Charles Ekemu
Charles Ekemu unsuccessfully ran against a Movement candidate for parliament (MP) and then unsuccessfully ran as a Reform Agenda member for mayor of Soroti, eastern Uganda, in 2001. He was detained at his home in Soroti in early January, 2003, by plainclothes men, who took him to a vacant house in Soroti, blindfolded him, and tied his hands. Others were detained in Soroti on the same day by the same group.A few hours later the captors drove him to Kampala and took him to a building where he was told to climb the stairs. He sat alone for three days blindfolded and hands tied, and was warned not to move or he would fall into a pit. He scarcely dared to sleep.After he wrote a statement denying the accusations of being a rebel they rejected the document, saying, âYou must cooperate and fill in the pages or the boys will be rough. We can keep you for one month, one week, or years. Even Museveni cannot do anything, we are the power here.â Under coercion, he wrote what they wanted.Members of Parliament from the Teso area (eastern Uganda), his family, and others made a fuss about the arrests and incommunicado detentionsâthey could not locate Ekemu and the others detained in Soroti on the same day anywhere. Eight days after his arrest, he and others were taken to the police CID headquarters, where they found nine MPs waiting for them in the office of the Minister of State Security. The minister asked the prisoners, in the presence of the MPs, if they had been tortured. Outside, there was a large crowd including some of their relatives.44He was charged on January 17, 2003, with treason for allegedly plotting between 2001 and January 2003 to overthrow the government and of establishing the PRA, with others.45 He is now out on bail and the charges against him are still pending.
"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
