{Hours into his temporary freedom Opposition leader, Dr Kizza Besigye remained defiant urging his supporters not to give up the fight for a better Uganda.}<\/p>\n
Hours into his temporary freedom Opposition leader, Dr Kizza Besigye remained defiant and urged his supporters, who turned up at his Kasangati home, not to give up the fight for a better Uganda.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are fighting to put our country in our own hands. Until we achieve that, there is no turning back. If they think that putting us in prison will demoralise us, then they are wrong,\u201d Dr Besigye told a crowd of about 200 people who managed to beat the police siege outside his farm and accessed his home.<\/p>\n
Dr Besigye who had been on remand since May on treason charges assured his supporters that they were not breaking any law in defying a \u201cdictatorship\u201d. He instead blamed a section of \u201ccriminals\u201d within the Police Force for slapping trumped up charges against him.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt hurts that police has been infiltrated by criminals but these are just a few individuals. Most of those in police are not criminals but there is a group of kifeesi who have tarnished the image of the Force. They are led by Mr Kale Kayihura (IGP) and his colleagues,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Urges police to be strong
\nDr Besigye urged police officers and members of other state security organs \u201cwho want our country to go forward and who overwhelmingly voted for us\u201d to be strong.<\/p>\n
Musician Robert Kyagulanyi aka Bobi Wine equated Dr Besigye to South African anti-apartheid revolutionary and former president Nelson Mandela.
\n\u201cWe the youth are very lucky. We used to just read about freedom fighters such as Nelson Mandela but we have had an opportunity not to just see you but also learn from you,\u201d Bobi Wine said.<\/p>\n
This singer also unveiled another artiste Ronald Mayinja who he said had joined the \u201cstruggle\u201d. Mr Mayinja was one of the artistes in President Museveni\u2019s 2016 election theme song Tubonga Naawe. However, both artistes are known for releasing songs laden with political overtones.<\/p>\n
He said he had been overwhelmed by Dr Besigye\u2019s resoluteness. \u201cIn school, I studied about Nelson Mandela but very few times did I read about him having food in a hotel, most of the times I heard about him, he was incarcerated in prison but in the end he won,\u201d Mr Mayinja said.<\/p>\n
The journey
\nImmediately after leaving the court premises, Dr Besigye defied the heavy police and military presence and stood through the open-roof compartment of his car waving to his supporters that had been blocked along roads such as Kampala Road, Lumumba Avenue and Nakasero Road.<\/p>\n
He then proceeded to Ternan Avenue past the entrance to State House Nakasero connected to Yusuf Lule and then Gayaza Road.
\nPolice was compelled to fight off his supporters\u2019 procession which kept growing by the minute.<\/p>\n
Police commanded by Geoffrey Kaheebwa, the deputy RPC Kampala South, would occasionally block the road to stop Dr Besigye\u2019s supporters who were mainly running along or riding on boda-boda motorcycles.<\/p>\n
Stick wielding uniformed police officers and operatives would occasionally beat them in an attempt to disperse them. Journalists, too, were not spared.
\nAt the dusty road heading to Dr Besigye\u2019s home, Police again blocked people and mounted a road block on the main entrance to his farm.<\/p>\n
This, however, did not deter some of the determined supporters. They used short cuts to access the home where they sang, danced and chanted slogans in praise of Dr Besigye. One group even played football in his compound, saying they feel free \u201cwhen we are in State House with our president\u201d.<\/p>\n
{{Police say}}<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t want to make a big elephant out of his opinion.That is his opinion, and he is entitled to it. We don\u2019t find insult in what he says because we are doing our job. We hope he will abide by the regulations of his bail, that will make our work very easy,\u201d Polly Namaye, Police Deputy Spokesperson.\u2019<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
{Hours into his temporary freedom Opposition leader, Dr Kizza Besigye remained defiant urging his supporters not to give up the fight for a better Uganda.} Hours into his temporary freedom Opposition leader, Dr Kizza Besigye remained defiant and urged his supporters, who turned up at his Kasangati home, not to give up the fight for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[99],"byline":[2481],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-26850","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics-48","tag-greatlakesnews","byline-daily-monitor"],"bylines":[{"id":2481,"name":"DAILY MONITOR","slug":"daily-monitor","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"contributors":[{"id":2481,"name":"DAILY MONITOR","slug":"daily-monitor","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26850","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26850"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26850\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26850"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26850"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26850"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=26850"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=26850"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}