Re: ugnet_: QUEST FOR PEACE: LETTER TO PRESIDENT BUSH
This is the kind of stuff Oloya Opio (The ESO agent in Canad?)should have been writing and doing instead of discouraging Ugandans from agitating against the Third term as he did recently! Brother Ochan..thanks! Gook "You can't separate peace from freedom because no one can be at peace unless he has his freedom."- Malcom X Original Message Follows From: "Mulindwa Edward" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> CC: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,"Rwanda" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: ugnet_: QUEST FOR PEACE: LETTER TO PRESIDENT BUSH Date: Mon, 9 Jun 2003 21:58:50 -0400 Mr. President, This is an exciting time in America for peace lovers and those who cherish justice. This is a Godsend time for those suffering under repressive dictators and governments. Your actions against international terrorism and dictatorial regimes have put hopes for peace and democracy in the hearts of all the oppressed of this world. We the members, board of directors, and the executives committee of Friends for Peace in Africa (FPA) have such hope and we, therefore, humbly ask you to answer our cry for peace in Northern Uganda.This is because President Museveni has been waging a vicious war against child soldiers in Northern Uganda for the past 17 years and forcing innocent citizens to live in camps under horrendous conditions. Although President Museveni is sometimes portrayed as an African leader of the new breed, he has a dark side that most American people do not know. President Museveni has been fomenting war in the Great Lake Region of East and Central Africa long before he became President of Uganda. He overthrew the governments of Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, and Zaire. In each of these countries, unprecedented levels of killing attended the overthrow governments, the best known of which was the Rwanda genocide of 1994. He tried, though without appreciable success, to do the same in Kenya through the Wakenya rebels, and in Sudan through the SPLA. In his own country, he has herded a whole Acholi nationality into concentration camps, ostensibly to protect them from the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels. He and his brother Gen. Salim Saleh now have plans to completely destroy the Acholi people and take away their land. As you prepare to host President Museveni at the White House this week, we humbly bring up the following observations and request that you ask him for explanations during your discourse. 1. The government of Uganda herded up the Acoli people into 'protected villages' in 1996, supposedly to protect them against raids by the LRA. Yet the LRA raids these camps, kills, and abducts children unchallenged by the Uganda Peoples Defense Forces (UPDF). The Acoli people are starving in the Internally Displaced People's (IDP) camps. The UPDF won't allow them to go back home and plant food crops. The Uganda government, on the other hand, is not providing food aid, sanitation, water, medical services, or school for children. Since the UPDF has shown that it is neither able to defeat the LRA nor protect the camps, why can't the President allow the Acoli to return to their homesas they want to? 2. Several years ago, President Museveni boasted that he had the second most powerful military in the worldsecond only to that of the USA. How can the 'second most powerful military in the world' fail to defeat a ragtag guerilla army made up mostly of 8-13 year old children? Yet, he continues to ask for military assistance from donor countries to arm his troops against the abducted children turned rebel child soldiers. 3. The Uganda government claims that the UPDF went into Congo to protect its citizens and prevent another genocide at the scale of the 1994 Rwanda massacre. Why was this potential genocide more of an emergency than the actual one happening in northern Uganda? Why should President Museveni spend so much financial and military resources trying to 'prevent a genocide' in Congo but when he should stop the one that has been going on in his own count ry? Why has President Museveni who has negotiated settlements of disputes between Uganda and Rwanda, Uganda and Sudan, Burundi and its rebels and between the Uganda Government and it other rebel groups, steadfastly refused to end the war in Northern Uganda by negotiation. 4. The Uganda government goes to donor countries every year to ask for more money to fight the LRA, but the LRA grows stronger every year. Every year, the defense budget and other defense-related appropriations take up ever-bigger percentages of the national budget, a budget that is 50% subsidized by donor countries. Where is the money going, and w
ugnet_: QUEST FOR PEACE: LETTER TO PRESIDENT BUSH
