Ugandan opposition politician Kizza Besigye has been brought before a mlitary court over an alleged plot to destabilise the army, APA can report from Kampala on Thursday.
Besigye who contested four presidential elections against current President Yoweri Museveni was reportedly held in neighbouring Kenya for allegedly being in possession of 2 pistols.
According to the reports he was surreptitiously handed over to the authorities in Uganda where he was spirited before a court martial at the Makindye General Court on Wednesday for an alleged plot to attack military targets in the country.
The court was under heavy guard.
According to his wife Winnie Byanyima who has dismissed the charges as nonsense and demanded his release, the 68-year-old Besigye was kidnapped while attending a book launch in Kenya.
He ended up being remanded at Luzira Prison in Uganda with alleged accomplice Hajji Lutale Kamulegeya.
Aside from alleged firarms possession, Besigye and Kamulegeya were reportedly soliciting “logistical support in Uganda, Greece and other countries with the aim of compromising the country’s national security”.
They are bieng held until December 2, 2024.
Besigye’s lawyers deny all the charges against him.
Despite unsuccessfully contesting the presidency in 2001, 2006, 2011, and 2016, Besigye has maintained interest in politics, using social media platforms to criticise the Museveni government which has been in power since 1986.
Besigye a trained doctor and soldier, was an ally of Mr Museveni during the guerilla war in Uganda of the 1980s and was the then rebel leader’s personal physician.
After the National Resistance Movement swept to power in January 1986, Besigye became Minister of State for Internal Affairs and was later appointed Minister of State in the President’s office and National Political Commissar.
He was also the chief of logistics and engineering for the Ugandan military before falling out with Museveni in 1999.
WN/as/APA