KAMPALA-UGANDA/NEWSDAY: President Museveni identified the terrorist behind the Swift bus coach attack as Muzafaala who has been on a security watchlist ans warned “We shall get all of them all”.
The president said that Muzafala was part of the Pader group that had been sent by ADF to blow up the mourners during the funeral of late Maj. Gen Lokech’s funeral and that his colleague Katumba Abdu, was arrested in a Pader Hotel with his bomb-making equipment.
“This is to inform you that the person who died in the Ishaka – bound bus yesterday, was a terrorist (mutujju) by the names of Muzafala, but also calling himself Isaac Matovu,” Museveni said in a statement.
On Police also named a 23-year-old Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) attached suicide bomber conducted the attack that targeted 52 passengers on a Swift Safari Bus destined for Ishaka.
Police said Matovu was a resident of A-Zone, Kireka in Kampala.
He made his bomb out of bicycle bearings- and with other metallic tools that he wore in form of a vest and belt.
Katumba, earlier on arrested from Pader has already been charged with terrorism.
“His collaborator, by the name of Nsubuga Hamid fled from Pader to Kampala, where he was killed by the CMI operatives while resisting arrest,” Museveni explained.
Museveni said that investigators were examining a possibility Muzafala blew himself up accidentally while carrying the bomb on his lap or he did so deliberately but that the CMI had been following him and all other accomplices.
He explained that after the attack on Gen Katumba Wamala security went full swing to trail all the ADF criminals irreversibly “and their impunity ended in the phase of urban terrorism.”
He said the defeat of their rural terrorism was in 2007 in the Semliki National Park.
He told the property owners, worshipping place managers and transporters to ensure they check visitors.
“The Police will put out guide lines. We are following all the other shallow schemes that will be similarly defeated. The injuring of some Ugandans in the bus is much regretted” Museveni said.
Nonday’s bomb explosion was the second in a space of one day with the first being Saturday at Digida Pork joint in Komamboga. One person died in the first incident.
The UK and France early this month warned of imminent terrorist attacks.
What remains a puzzle is Museveni’s explanation that the attacks are a result of ADF criminals yet the Islamic State has also claimed responsibility.