MUST READ:
Have death squads come to Uganda???? MP Kyanjo suspects poisoning for his illness
https://watchmanafrica.blogspot.com/2012/10/have-death-squads-come-to-uganda-mp.html
Friends seek Shs105m to save ex-MP Kyanjo
https://www.monitor.co.ug/uganda/news/national/friends-seek-shs105m-to-save-ex-mp-kyanjo-3786148
What you need to know:
- A post that has been widely shared on social media stated that Mr Kyanjo is battling cancer, and asked friends and well-wishers to contribute money for the treatment.
Friends of Mr Hussein Kyanjo, the former Makindye West MP, have launched a fundraising drive to collect $30,000 (about Shs105 million) for his cancer treatment.
It is not clear what type of cancer the former legislator is suffering from.
A post that has been widely shared on social media stated that Mr Kyanjo is battling cancer, and asked friends and well-wishers to contribute money for the treatment.
“Hon Kyanjo was poisoned and now fighting cancer. $30,000 is urgently needed for his cancer treatment. Help to save his life please. Join the fundraising event tomorrow (Sunday April 17) on zoom at 3pm UK time (5pm Uganda time),” the notice reads.
Said organisers
Listed on the zoom meeting as chief fundraisers are Mr Imam Kasozi, Sheikh Nkata, Mr Shaikh Mafo and Mr Asuman Basalirwa, the Bugiri Municipality MP.
We were unable to get a comment from Mr Basalirwa as his known mobile phone numbers were switched off by press time.
Mr Kasozi declined to offer any explanation on the drive and the state of Mr Kyanjo’s health, saying he was not the one who posted the notice and would not be drawn into any discussions.
He also said the post is an old one and that a new post has since been shared.
“Am I the one who shared that post? I cannot comment on something I did not share, so go and ask the person who did,” he said.
Asked how his name and phone contact ended on the said notice if he is not part of the organisers, Mr Kasozi said: “That is an old post and there is a new one. Go and look for the new one and when you read it, you can call me back and ask the questions.”
However, according to the information on the notice, the post was dated April 16, and when asked to share the new post, Mr Kasozi declined.
KYANJO’S HEALTH CONDITION
Mr Hussein Kyanjo’s first openly spoke about his health condition in an interview with Daily Monitor in May 2014 after he had been in and out of hospital for about two years.
Mr Kyanjo said he had travelled to Johannesburg, South Africa, for Parliament business in early 2011 when two days into the trip, he realised he was struggling to speak.
He said by the time he went to see the doctor, who could not identify the problem, he had some missing teeth and thought it was one of the problems.
Mr Kyanjo, however, said when he went for that (check), it was not part of the problem until he went to an Iranian-owned hospital in Dubai.
“There, they diagnosed me with a disease called dystonia. They said it was a rare stubborn disease; it resists drugs and is very disturbing to one who has it. They gave me some drugs which I started using but also referred me to a London hospital where they said it was going to be better for me,” he said.
Mr Kyanjo said doctors told him his condition could have been caused by any of three factors, an inheritance of the disease, effects of a serious accident or poison.
“I checked and found I could not have inherited it because no one has suffered from such a disease in our family. It also cannot have been caused by an accident because I have never been involved in any. So, I was left with one possibility—poisoning,” the former MP said then.
MP Kyanjo opens up on his ‘poison’ scare
https://www.monitor.co.ug/uganda/magazines/life/mp-kyanjo-opens-up-on-his-poison-scare-1571450
What you need to know:
ORDEAL. His sickness started with small pain in the mouth and he now labours to speak. Hussein Kyanjo, Makindye West MP managed to chat with Charles M. Mpagi on how he got into that state of health and how he copes.
His gaze is strained, the speech laboured. In fact, keeping a conversation for longer than half an hour let alone an hour with Hussein Kyanjo, the Makindye West MP, feels like such a sadistic act.
Yet, he does not flinch nor complain, much as every word drawn out of
his mouth is an effort and the man who sits behind a simply furnished
office in room 308 of the East Wing of Parliament building looks like a
total stranger to the smiling portrait that sits at the far corner
of his office.
Hussein Kyanjo, the shadow minister in charge of the Presidency was until two and a half years ago one of the brightest lights of the 9th Parliament. Five years in the 8th Parliament had shaped a man who cut his teeth in politics through the now banned open air live broadcast radio debates popularly known as Bimeeza. He had metamorphosed into one of the finest and some would say hardest hitting legislators Uganda has known.
Humble to a fault, Kyanjo, the only MP representing the Justice Forum Party (JEEMA) in the August House was one of the most vicious opposition figures, the position enhanced by his sobriety in approach to legislative issues and yet very uncompromising.
He tells me in the first comprehensive interview he has offered since, of how he enhanced his position by being an avid reader to become a knowledgeable legislator.
“I managed to become a good legislator through reading a lot of literature. Parliament has a lot of material to read and I made it a point to read extensively,” he says.
