Uganda opposition leader Bobi Wine reportedly arrested as he returns from South Africa

Bobi Wine on stage at the Los Angeles premiere of the film “Bobi Wine: The Peoples President”, on 25 July 2023, in Beverly Hills, California. (Photo by Kevin Winter/GA/The Hollywood Reporter via Getty Images)

• Ugandan opposition figure Bobi Wine visited South Africa this week.
• He was, says his party, arrested as soon as he arrived back home.
• Supporters had planned to turn his return into a campaigning event.

Ugandan opposition leader Bobi Wine was arrested Thursday on his return home from a trip to South Africa, a top party official said.

“Our President (Bobi Wine) picked up by regime operatives as soon as he landed at the airport,” David Lewis Rubongoya, the general secretary of Wine’s National Unity Platform (NUP) said on X, formerly Twitter.

Wine was in South Africa this week as part of what his party termed a mobilisation effort of the Ugandan diaspora.

Rubongoya’s post was accompanied by a photo appearing to show two men seizing him by the arms on the tarmac at Entebbe International Airport.

Wine’s supporters had planned to accompany him en masse to his home north of the capital, Kampala, to welcome him back, but police had said such gatherings were illegal.

Last month, Ugandan police announced they were banning rallies being organised by the National Unity Platform across the country because of public order issues.

Wine, a former singer whose real name is Robert Kyagulanyi, is a prominent critic of President Yoweri Museveni’s government and has faced numerous arrests and alleged human rights abuses in the past.

He made a failed bid for the presidency in 2021 against Museveni, who is serving a sixth term in power.

Wine’s previous arrests and detentions have sparked protests by his supporters. 

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