyamwasa, boss of RNC – the rebel group that’s facilitated by President Museveni in plots to bring war back to Rwanda.

He alleges part of Rujugiro’s anti-Rwanda efforts is to finance RNC misinformation, such as paying one David Himbara, the rebel group’s chief propagandist that’s based in Canada. It is a matter of record that in September 2017 for instance, Rujugiro through Himbara paid the Washington DC lobby firm Podesta Inc US$ 440,000.

According to the writer, the aim was to buy access to the US Congress, for Himbara to level allegations of a nature to smear and tarnish Rwanda. In the interview, Rujugiro claims, “if he funded rebels against Rwanda, it would fall in six months. But his payments to Himbara, and to US lobbyist firms show he indeed is funding RNC.

The writer alleges Rujugiro, “channels through Himbara ample sums of money to go into RNC operations. “This renders his claim – that if he funded RNC the government of Rwanda would fall in six months,” he says adding that that was an idle boast.

He alleges Rujugiro’s tobacco company in Arua is not benefitting Ugandans. “A Kigali-based observer, speaking anonymously, comments that he would advise Ugandan lawmakers to immediately investigate that company, Meridian Tobacco Company, to ascertain whether it really is paying its tax obligations to Ugandans,” he alleges

Enter Gen. Saleh

The writer accuses Gen. Salim Saleh, President Museveni’s brother, as being a shareholder, with a fifteen percent stake in Rujugiro’s company. “Meridian Tobacco’s documents at the Uganda registry of companies show that. “The fact Saleh is involved already is a glaring red flag that this is a fraudulent company!” the analyst commented,” he alleges.

He alleges that Saleh has been involved in “hundreds of crooked activities he has perpetrated, or participated in down the decades his brother has been in power. It should also be noted that in all Saleh’s crooked activities, he has done everything on behalf of Museveni. “The hand of Museveni is never absent in Saleh’s activities,” he alleges.

“Rujugiro’s interview is peppered throughout with personal attacks on President Kagame. It however is a new kind of low for the Ugandan paper to allow Rujugiro drag the President’s family into a polemic they have nothing to do with,” he said.

“All that cannot obscure the fact Rujugiro is in partnership with the Ugandan authorities in the mutual goal to destabilize Rwanda. It also cannot take away the fact a renowned fraudster – that happens to be the chief financier of one of the main terrorist groups against Rwanda – is running a firm that only is a front for that group, with the partnership of Ugandan government officials,” he alleges.
Eagle Online couldn’t a comment from Gen. Saleh on the above allegations as he didn’t answer his mobile phone.

Uganda has denied accusations that it is hosting elements that want to destabilize Rwanda.

Stories Continues after ad

Minister of Energy and Mineral Development, Eng. Irene Muloni, is on Thursday expected to commission Isimba Hydro Power project.

The construction of the 183 megawatts project was launched in 2013, with the construction works beginning in 2015. The contractors, China Water and Electrical Company Limited are finalizing the construction process with the dam built and the generating equipment installed.

The Isimba Hydro Power project cost US$567 million with 85 percent funding from the Chinese government and 15 percent from Government of Uganda. The 47 months project period ends on 31 March 2019 and it will be inter-connected to the Bujagali power dam 42 km away in Jinja.

According to a statement released by the Chairperson of the Steering Committee of Isimba Hydro Power, Eng. Badru Kiggundu, the operational handover will take place at Uganda Electricity Generational Company Limited and there will be a defect liability period of two years within which if anything develops, it will be the responsibility of the contractor to rectify.

“During the defect liability period of two years, the contractor, China Water and Electrical Company Limited will construction a bridge across the river linking Kayunga to Kamuli Districts,” said Kiggundu

He said that the bridge will be in two spans; one from Kayunga to Kuva Island and the other from Kuva Island to Kamuli side. These are realistic developments and as a country, this is one of the flagship projects followed by the bigger brother Karuma.

“The project has been realized due to the good bilateral relations between Ugandan and Chinese presidents and said Ugandans should be proud of the project. Let us take advantage of the power that will be poured on the grid not just to light our homes but to establish factories; they don’t have to be very big so that we can realize some revenue out of this added power,” he said.

Stories Continues after ad