Playboy Interview: Henry Kyemba

As we go to press, Henry Kyemba (pronounced Chemba) is hardly a household name in the United States. In Uganda, however, he was just that, since only former president Milton Obote and his notorious successor, Idi Amin, are better known. Americans, too, are about to get to know him better. He has written the first authoritative inside account of Amin's brutal rule, "State of Blood," published in September by Grosset & Dunlap and Ace Books.

Kyemba's story is extraordinary. Born in 1939, he met Amin as a teenager, when the latter was a bright, eager-to-please soldier in Uganda's then-British King's Rifles. After graduating from Makerere University, Kyemba joined the civil service. Then, at the age of 22, he was appointed to the office of the prime minister, Obote, in whose service he saw the independence of Uganda's 11,000,000 people in 1962.

During the next nine years, as Uganda's new democracy was undermined by tribal rivalries and by Obote's increasingly oppressive attempts to retain control, Kyemba got to know Amin well. "Amin couldn't read or write," Kyemba recalls of that period, "but he was delightful to work with. He seemed naïve, but people underestimated him. Here he was, operating a giant gunrunning organization, sending convoys of trucks across central Africa and happily skimming the cream off the operation. He used to bank wads of cash, up to $100,000 at a time. He was, I saw, not only outwardly charming; he was also canny, unscrupulous and dangerous."

In 1971, Amin seized power when Obote was absent in Singapore. Kyemba, as one of Obote's senior officials, was with him when the news came through aboard the plane on the return flight. Kyemba called Amin from Dar es Salaam to ask if he could return home. "We're all celebrating," Amin bawled into the telephone. "When are you coming?" and promised to send a car to the airport to pick him up. When Kyemba arrived, the first thing Amin asked was, "Did you remember to bring me something from Singapore?" Kyemba had and, having passed that odd test of loyally, was offered the job of Amin's principal private secretary. In short order, Kyemba became a ministerial deputy, minister of culture and minister of health.

In the next six years, Amin's extraordinary personality, unrestrained by any authority, found true expression. The major accusations against him have been widely reported in the press. But until now, there have been few eyewitness reports to confirm the details--and none at all by any who were also high in Amin's confidence through the years of terror that continue to the present day.

Kyemba, who says he did not dare resign for fear of his life, watched as the number of bodies bobbing in the Nile began to grow daily--and resulted in estimates of 150,000 killed; as orders were given in his presence to give someone "the VIP treatment"--death by torture; as Amin's barbarities became more and more gruesome. Eventually, he realized that his knowledge made him vulnerable. When the Anglican archbishop of Uganda, Janani Luwuum, was killed on February 17, 1977, along with two of Kyemba's Cabinet colleagues, Kyemba realized that simply not resigning--and not speaking out against the atrocities--was no safeguard for him. His rationale for having served Amin for six years--as well as his motives for finally deciding to flee--may fairly be questioned; but by early 1977, one thing was clear to him: No one in Uganda was secure. So he began to plan his escape from the country.

First, he made sure that his friends and colleagues believed his future lay in Uganda: He made a down payment on a car and dropped other hints of that nature. He planned his getaway for the time he was scheduled to be in Geneva in May 1977 for the annual meeting of the World Health Organization, of which he was a vice-president. While he was there, rumors of Kyemba's plans reached Amin, who immediately placed his family under arrest. That included one of his two wives (polygamy is still a common practice in Uganda) and his two children; his other wife had accompanied him to Geneva.

Kyemba had built up a system of contacts within the Amin administration and was secretly told what had happened. He immediately called Amin from Geneva to say that he, too, had heard rumors of his defection but pointed out that he still in charge of his delegation and that he had no intention of defecting. Kyemba then held a press conference, praised Amin publicly and denied the rumors.

Mollified, Amin released his family. By prearrangement, they found their way to the border and slipped across to Kenya on foot. Kyemba was told his family was safe, flew to London (not before being spotted by an Amin agent at a stopover in Paris) and went into hiding. He revealed his defection in two articles for the London Sunday Times on June 5 and June 12. Amin then had the Ugandan radio announce that Kyemba had embezzled government funds--almost standard procedure, since the last two defecting ministers had been accused of the same thing by Amin.

