{UAH} The "El Chapo" Debate 2021.

Picture: Capital Radio (2001). A Saturday morning before the "Capital Gang" political Talk show. (I was the technical producer back then, on the phone with my father. Can't exactly remember which colleague took the picture)

If Idi Amin hadn't existed, Uganda's first ever democratic presidential debate couldn"t have been held. At least not at the Conference Center.
My father built the venue and the adjacent Serena Hotel (then Nile Mansions) in a record nine months so as to have befitting brand new premises to host the African Union Heads of State Summit (1975). However after Amin, the Tanzanians and the Ugandan exiles senior officers (i.e Oyite Ojok, Paulo Muwanga, Museveni, Tito Okello...etc.) took free rooms in the hotel for themselves. Some for months and others for years. They also reportedly turned the place upside down.
An article in the Independent Magazine says "It's hard to believe the once beautiful gardens suddenly became littered with bodies by Obote's regime. The basement of the conference centre became a torture chamber, and rooms 211 and 233 were the offices of Obote's dreaded Military Intelligence and National Security Services."
Their governments operated from the hotel from 1979 after the "Amin war" until 1986. Even today a few rooms are still government offices. But at the time it was built, Amin had intended for an exclusive venue for foreign dignitaries and State guests. These included freedom fighters from Southern Africa, doctors from Cuba and African American teachers whom Amin had invited back to Africa (plus my late African American friend Chris Boyle, RIP. A black teacher from Queens, New York who in 1976 first made the T-shirts with Amin being carried by the British. They were distributed free to every citizen back then. Everyone scrambled to get one.
During Amin's presidency, though the venue was exclusive for guests, he had also ordered that the vast plush gardens remain free to the Ugandan public. Cultural dance groups and music bands featured as entertainment on weekends back then.
But the so-called "Ugandan liberators" who came with the Tanzanian forces decided to enjoy the place themselves, ruining it in the process.
Today, as the venue hosted Uganda's first ever presidential debate in preparation for voting day February 18th, and as Museveni historically dodged the event ("El-Chapo"), he might have had a nightmare about how, as Military Council Defence Minister 1979-1980, this was once his interrogation center, and whoever he would invite there for questioning, would forever remain grateful if they came out alive.
One day God willing if I join the presidential debate. I hope my good friend Allan Kasujja, last Fridays debate moderator, will be linient on me then. I might remind him pleadingly how we know each other since our radio days. How I first met him when he was a radio dj at Kampala's Power FM, and his gospel show at Radio Sanyu. He is a born again christian by the way, so maybe he might have mercy on me during "interrogation".

#UgDebate16

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