Uganda's main opposition leader and three-time Presidential aspirant, Kizza Besigye has been arrested by police as he prepared to travel to the country's eastern region for a rally. Also arrested, were three lawmakers and a dozen party officials.
Kizza Besigye
Kizza Besigye
Besigye’s lawyer said his client - the leader of the Forum for Democratic Change, “was given the option of staying home under preventive arrest which he declined.”
“He will not allow police to turn his home into a detention facility,” he added.
A police spokesman said Besigye, currently held in a facility 20 kilometers (12 miles) east of the Ugandan capital, Kampala, would be charged with endangering public order after security forces gathered intelligence that his activities would jeopardize public safety.
72-year old President Yoweri Museveni who came to power in a 1986 coup, is facing mounting challenges ahead of elections later this year. Critics accuse him of pursuing a life presidency, a charge he has consistently dismissed.
Besigye was once Museveni’s personal doctor in the 1980s but is now his most powerful opponent and frequently calls the longtime leader “dictator.”