Kampala:
Daniel Byansi, 21, is a Ugandan student who has only ever known one president, and is desperately yearning for change. He’s hoping “the doctor” will deliver this to his country.
“The infrastructure is in bad condition, let my future children have some good roads, ” said Mr Byansi. “
Let them experience good health services.”
“The doctor” is Ugandan Aggrey Kiyingi, now a Castle Hill-based cardiologist, who moved to Australia in 1982, and has a practice in Merrylands in Sydney.
To his supporters in Uganda, Dr Kiyingi, 61, is a “God-fearing” Christian and natural leader who has constructed bore holes, paid orphans’ school fees, and introduced the internet in the east African nation through his company, Dehezi International.
To the authorities, he is a wanted man, after being charged in absentia in March with terrorism, murder, attempted murder and crimes against humanity over the recent killings of Muslim clerics.
But Dr Kiyingi, who is alleged to have provided logistical and financial support to Muslim rebel group Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), linked to the murders by Ugandan police, vehemently denies the charges. He claims they’re part of the game plan of Yoweri Museveni, 70, who has ruled Uganda since 1986, ahead of the country’s 2016 elections.
“If there was no support for me in Uganda, Museveni would not be having sleepless nights,” said Dr Kiyingi, who has declared he will challenge the veteran leader as president.
“If there was no support for me, police would not be harassing my supporters, arresting, following them, threatening them.
“By the very fact that they’re spending so much time and money trying to block anybody who says the name ‘Kiyingi’, in the papers or on the radio, that tells you a lot of things”.
In Uganda, opposition leaders and activists are regularly arrested. Supporters of sacked prime minister and former Museveni ally, Amama Mbabazi, who officially declared his presidential ambitions earlier this week, have already been jailed for unlawful assembly and early electioneering.
It’s now also “like a crime” to be found with Kiyingi’s leaflets, said supporters of his Uganda Federal Democratic Organisation (UFDO) party.
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