"Amin, humiliated by Entebbe, ordered mockers to be shot’

Press, 5 July 1977, Page 8

"Amin, humiliated by Entebbe, ordered mockers to be shot’

NZPA-Reuter London The Ugandan Minister of .Justice at the time of the Entebbe raid said yesterday that President Idi Amin was so angry after the raid that he ordered people suspected of laughing at him to be shot.

Mr Godfrey Lule. who is--42, said in an interview pubIshed in the "Daily Mirror”: ‘ Idi Amin was like a wild animal after the Israeli raid on Entebbe Airport. The Ugandan people on the other hand were delighted that their ruler had been humiliated." Mr Lule. who was Justice Minister for four years, publicly announced his defection in London last week. He said tha,t President Amin heard that Ugandans were poking fun at him because of the raid and ordered his troops to arrest anyone found laughing at him in the streets. Mr Lule said he saw a group of about 50 people, who had been joking together, arrested at the central bus station in Kampala and "shortly afterwards I learned that they had all been shot."

"Reports suggested that altogether as many as 200: or 300 were rounded up, but I cannot say how many, were shot,” he said. Mr Lule said the only man ]■ in the Entebbe control tower at the time of the raid wasi killed by the Israelis, but: President Amin ordered three off-dutv controllers toi be shot. Two officials of the meteorological office, which ! is at the airport, were also executed, he said. Mr Lule also told independent Television News of! seeing a torture chamber: and estimated that more than 100.000 Ugandans had now been killed. Only President Amin had the power to intervene to prevent torture or killing, said Mr Lule. Asked why he stayed tor so long as a Minister, hei said: “In Uganda you can do

one of two difficult choices] — either remain or run out| of the country as 1 have] done now-. “You cannot resign and 1 you cannot oppose.” Mr Lule. now living in southern England with his wife and seven children, said he had once been shown a torture chamber by a policeman who explained to him the use of the instruments of torture. The visit to the prison was unofficial and he saw nobody tortured. Asked why, as Justice] Minister, he did not try to] stop the bloodshed he re-1 plied: “No-one could — except Amin.” Mr Lule escaped from! Uganda two months ago' when he went to Geneva to] present his country’s case ] before the United Nations] Human Rights Commission. .