Charles lost his arms after a severe beating by soldiers
I worked as a cook at a primary school. I lived in the school compound. Some UPDF soldiers guarded the school. One afternoon, I went back home from work and sat outside my house. Some soldiers came and surrounded me. They said I was a rebel and demanded that I show them the gun I was hiding. I told them I was a civilian and didn't have a gun. But they did not believe me. They insisted that I was a rebel. They tied my hands tightly behind me with a rubber strap and began beating me till I was unconscious.
They only left me when they thought I was dead. I woke up in hospital some days later. The doctors told me they had been forced to amputate my arms to save my life. I have been trying to follow up the matter with the authorities through a human rights organisation, which sent a letter to the UPDF Fourth Division. There have been threats to prevent me from pressing the case.
I still see all of the soldiers who attacked me. Nothing has been done to them.This is a new life for me. I now have to depend on people to help me with everything. I cannot even dress or eat on my own. I am tired of this. The school only helped me meet my medical costs, but now I have no job. I cannot go back to my old job with both hands amputated. I have two children to feed. My wife left me when I returned home without my hands.
"The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth becomes the greatest enemy of the state."
- Dr. Joseph M. Goebbels - Hitler's propaganda minister