Dear Gook, Regarding the perplexing and baffling Opio-Oloya article, it was just an indirect way of apologising for mu7, and a covering-up of crimes against humanity!! It is sad that a fellow who at times mascarades as an Acholi son would trivialise a systematic wiping-out of our people in Acholi province. How can one say to those who are perishing daily in Acholi that it does not matter whether the one in power is mu7 or not? It is not the first time that Opio-Oloya talks like one bent on a cover-up of these crimes, but he should remember that today, we may be weak and without voice but one day there will be time to account, and for justice. We thank comrade Ochan Otim for this public letter. Opio-Oloya sold his soul for crumbs from mu7's table a long time ago, and should never be torarated in decent society. This is the kind of stuff Oloya Opio (The ESO agent in Canad?) should have been writing and doing instead of discouraging Ugandans from agitating against the Third term as he did recently! Brother Ochan..thanks! Gook You can't separate peace from freedom because no one can be at peace unless he has his freedom.- Malcom X ~~~ Date: Mon, 9 Jun 2003 21:58:50 -0400 Mr. President, This is an exciting time in America for peace lovers and those who cherish justice. This is a Godsend time for those suffering under repressive dictators and governments. Your actions against international terrorism and dictatorial regimes have put hopes for peace and democracy in the hearts of all the oppressed of this world. We the members, board of directors, and the executives committee of Friends for Peace in Africa (FPA) have such hope and we, therefore, humbly ask you to answer our cry for peace in Northern Uganda.This is because President Museveni has been waging a vicious war against child soldiers in Northern Uganda for the past 17 years and forcing innocent citizens to live in camps under horrendous conditions. Although President Museveni is sometimes portrayed as an African leader of the new breed, he has a dark side that most American people do not know. President Museveni has been fomenting war in the Great Lake Region of East and Central Africa long before he became President of Uganda. He overthrew the governments of Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, and Zaire. In each of these countries, unprecedented levels of killing attended the overthrow governments, the best known of which was the Rwanda genocide of 1994. He tried, though without appreciable success, to do the same in Kenya through the Wakenya rebels, and in Sudan through the SPLA. In his own country, he has herded a whole Acholi nationality into concentration camps, ostensibly to protect them from the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels. He and his brother Gen. Salim Saleh now have plans to completely destroy the Acholi people and take away their land. As you prepare to host President Museveni at the White House this week, we humbly bring up the following observations and request that you ask him for explanations during your discourse. 1. The government of Uganda herded up the Acoli people into 'protected villages' in 1996, supposedly to protect them against raids by the LRA. Yet the LRA raids these camps, kills, and abducts children unchallenged by the Uganda Peoples Defense Forces (UPDF). The Acoli people are starving in the Internally Displaced People's (IDP) camps. The UPDF won't allow them to go back home and plant food crops. The Uganda government, on the other hand, is not providing food aid, sanitation, water, medical services, or school for children. Since the UPDF has shown that it is neither able to defeat the LRA nor protect the camps, why can't the President allow the Acoli to return to their homesas they want to? 2. Several years ago, President Museveni boasted that he had the second most powerful military in the worldsecond only to that of the USA. How can the 'second most powerful military in the world' fail to defeat a ragtag guerilla army made up mostly of 8-13 year old children? Yet, he continues to ask for military assistance from donor countries to arm his troops against the abducted children turned rebel child soldiers. 3. The Uganda government claims that the UPDF went into Congo to protect its citizens and prevent another genocide at the scale of the 1994 Rwanda massacre. Why was this potential genocide more of an emergency than the actual one happening in northern Uganda? Why should President Museveni spend so much financial and military resources trying to 'prevent a genocide' in Congo but when he should stop the one that has been going on in his own count ry? Why has President Museveni who has negotiated settlements of disputes between Uganda and Rwanda, Uganda and Sudan, Burundi and its rebels and between the Uganda Government and it other rebel groups, steadfastly refused to end the
