One day in January of last year, Enock Katwesigye was taking tea inside the luxurious leisure facility adjacent to the Lake Victoria shores in Munyonnyo on the fringes of Uganda’s capital city, Kampala. Suddenly, a white man approached him. The white man was in company of another man of similar color.

Much as he had seen the duo previously at the same facility, he had neither shared a table nor a chat with them. The man who was first to accost the Ugandan gentleman asked Katwesigye to join them. The Ugandan did as requested. After exchanging niceties, one of the white man proceeded to introduce himself as Belesis Thomas of American nationality.

He went on to identify his colleague as Chad Altieri of the same nationality. Katwesigye would learn later that Thomas is a ‘dealer’ in the coveted mineral of gold while Chad is his attorney. In the tête-à-tête that follows, Thomas divulges to his new found pal (Katwesigye) his aspiration to set up base in Uganda. The white man goes on to talk of his interests in the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Cameroon as well as in Ghana. He also speaks of his many partners around the globe and then seeks to know from Katwesigye if he minded joining them as the local partner.

As Katwesigye drives the Americans to Entebbe and back to Kampala, they ask him of how they could move gold from the DRC and elsewhere into Uganda. They also seek to know how the Ugandan would render help in that regard. Seeing that the Americans’ business is too lucrative to snub, Katwesigye concedes to their request of being their contact person in Uganda. The white men assures him of a handsome handshake if he proves good at the job.

Days later, Thomas informs Katwesigye how they were leaving for Kenya. That they were going to Nairobi to meet and talk business with their partners there. They spend a bit of time both in Nairobi and Qatar. Before leaving for Kenya, the white men had engaged a firm of lawyers of Musangaala and company advocates to legalize their stay in Uganda as well as their gold business. They engaged Musangaala on their own without the involvement of Katwesigye.

In between, Katwesigye learns how the white men were busy working on moving 800 kilograms of gold from Kenya to Uganda. When they meet again, they disclose to Katwesigye how they had engaged Kingsway Holdings, Clearing and Shipping Company to work on that. During the meeting, they inform Katwesigye how they were desirous of hiring planes to move their gold. But that deal of the planes has since turned out to be hot air.

After months of waiting following that meeting, Thomas finally called in August last year to inform Katwesigye how he was flying to Uganda. He was asking the Ugandan to move to Arua where they would meet and inspect the airfield to see if the plane could land there for purposes of picking the cargo. And while the caller disguised his point of call to be Qatar, we have since established that he in reality, was in Nairobi.

Watch this space to read of how, what had been misrepresented as a lucrative gold deal ended up going from good to worse, leading to the arrest of Katwesigye and others…

Unlike in known instances where dealers in Uganda legitimize their bogus transactions using ‘proper’ legal processes, Bashir Ssemakula and group have their shortcut. They apply services of the hitherto respected Diamond Trust Bank officials to convince their targets that actually, they are selling genuine gold. Who wouldn’t trust any goods or money withdrawn from trusted Bank anyway?

This is how, Brazilians Maria Sulamita, 70, and son Fabio Eliandro fell victims and lost USD47, 300 to the shrewd city fellows on September 10^th 2019 at Ssemakula’s office located at Hotel Africana – annexed BMK House, Level six Room two. “We believed the bank gold was genuine and we accepted it as a security for the USD47300,” cried Maria at Entebbe based Mineral Police base on Thursday.

Through her friend and South African national interpreter Johnnie Benerndo, Maria says her son, a wood dealer back in Brazil, developed love of gold business recently. He sought and landed willing buyers in Dubai who would pay him on delivery. “He [successfully] approached his Uncle for a soft loan of over USD600, 000 for the business.”

Through Jonnie and another friend, Bashir reportedly extended the invitation to Maria and Fabio, the latter came first and the former jetted in around three weeks ago, but was stopped at the airport for he didn’t have a properly arranged visa to Uganda. His Uncle smelt a rat. “If they couldn’t allow you in their country just because of a visa, how then will they allow you out with over 100kgs of gold,” he reportedly reasoned.

On his return, Fabio’s Uncle advised that 15kgs be bought as a sample, himself having heard of fake gold deals in Uganda. Bashir and team were conformable and proceeded with ‘tax preparations’ for the transaction.

The video clip in the Bank storage

Documents before us include supposedly forged receipts and bank slips to the effect. On Tuesday 10^th 2019 at the earlier mentioned office premises, payments were done as shown in one of the featured video clips above.

After the payment, Bashir and team devised means to get rid of their victims. They supposedly organized with police at Jinja Road Station who drove in to effect an arrest, on allegations that their clients, especially Johnnie had ‘forged’ passports and that his numerous travels around Africa are suspicious!

Fabio’s Uncle fears had come to pass, rightfully thought Maria. They started moving around for whoever could help them. In search of help, as she walked around Muyenga, a bodaboda rider snatched her bag, taking off with all her vital documents, her passport inclusive. “This confirmed to me Bashir’s threats on my life. He has repeatedly warned and he wants us out of the country. He says we came as tourists and hence not allowed to transact business in Uganda, “she says.

When contacted, Bashir confirmed the incident at his office but said it wasn’t him in action. “That deal was done by certain boys and other guys from Angola but there are some people who want to blackmail me. If you need any information, I am available my brother,” he responded on Monday last week. However, during the transaction, they had fallen out with one of their own, a one Meddie, especially upon Johnnie’s arrest, correctly criticizing the double ‘punishment’ of theft and torture.

In several of the audio clips shared with police, Bashir’s said voice is heard ridiculing Meddie for not being ‘smart’ enough, choosing to side with foreigners instead of focusing on the money. “We thought we were dealing with a smart person, you might even cause us problems. Sulait [Kabangala] has the money,” he goes on to explain the expenditure of their loot to the less interested Meddie.

Indeed, upon their intervention, Mineral Police officers had arrested the receptionist, Nashim Muhumure, 22, who confirmed the transaction, having helped in counting the money. She mentions Sulait Kabangala and Mohammed Mbonde aka Ryan as other players. She further confirms, the soft hands seen in the video clip are hers and actually, she was counting money on the machine; “in our office.” Nashim was given “USD5, 700 of which mine was USD200 and the rest for office rent.”

On getting back to Bashir, he cut wires, saying we have failed to go for “people who kill others in the hospitals and disappears with their kidneys but die fighting gold businessmen,” He further warned us to “style up and tread carefully” on the matter. He also blamed police for arresting his secretary Nashim, who has no knowledge about the transaction.

Upon our visit at DTB Parliamentary Avenue branch yesterday, the duty manager referred us to his senior manager, a one Samuel Muyingo whose number he provided. We indeed called Muyingo and introduced the matter but he cut us short, saying he would call us back, a promise he never fulfilled until the filing of this report 24hrs after. Watch this space…