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KAMPALA â The director of economic monitoring at
the Internal Security Organisation has dismissed allegations that he
received a bribe from a Kenyan bank to help solve a fraud case.
Mr Teddy
Seezi-Cheeye rubbished media reports that he solicited $200,000 and
received $100,000 to help Standard Chartered Bank of Nairobi recover more
than $1 million it lost to alleged Ugandan fraudsters in September 2003.
"That is
total rubbish and I cannot lose any sleep over it," a visibly angry Cheeye
told this reporter at his Katatumba Suites offices.
He challenged
anyone with evidence to produce it.
Cheeye is investigating a case
where local businessman Andrew Kasagga Zzimwe, city lawyer Paul Kalemera
and Mr Cedric Nzamba of Goldfinger Forex Bureau allegedly defrauded
StanChart Nairobi of $1 million and attempted to defraud the same bank of
another $2 million in 2003.
Kenyan
authorities have since asked for the trio's extradition for trial in
Nairobi without much success.
The Uganda
directorates of public prosecutions and criminal investigations say they
are yet to find criminal doing by the three men.
There have
also been recent press reports that Cheeye could be arrested for
overstepping his area of jurisdiction by investigating a case supposed to
be handled by CID, Interpol or the External Security Organisation.
"I am doing
things very officially," said Cheeye, a former muckraking journalist and
publisher of the defunct Uganda Confidential newsletter. "It is just a few
corrupt elements in this government trying to pour cold water on the case,
but I will continue with my work and time will tell."
He also said
that Solicitor General Lucien Tibaruha was "sitting" on the Zzimwe file
and was using the confusion following the Cabinet reshuffle that saw in a
new attorney general to slow things down.
"The
solicitor general is always a willing participant in any case involving
corruption," Cheeye charged. "Tibaruha should be advised to put the nation
before his stomach. His greediness is going to cause bad relations between
Uganda and Kenya."
"I think that
man [Cheeye] has gone mad," Tibaruha fired back. "I have not seen any
documents on the Zzimwe case from anybody. I only read about the matter in
the press."
Cheeye
insisted that Tibaruha is aware of the documents and is only feigning
ignorance. "Corrupt people sit on files and deny any knowledge of them,"
he said.
Cheeye also
said that a senior Cabinet minister and two presidential assistants were
frustrating him over the case.
"I have
documentary evidence of this senior minister seeking to assume the role of
the attorney general to handle this case," he said but declined to name
the minister.
Neither did
he name the two presidential aides. "These two presidential assistants are
making phone calls everywhere, intimidating people. The good news is that
President Museveni is very supportive because he is looking at the bigger
picture of regional co-operation," Cheeye said.
It is also
alleged that Cheeye is hounding Zzimwe because the businessman refused to
give him a bribe of $200,000 to "kill" the case. This is a separate amount
from the StanChart one.
"That man
asked Mzee [Zzimwe] for money so that he could kill the case but Mzee
refused, that is why he is so much on him," a source said.
Other sources
said that Zzimwe and his friends were willing to pay Cheeye some $100,000
to settle matters but he insisted on $200,000.
"That is not
true, it is total rubbish," Cheeye said. Cheeye said he was instead
contacted by some of Zzimwe's friends requesting that he talks to him
rather than damage him.
"The vice
president contacted me saying Zzimwe had appealed to him but when he saw
my evidence on the matter, he was very supportive," Cheeye said. "I told
Zzimwe that I can only help him if he got the money and paid back the
bank." | 