Shortly after Kyemba went public and vowed to tell the complete story of Amin's regime, the heads of the Commonwealth nations then gathered in London agreed on a sharply worded denunciation of Amin. Kyemba's refusal to be cowed--as other defecting officials had been--by Amin's threats to his friends and relatives remaining in Uganda made the former minister of health well known in Europe. It was then that John Man, a former correspondent with Reuters and, more recently, a Time-Life Books editor in London and New York, got together with Kyemba and they decided to write a book of his experiences.

Playboy contacted Man in London and, despite a hectic schedule--the book was written in five weeks--Man and Kyemba agreed to set time aside for this interview. It was a deadline dash for Playboy as well, with the manuscript being couriered across the Atlantic and subsequent questions being telephoned just days before this issue went to press. Man's report:

"When I met Henry for the first time, I knew why this project was bound to happen. He is calm, dignified, unflappable. He has a reassuringly slow blink that takes the panic out of life. He wasn't exactly worried about security, was he? No, he said, but working in isolation wouldn't be a bad idea.

"Perfect. I found an apartment in the quiet Victoriana of North Oxford and hired a battery of typists, tape recorders and transcription machines. Henry and his junior wife, Teresa (who by then had joined him with their children), moved to Oxford from their hiding place in London. We started taping on July first. One month and 60 hours of tape later, we finished: the inside story of Idi Amin."

"The first thing Amin did when he heard there had been an attack on Entebbe was to hide inside his driver's quarters near his residence."

[Q] Playboy: You were Amin's minister of health and worked with him closely between the time he came to power in 1971 and your defection this year. If you were faced with the task of bringing Amin before a court of law, what would be the nature of the evidence against him?

[A] Kyemba: It is very difficult to gather any evidence of the various crimes that Amin has committed, by the very nature of his regime. The atrocities are carried out on Amin's verbal instructions only. There are no formal arrests, no written statements, no record of the police officers or troops involved, no record of the cars used. The people who do the killing are mostly foreigners, recruited especially in the southern Sudan. They have no personal responsibilities to Uganda or Ugandans. They dispose of the bodies in rivers, in forests, in swamps.

[Q] Playboy: You mean there is no documentary evidence at all?

[A] Kyemba: Not much. Some evidence is available in hospitals--post-mortem reports of bullet-ridden and mutilated bodies. However, at the moment, even ordinary records of a personal nature in hospitals cannot be produced, because nobody's ready to do it. Even then, there's hardly anything that points directly to Amin. When he tells you to do something and it has repercussions that turn against him, he will be the first to deny any responsibility. On more than one occasion, when the accusations against him have been particularly intense, he has merely blamed a subordinate publicly--and that person then has to flee for his life, even though he was following Amin's personal orders.

[Q] Playboy: You do have documentary evidence, though, don't you?

[A] Kyemba: Yes. I think I'm one of the few with hard evidence.

[Q] Playboy: Let's take one case with which Americans are familiar--Dora Bloch, the British-Israeli grandmother who was one of the hostages at Entebbe. What do you know for certain about her fate?

[A] Kyemba: I can tell you that Amin personally told me to forge the evidence surrounding her death--the hospital records, her diet and treatment papers. I did as he ordered and I had the hospital staff forge the material but kept the originals. Then there are the possessions of Mrs. Bloch: her dress, her handbag, her cane. There is very little Amin can do to destroy that evidence.

[Q] Playboy: You've had it hidden?

[A] Kyemba: Yes. I know where it is. I may be asked to produce it for an international court someday.

[Q] Playboy: What else do you know about what happened to her?

[A] Kyemba: Amin put me in charge of the hostages' medical condition, so when Mrs. Bloch was brought to the hospital with some food lodged in her throat, I went to visit her after our doctors had operated to remove the obstruction. We spoke only briefly--she asked me if I could tell the guard outside her room to stop staring at her--but I felt a sympathy for her. She reminded me of my own mother.

It was that night that I received word of the fighting at the airport. There was nothing to do but make a few calls to relatives, who knew even less than I, and await developments in the morning. That's what happened all over Kampala that night--officers and government officials simply went into hiding at their homes or elsewhere, until they could make sure it wasn't another coup. Incidentally, that night, even Amin went into hiding. I was told by a reliable source that the first thing he did when he heard there had been an attack on Entebbe was to hide inside his driver's quarters near his residence, the State House.

