KAMPALA — Ugandan prosecutors have charged main opposition leader Kizza Besigye, who returned from exile in SA three weeks ago, with treason for plotting to topple the government of President Yoweri Museveni.

Inspector-general of police Maj-Gen Kale Kayhura said in Kampala yesterday that Besigye, an outspoken critic of Museveni, would be charged with treason under section 23 of the penal code.

“Dr Besigye together with 22 others are accused of plotting to overthrow the government of Uganda by force of arms,” he said. If found guilty, Besigye could face the death penalty.

Kayhura said the suspects were also accused of recruiting, mobilising arms and gathering intelligence to wage war against Museveni’s government under the cover of the Democratic Republic of Congo-based rebel People’s Redemption Army (PRA).

In addition to the treason charges, Besigye and the other defendants were accused of having links with the northern rebel group, the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), Kayhura said.

Besigye, once Museveni’s doctor and close friend, appeared in the high court to hear the charges, and was expected to be kept in custody. “He is linked with the LRA and PRA ... that is what is being looked at,” Kayhura said:

Protests spread yesterday after heavily armed police arrested Besigye, the Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) leader, in Kampala earlier in the day after he had addressed a political rally, police and party officials said.

Riot police fired rubber bullets and tear gas to disperse violent protesters near the city’s central police station after thousands of supporters failed to block his arrest. The riots soon spread across the capital.

Stone-throwing Besigye supporters battled police, set alight a government vehicle and vendor’s kiosks and telephone booths and destroyed barricades erected along the main roads.

Besigye, who lost disputed 2001 presidential elections to Museveni, fled Uganda for four years of exile, settling in SA after the polls when the president and other government officials accused him of colluding with rebel groups to foment a coup. He returned to Uganda on October 26 in an apparent bid to take advantage of Museveni’s calls for reconciliation after this month’s death in exile of former Ugandan leader Milton Obote, a foe of the president who nonetheless was granted a state funeral.

In addition to accusing Museveni of running a “dictatorship” and detaining political prisoners, Besigye has urged Uganda’s fractured opposition to unite around a single candidate to oust the government in March elections.

The arrest gives the lie to calls for reconciliation by Museveni at Obote’s funeral. If Besigye is cleared of treason he will be the strongest candidate against Museveni, who recently pushed through a constitutional amendment scrapping term limits and says he will not become involved in the Besigye case.

The move, which allows Museveni to stand for a third term, has been decried as a tool for the already long-time leader to become a “president for life”.

Besigye has said he fled political persecution after authorities twice blocked his attempted to travel outside Uganda after the 2001 polls.

The LRA has been waging a brutal campaign in northern Uganda since 1988, fighting the government and terrorising civilians. The PRA, based in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, has a similar agenda. Reuter