Lockdown Tales: Police on spot for ‘grabbing’ three tons of Maize flour meant for the needy Makindye residents

KAMPALA, Uganda: The fate of the needy in Makindye hangs in balance after the police grabbed three tons of posho that had been bought to feed them. The government of Uganda locked people in their homes as one of the measures to control the spread of the Corona.

While the move is understandable in light of the spike in the number of Corona infections, the government did not make any provision for the needy as well as Ugandans who are daily earners. The Prime Minister’s office is currently struggling to find money to give out to five hundred and thirty people government identified as the ones deserving of relief, out of the forty five million Ugandans.

The Police had been called to investigate the theft of three tons of maize flour, when its officers grabbed even the remaining three tons of the relief. Unidentified people had broken into the stores where the food was being kept before it could be distributed to the beneficiaries, when police officers from Kibuye station came for the remaining bags of the flour.

The Member of Parliament for Makindye Ssaabagabo, Dr. Charles Sserukenya upon discovering the stores he had rented to keep the food relief breached, went and made a report to the police. “The Police instead of assisting me to track down the thieves, grabbed the remaining food themselves”, Sserukenya curses.

Police accuses Dr. Sserukenya of gathering people while distributing the posho, hence exposing them to the Corona virus. “Police is lying. How can they accuse me of distributing posho which was in the stores”? The legislator weighs in.

Dr. Sserukenya says he is lucky he had made a report to the police itself otherwise the Force would have framed him up with some funny criminal charges. “Thank God, I have the case reference number. Those people (Police) would have framed me up in absence of the case reference number,” Dr. Sserukenya adds.

Sserukenya denies he was going to gather people and hand each of the beneficiary their share of the posho, clarifying he was going to surrender the relief to the area Corona task force to give out to the people.

Police has video images of the posho purportedly being distributed. But Sserukenya counters, it is police who distributed some of the posho after grabbing the foodstuff in order to incriminate him. Residents of the constituency are worried Police is going to feed on their posho.

“We don’t trust police at all. Police is full of filches. They steal exhibits. They frame up innocent people. They even steal or hide case files after getting bribes. How can one trust such crooked characters?” a local wondered.

The locals point out how majority of members of the Uganda Police are broke people who won’t hesitate to cook and eat their food now that it is in their hands. “They will eat the food and claim later how thieves broke into the police station and stole the posho”, they claim in unison.

The locals appeal to the Inspector General of Police, Martins Okoth Ocholla to prevail over his people and release the food relief. “We ask Mr. Ocholla to tell his people to release our food. We can’t starve just because police took our food,” they state.