An unholy alliance as independent media in East Africa come under severe assault

Media freedom in East Africa.[File, Standard]

I hear some propagandists are claiming that the attack on this media house and the shutdown of the Monitor Group in Uganda are somewhat connected to the pledge from TZ’s Suluhu Hassan to play ping-pong with Prezzo William Ruto whenever activists cross the border of either country.

Madam Suluhu said hitting such activists hard with her mikwaju would go a long way in quelling social strife that those activists have occasioned by protesting in the streets, instead of working hard to create wealth for their nations.

The third element in his unholy alliance, propagandists claim, is that the assaults in Kampala and Mombasa Road were orchestrated to coincide with a change of guard at another major media house in the region.

This theory might not hold true, as real soldiers with real guns have been staking out at the Monitor Group, at the instruction of M7, the life Prezzo of Uganda, and his only begotten son, General Muhoozi. The duo of father and son have been at the helm of the nation for the last 40 years, and it is expected that the son will inherit the father’s throne.

I’m not sure why Muhoozi might have any use or need for a newspaper, given that his preferred mode of communication is X. It was on that platform that he declared war on Nairobi, which he estimated would fall within a week of his onslaught, and he’d patrol the wealthy suburb of Westlands with his beautiful wife in tow.

On that occasion, he declared he was torn between living in Riverside and Westlands as part of his spoils of war. Not too long afterwards, the Ugandan opposition leader Kizza Besigye was abducted from Riverside and driven to Uganda. He has been rotting in jail ever since.

The latest debacle from Uganda was the deportation of opposition leader Martha Karua, who had travelled to Kampala as part of Besigye’s defence team.

If there is an unholy alliance between the three East African leaders to suppress independent national and regional media, is there an organised response? someone asked me this week. We’ve been here before, I told him. And our people triumphed.