Prominent Ugandan opposition politician Kizza Besigye has appeared in a military court in Kampala after his wife said he had been kidnapped in neighbouring Kenya.
Besigye, 68, a doctor and critic of President Yoweri Museveni, was brought to the Makindye General Court Martial under a heavily armed military escort on Wednesday.
His lawyer Erias Lukwago told the AFP news agency that Besigye appeared in the dock with Hajji Lutale Kamulegeya, another opposition figure.
Lukwago said the two men were accused of being in possession of two pistols and soliciting “logistical support in Uganda, Greece and other countries with the aim of compromising the country’s national security”.
“[Besigye] has denied the charges and challenged the court’s jurisdiction to try him, and he has been remanded to Luzira Prison until December 2,” he added.
Earlier, Winnie Byanyima had called on the Ugandan government to release her husband immediately.
In a post on X, Byanyima, who is the executive director of the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV and AIDS, said Besigye was kidnapped on Saturday while he was in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, to attend a book launch of another politician.
“I am now reliably informed that he is in a military jail in Kampala,” she wrote. “We his family and his lawyers demand to see him. He is not a soldier. Why is he being held in a military jail?”
The Ugandan military has not commented on the incident. But Chris Baryomunsi, Uganda’s information minister, said the Ugandan government does not carry out abductions, and any arrests abroad would be made in collaboration with a host country.
“So being arrested from Kenya should not be a problem. The assurance we give the country is that the [Ugandan] government does not arrest somebody and keeps him or her incommunicado for a long time,” he told Uganda’s public broadcaster.
However, Korir Singoei, Kenya’s principal secretary of foreign affairs, told local media that Kenya was not involved in the incident.
In July, Kenyan authorities arrested 36 members of Besigye’s Forum for Democratic Change party, one of Uganda’s main opposition groups.
They were then deported to Uganda, where they were indicted on charges related to “terrorism”.
Besigye has been arrested numerous times over the years. He was once Museveni’s personal doctor in the 1980s during Uganda’s civil war between government and rebel forces but later became an outspoken critic and political opponent.
He has run against Museveni, who has ruled the East African country since 1986, four times. He lost all the elections but rejected the results and alleged fraud and voter intimidation.
Over the decades, Museveni’s government has been accused of repeated human rights violations against opposition leaders and supporters, including illegal detentions, torture and extrajudicial killings.
Authorities in Uganda have rejected these accusations, saying those arrested are held legally and are given due process in the judicial system.