The next morning, amid reports of the dead and wounded at the airport, the truth came out--that Israeli commandos had successfully taken away all but one hostage--except for two hostages who were killed in the raid. I began to worry about Mrs. Bloch's safety. I went to the hospital, where Mrs. Bloch had heard nothing. She simply asked me if she could wash the dress she had been wearing for the past couple of days.

I heard what happened after I left the hospital. Two men from Amin's State Research squad--his official killers--arrived. I understood one man was Major Farouk Minawa, the effective head of the bureau, and another was Captain Nasur Ondoga, Amin's chief of protocol. They shouted to the hospital staff to stand back, marched into Mrs. Bloch's room and dragged her, screaming, down the hall and outside. Everyone watching knew that she was going to her execution. Nobody did anything, because interfering meant death, and public kidnapings were an everyday thing in Kampala.

That night, Amin called me to discuss the injuries sustained during the raid and at the end of the conversation, he said casually, "Oh, by the way, that woman in the hospital: Don't worry about her. She has been killed."

[Q] Playboy: What did you say to Amin?

[A] Kyemba: I said, "Oh, dear." By them, I had become very used to keeping my reactions to myself. Privately, I was horrified. It was the next day that Amin ordered me to falsify the records, even though it had become public knowledge that Mrs. Bloch had been murdered. Her half-burned body showed up about 20 miles outside Kampala by the roadside. Hundreds of people saw it, because her white hair made the body identifiable. One of those who saw her was a famous Ugandan photographer, Jimmy Parma, who worked for the government newspaper and until that time had been accorded privileged status. He made the mistake of photographing Mrs. Bloch's corpse. He was picked up soon afterward. His body was found later on. He had been shot and stabbed repeatedly.

[Q] Playboy: You say you're the only one who knows where the evidence surrounding Mrs. Bloch's murder is----

[A] Kyemba: I don't think more than one other person knows.

[Q] Playboy: What we were going to ask is how much evidence there is for all the other random murders that have apparently occurred in Uganda. Some estimates have put the figure as high as 150,000 deaths.

[A] Kyemba: That is my estimate, too. But the sad thing is that the evidence is hard to find. Even my own brother disappeared. Why he was arrested I never knew. He worked for a textile firm and I got the news that he was arrested only as a personal favor. A friend called to tell me that my brother had been placed in the infamous Naguru prison and that the guards were going around killing prisoners indiscriminately. There was no chance that he survived. The man who told me that is still around in Uganda, but it is impossible to provide any conclusive evidence. Nobody is prepared to say who did what.

[Q] Playboy: Still, with a system that can dispose of 150,000 people, surely something will come out to prove it happened under Amin's orders.

[A] Kyemba: Well, there are thousands of bodies that can be dug up as soon as Amin goes. How would anyone explain thousands of corpses in the swamps between Masaka and Kampala, at Mutukula, at Jinja, at Mbarara? And the bodies the crocodiles miss, swept up onto the banks of the Nile? Many gruesome relics will be there for years as evidence of his murderous regime.

As for responsibility, if Amin isn't responsible, no one is. His killers don't owe their loyalty to anyone else. They are armed by him and carry out those things on his orders.

[Q] Playboy: Besides Amin himself, will the people who committed these atrocities be around to answer for them?

[A] Kyemba: That is another difficulty. Amin's official killers--and there are almost 20,000 of them--are foreigners, by and large. The few who have got any roots in Uganda and who are big murderers will be among those first to flee as soon as Amin goes. The southern Sudanese who are doing the killing have got their homes over the border in Khartoum and Juba. They go to Uganda to do their jobs and they return. There is no way of getting them arrested.

[Q] Playboy: How are the southern Sudanese recruited?

[A] Kyemba: It's easy. Their countrymen have for three generations or so provided the bulk of the army and the police. The British brought them in and they formed their own community in Uganda. The Ugandan southern Sudanese are known as Nubians. All that happens if Amin wants more men is that lorries drive over the border--it's quite open and patrolled, anyway, only by the southern Sudanese themselves, because the southern Sudan has been in revolt against Khartoum for some 20 years. It's almost autonomous. The lorries, full of hardened southern Sudanese, drive to the men's home areas and drop them off overnight. The troops themselves do the recruiting with promises of luxury goods and easy cash. The next morning, the lorries return, pick up the old hands and the new recruits and drive back into Uganda.

