On May 15, an explosive leak brought to the fore script details of a letter written by Sam Kutesa, the Foreign Affairs minister, authorizing three individuals to fly into the country, defying a presidential ban on passenger flights into Entebbe international airport imposed since March 21.
The leak, which went viral on social media, set off a huge public uproar over what many people perceived as selective application of the presidential lockdown restrictions yet hundreds of Ugandans were still stranded in Ethiopia at the time.
Now, the Minister has been dragged to court by a city lawyer Leonard Otee, seeking to be privately prosecuted for his actions.
Kutesa has been sued alongside the three members including Barbara Kavuya the wife, his daughter Blanche Kavuya and grandson Isiah Tiba Byabashaija who were allowed to return back to the country.
The petitioner says this was in breach of a Presidential directive that bars people from flying into and out of the country during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic while other Ugandans abroad including medical students in Wuhan were denied the same privilege.
Otee who hails from Soroti has also requested the Buganda road magistrates court to draft a Charge Sheet for the four persons.
In his documents filed before court, Otee states that on March 24th 2020 the minister of health using the public health act passed an order into law prohibiting any person from entering Uganda effect from Monday March 23rd to April 23rd which was later extended and remains into effect up to date as measures to contain the virus.
“I verily believe that entering the country in the manner aforesaid, the aforesaid persons committed a criminal offence contrary to S: 2 of S.1 No. 53/2020,” Otee says in his complaint.
The lawyer however notes that on May 18th, the said persons entered Uganda and continue to stay in Uganda and as a result committed a criminal offense together with minister Sam Kutesa who authorised their return.
He says that the actions of minister Sam Kutesa to allow only that family to return home was discriminative in nature since other Ugandans who wanted to return were not given permission or those who wanted to leave.
THE PLOT
Corroborating accounts from different sources at the ministry of Foreign Affairs and State House suggest that in the first week of May, Kutesa led a team of top businessmen and powerbrokers within NRM to State House where they tabled a list of their loved ones who needed to return home.
The team, sources say, pleaded with President Museveni to give his nod of approval for the repatriation of their family members and friends into the country.
However, the president reportedly rejected the request, insisting that allowing a select privileged group to return home would diminish his public image since he had ordered that all Ugandans abroad should stay put wherever they were until the Covid-19 situation stabilizes.
The team is said to have left State House quite dejected. It is at this point that Kavuya, who had already flown his family members from Florida, USA, to Addis Ababa en route to Entebbe, decided to go for a covert approach.
He pleaded with minister Kutesa to ditch the bureaucratic protocol rulebook and directly inform the Ethiopian Airlines management to allow his family fly back home.
Kutesa’s authorization letter was to go through specific trusted hands to ensure extreme secrecy in the handling of the matter. This plot, according to sources, was specifically to be known by just a handful of people to avoid a leak and uproar, especially in Addis where several Ugandans were stranded.
“Can you imagine Maj Gen Francis Okello of the African Union Commission is in bad health and wants to return but has not been granted an opportunity?” said a source in Uganda’s embassy in Addis.
“Even top IGAD officials like Joseph Rwanshote [the program manager trade, industry, and tourism] remains stranded.”
Sources at the ministry of Foreign Affairs claim Mugoya was not aware of the developments and only got to learn about the letter in the media.
“He was shocked like everyone when the letter surfaced because it [letter] did not reach his desk,” a source said.
Incidentally, Mugoya’s sister, Sarah, a diabetic, died of Covid-19-related complications in April while in the UK and this source claims the permanent secretary had earlier tried to get his ailing sister Sarah back home but failed.
