What do we know about the Ugandan opposition leader’s arrest?

The mysterious arrest of Ugandan opposition leader Kizza Besigye during a visit to Kenya nearly two weeks ago has sparked widespread condemnation and fears of intelligence sharing between the two neighbors.

Besigye’s allies and wife have come out to reveal horrifying details of how the opposition leader was lured to meet his kidnappers, who were said to be disguised as Kenyan security agents.

Reports say he was spied on from the time he boarded a flight at Uganda’s Entebbe Airport to Nairobi, the Kenyan capital, where he was somehow repatriated to a military court without extradition proceedings.

While Kenya insisted it played no role and was investigating the incident, Uganda said Kenya was fully aware of the plan, citing intelligence correspondence aimed at tracking down Besigye.

As for his return to the military court in Kampala, we piece together what we know so far.

Besigye has contested and lost four presidential elections against President Yoweri Museveni, who has been in power since 1986.

He has recently been less active in politics and did not contest the 2021 election.

But earlier this year he formed a new party, the People’s Front for Freedom (PFF), after leaving the Forum for Democratic Change (FDC), which he founded two decades ago.

The opposition politician has traveled to and from Kenya freely for years, sometimes to attend high-profile events – even as he remains Museveni’s main challenger and biggest critic.

This time, Besigye traveled to Nairobi to attend a book launch by Kenyan opposition politician Martha Karua.

The 68-year-old landed in the city on the morning of November 16 and took a taxi to his hotel in the affluent suburb of Hurlingham. He was accompanied by his long-time friend Haj Obid Lutale.

A few hours later, he left the hotel, boarded a taxi and drove to Riverside Drive, about 5 km (three miles) from his hotel for a private meeting, according to his political allies.

He was last seen until he re-emerged four days later in Uganda.

His taxi driver waited for more than 12 hours for the senior politician, deciding to leave when he couldn’t get on the phone.

Besigye’s team in Uganda began relaying distress calls after their leader’s mobile phones went unanswered.

His disappearance hit the headlines and raised eyebrows in the region, with his wife Winnie Bainima, head of the UN’s agency to tackle HIV and AIDS, taking to social media to report that her husband had been “kidnapped” in Nairobi.

The next day, his reserved seat at a book launch where he was expected to be a guest speaker was empty, prompting organizers to raise the alarm over his absence.

Ms Bainima said Besigye and his friend Lutale arrived at the apartment on Riverside Drive where they were to meet an unidentified Ugandan national and another unidentified British national.

The British national wanted to introduce Besigye to a group of colleagues and businessmen who had expressed interest in supporting the PFF financially, he said.

There was a box of money in the room. One of the hosts had two guns.

Shortly after the brief introduction, eight men who said they were Kenyan police officers knocked on the door and told Besigye and his companions that they were under arrest, Ms Byanyima told Kenya’s Citizen TV.

The opposition leader tried to explain that he had nothing to do with the items in the room, but the security agents would not listen.

The four men bundled Besigye and Lutale into a car with Kenyan number plates and drove under cover of night towards the Ugandan border.

“This was clearly a planned operation,” Ms Byanyima added.

Before crossing into Uganda, the four stopped speaking Swahili and started speaking in the Ugandan languages ​​of Luganda and Runyankol.

The two arrested were flown to Uganda, without their luggage, including their passports, which were later picked up from a Nairobi hotel by Besigye’s party officials.

PFF spokesman Ibrahim Ssemuzu Nganda told Uganda’s Monitor newspaper that Besigye and his friend went through the Malaba border post without stopping for a routine security check.

“They only changed vehicles. A four-wheeler with a Kenyan number plate was left at the Malaba border post and moved to (a) another vehicle with a Ugandan number plate,” he said.

Uganda’s Information Minister Chris Baryomunsi said detectives gathered enough intelligence to arrest Besigye while in Nairobi.

He said Kenyan authorities had activated the cross-border operation, insisting Nairobi authorities knew nothing about it.

Besigye is now being tried in Kampala and not Nairobi because the planned crime was “against Uganda and not against Kenya,” Ugandan army spokesman Brig Gen Felix Kulayigye said. told the BBC’s Africa Daily podcast.

“We have a legal framework with our counterparts in Kenya to deal with matters that threaten regional security,” he said.

However, he did not explain why the extradition process has not taken place.

Reports suggest that Besigye’s arrest was planned for months and executed with the help of some people close to him.

Ugandan media reported that the organizers of the meeting were said to be a British national and a senior Ugandan army officer, both of whom were well known to Besigye.

His wife accused Besigye of being a “paid operative who tried to plant guns” on the British national who was at the meeting.

Over the decades, hundreds of civilians have been tried in Uganda’s military courts, even though the Constitutional Court has ruled against the practice.

Brig Kulayigye told the BBC that Besigye was no stranger to appearing in military courts, having returned there because he was subject to military law.

Last week, he and his co-accused were arraigned in a Makindye military court after being held incommunicado for four days.

He is facing four charges of being found with two pistols and ammunition and trying to buy weapons from foreigners in the Swiss city of Geneva, the Greek capital Athens and Nairobi.

Both denied the allegations.

Besigye objected to the trial by court martial, saying that if there were any charges against him, he should be tried in a civilian court.

His lawyers argued that the alleged crimes were committed outside Uganda and therefore he was illegally court-martialed.

But the court overruled the lawyer and allowed the trial to continue.

The accused were remanded in Luzira Maximum Prison till December 2.

Agathare Atuhire, a Ugandan lawyer and human rights activist, told the BBC that Kenya should have arrested Besigye and extradited him to Uganda.

Ms Byanyima said she did not expect justice for her husband.

But the court martial is “not a kangaroo court,” said Brig Kulayigye.

“Justice will be served.”

Kenyan officials deny any knowledge of the operation and remain silent, while Ugandan officials say there is considerable intelligence sharing between the two countries.

“The Ugandan government is in contact with the Kenyan government. Otherwise, how do you arrest someone in the middle of Nairobi and then bring him to Uganda by airport or land, without full knowledge and support? In Kenya?” Information Minister Baryomunsi told Uganda’s NBS TV.

Many Kenyans are asking about the nature of security ties between the two countries and whether Besigye will be charged in a military court if there is a full disclosure.

Last Tuesday, Kenya’s current foreign affairs minister, Musalia Mudavadi, avoided giving clear answers to journalists, pleading not to judge his country “too harshly”.

Mudavadi, who is also acting interior minister, said Kenya was a free country which allowed “a lot of latitude”. But he cautioned foreigners against creating a rift between Kenya and their homeland.

Besigye’s matter will be resolved diplomatically, he said, describing Uganda as a “strong partner” of Kenya.

Uganda’s admission that Kenya was involved in the kidnappings has led to a backlash from the Kenyan government both in Uganda and at home.

Some Ugandans have staged protests outside the Kenyan embassy in Kampala and others have threatened to boycott Kenyan brands.

Besigye’s arrest follows a series of high-profile kidnappings and disappearances in Kenya. Four Turkish refugees were forcibly deported to AnkaraThere he faced conspiracy charges against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Additional reporting by Alan Kasuzza