How then did he fall silent?
Kyanjo, says he had
travelled to Johannesburg South Africa for Parliament business in early
2011 when two days into the trip, he woke up to realise he was
struggling to speak.
“I started feeling something in my tongue and I was failing in my speech. I thought it was something small. I had gone to South Africa with Amuriat Oboi of the FDC who represents Kumi County. I couldn’t speak well and I thought it was something small that could be fixed easily by a doctor on return home.
I went to see the doctor but he could not identify what my problem was. I had some missing teeth and I thought it was one of the problems, but when I went for that (check), it was not part of the problem until I went to an Iranian-owned hospital in Dubai. There, they diagnosed me with a disease called dystonia.
Diagnosed
They said it was a rare stubborn
disease; it resists drugs and is very disturbing to one who has it. They
gave me some drugs which I started using but also referred me to a
London hospital where they said it was going to be better for me.
So, when I returned, I went to the Speaker and explained to her my ordeal and she gave me a go ahead and Parliament sponsored me to go to the University Hospital of London where I have been getting treatment for the last two and a half years.”
Kyanjo says he now has to travel to London every three months to get two toxin injections on the lower part of his jaws to keep the muscles in shape.
Kyanjo says doctors told him his condition could have been caused by any of three factors, an inheritance of the disease, effects of a serious accident or poison.
“I checked and found I could not have inherited it because no one has
suffered from such a disease in our family. It also cannot have been
caused by an accident because I have never been involved in any. So, I
was left with one possibility—poisoning.”
Kyanjo says during a typical attack, he keeps fighting not to swallow his tongue.
Struggling to cope
But the treatment has enabled
him resume work and we conducted our interview in his Parliament office.
As soon as we were done, he headed straight to a committee meeting.
Evidently frail from the battering of two years of incapacity, Kyanjo
believes he “ate” the poison responsible for his current condition but
cannot point to a specific source or motive.
“I believe I ate the poison in Kampala, but I can’t tell where before I went to South Africa,” Kyanjo says.
He suspects a political motive and says the strike came after his very visible role in heated oil bribery claims that rocked Parliament at the turn of 2011.
He says he had been warned before by supporters and admirers to watch where and what he ate but he took no caution believing he did not have such avowed enemies as would want to take his life.
“But now I carry my own food wherever I go,” he said.
But searching for a motive can easily lead to a wild chase, though, Parliament is no stranger to such claims.
Similar claims
In December 2012, youthful
Butaleja MP Cerinah Nebanda died under controversial circumstances. In a
recently published book, US researcher and writer Helen Epstein
broaches the idea Nebanda was poisoned.
Though her former boyfriend
Adam Suleiman Kalungi is serving a jail term for causing her involuntary
death questions that led to the jailing of MPs—Chris Baryomunsi, a
professional medical practitioner and a seasoned pathologist at Mulago
Sam Onzivua —over the controversial postmortem, has kept questions
lingering.
It was former coordinator of intelligence agencies, now a dissident exiled in London Gen David Sejusa who claimed last year that Nebanda was a victim of an “assassination”. According to Sejusa, others were in line for a similar fate if they had not succumbed already.
Having fallen ill by the time of the Nebanda death debate in Parliament, Kyanjo’s situation was a reference highlighted by his colleagues in Parliament especially those on the opposition side. However, Kyanjo is reluctant to point fingers.
Serving last term in Parliament
His unfortunate
situation has not, in his view, diminished his support in Makindye West,
since regaining some strength and mobility, he has been engaging in
constituency work as well as Parliamentary responsibilities to his best.
“My constituents have been very understanding. I thank God for them, ” he says. “It is very humbling to see so many people coming to my home to offer support, they have reduced the traditional demands on an MP by more than 80 per cent, now instead of me giving them, they are the ones who are giving me support.
“The other day, an old woman came to visit me at home and I was humbled when she pulled out Shs10, 000 and gave it to me.”
However, Kyanjo says he is serving his last term, a decision he says he made years ago.
“It
has nothing to do with what happened to me. I made a decision to serve
only two terms and I will not be seeking re-election in 2016. I think
two terms are enough, I will go back to business,” he said.
A husband
and father, Kyanjo says apart from supporters, he has leaned on a very
supportive family and is grateful to Parliament for the timely
assistance that has kept him alive where he thought he would have died.
WHAT IS DYSTONIA?
The online encyclopedia,
Wikipedia defines dystonia as “a neurological movement disorder, in
which sustained muscle contractions cause twisting and repetitive
movements or abnormal postures.
The disorder may be hereditary or caused by other factors such as birth-related or other physical trauma, infection, poisoning (e.g., lead poisoning) or reaction to pharmaceutical drugs, particularly neuroleptics.”
How it affects
The US based National Centre for
Biotechnology Information (NCBI) says dystonia is “usually a lifelong
condition with persistent pain and disability. Focal dystonia affects a
single part of the body; generalised dystonia can affect most or all of
the body.”
