{UAH} He fled Mak a student, returned as a lecturer

https://www.monitor.co.ug/News/National/He-fled-Mak-student-returned-lecturer/688334-5184728-eavhac/index.html

I was the general secretary of the students' guild in 1981, with Opiyo Oloya as the president. We were challenging the elections, which we believed were fraudulent. We were also concerned with the abductions and disappearances at campus of both students and lecturers.

As student leaders, we sought audience with the Education minister to air out our concerns. The minister instead sent us to the Permanent Secretary, who told us that the Education ministry was not responsible for security affairs, and he directed us to the head of the police.
The commissioner of police we met told us he didn't know what was happening at the university. But students were being picked from campus by officers from the military police.

With no help coming from the ministry and the police, I wrote a circular, which was posted to all places of residences calling on students who knew anyone missing to come to the guild office and give us some information. Instead, a group of Uganda Peoples Congress (UPC) youth wingers came to tell us that if we wanted to know where those people [military police personnel] were coming from, we should go with them to Mbuya Military Barracks.

They didn't stop at that, they mobilised their supporters, who came to the guild office and threw us outside and they took over the office. We also mobilised about 200 students and we went and threw them out of the office and changed the locks. Following the standoff the university administration responded by banning the students' guild. We responded by circulating flyers asking students not to sit for exams.
By that time, soldiers had been deployed at the campus and we were put on the wanted list.

The four of us – myself, Opiyo Oloya, George Otto, the minister of internal affairs and Oryema –camped out at the Medical School for a couple of days until our hideout was discovered. We immediately left the place and went to some residence in Kololo for two days.
We were now on the run, and we were accused of belonging to the Andrew Kayiira's Uganda Freedom Movement rebels. After two days in Kololo, we fled to Mbuya Catholic Church, where we stayed for a week.
Somehow, word of our hideout got out and we had to run again. We went to Jinja, from where we managed to cross into Kenya.

Escape route
The security agents didn't know who we were. We had our passports in Makerere student's identity cards. We had also created other identities. The different cards were to be used depending on the circumstances.

There were several roadblocks on the way to the border, but the worst was at the [Jinja Nile] bridge. On the roadblock, I was singled out to explain why I was going towards that direction. Two of my friends said they had finished their medical studies and were going to Naivasha where they had got jobs.

Oloya and I, were left in a dilemma. I told the security officials that Oto owed me money and we were going to Busia to meet his uncle and I get my money, then return home.
At the border, we just walked over to the Kenyan side. The immigration officer was out for lunch. As we waited, we engaged some Kenyan police officers in conversation until the immigration officer returned. As we queued up for clearance, Oloya was in front of me. When his turn came, he was turned away and told to go get clearance from Uganda. I didn't wait. I just followed him. Our other two colleagues were far behind to know what had transpired.