[Q] Playboy: Which means Amin has an almost unlimited supply of men for the army, police and terror bureaus.

[A] Kyemba: That's right. Especially his main terror unit, the State Research Bureau. Under Obote, by the way, it really was for state research. University theses were submitted to that bureau. Amin expanded it to a military-intelligence and secret-police operation, which provides his bodyguards. It must have trained 10,000 to 12,000 killers by now.

[Q] Playboy: It was one of those mercenaries who spotted you when you were fleeing Uganda, wasn't it?

[A] Kyemba: Yes; I was changing planes in Paris and he spotted me.

[Q] Playboy: What was he doing there?

[A] Kyemba: Oh, he was one of the two embassy thugs. There are two in most embassies. They work together to keep an eye on diplomatic personnel for Amin. They're called two-by-twos. This two-by-two spotted me and thought to himself, What's Kyemba doing off by himself away from his job? and called his pal in Paris, who called Amin with the advice that if he were to check up on me, he might find something of interest. Then----

[Q] Playboy: How do you know?

[A] Kyemba: What?

[Q] Playboy: How do you know he got that message to Amin?

[A] Kyemba: I can't tell you.

[Q] Playboy: Why not?

[A] Kyemba: How do you think I get a lot of my information? I have my contacts; I can't tell you where they work or what areas they work in. It would endanger them. As it is, I get the news direct, often before Amin himself knows. There's quite a bit in my book that will be news to Amin. He'll have someone read it to him, you know--he can hardly read it for himself.

[Q] Playboy: Will he have someone read this interview to him?

[A] Kyemba: Oh, sure. Perhaps we could arrange for him to be sent a complimentary copy.

[Q] Playboy: Let's go back to the time you first became involved with Amin. You became his principal private secretary after he seized power in 1971. When do you recall first becoming aware that Amin wasn't the buffoon the press was making him out to be?

[A] Kyemba: From the very first, I saw the brutal side of his nature. When I got back to Kampala after the coup--I had been on a mission to Singapore with former president Milton Obote--I knew that some military operations were being carried out under Amin's orders. I was with Amin when reports of killings were telephoned to him. I remember, in particular, one pathetic case--the conductor of the police band, Mohammed Oduka.

[Q] Playboy: What happened to him?

[A] Kyemba: He had been implicated in the plot to overthrow Obote and had fled to Kenya. Since he was supposedly on the "right" side, he was persuaded to return by one of Amin's boys with the promise of a friendly reception. Upon arrival, he was taken to see Amin. The new president met him at the command post and then ordered him to be taken to make a statement and released. Amin drove from the command post to his new office, where he told me of the meeting. Just then, the chief medical officer telephoned him. Amin turned to me and said coldly, "Oduka is dead." Just like that! About a man whom he had welcomed back as a friend just an hour before! Now, who is responsible for that? Not the chief medical officer, certainly.

[Q] Playboy: Did that sort of behavior indicate to you that Amin would be capable of such actions toward the civilian population?

[A] Kyemba: Not really. The killings were mostly in the barracks. He used to tell us they were mopping up a few guerrillas recruited by Obote. And I believed him--we all did. Obote was obviously very bitter about the coup and we thought he was trying as hard as he could to re-establish himself in the country. The first civilian killing that shocked me was that of Michael Kagwa, who was then president of the industrial court [a court for settling industrial disputes between employers and trade unions]. He was friendly with Amin and Amin used to call him at his office from time to time when I was there; but Amin had designs on Kagwa's girlfriend. Kagwa was picked up at a Kampala swimming pool. He was shot and his body dumped and burned on the outskirts of the capital. That was in September 1971. It shook me.

[Q] Playboy: When did it become apparent that Amin's killings were not individual cases but mass murder?

[A] Kyemba: That was not until late 1972.

[Q] Playboy: And you started to see bodies at that stage?

[A] Kyemba: Everybody started to see bodies. There were so many that they couldn't be buried, so they were dumped into the Nile. The main road that connects Kampala and Jinja passes over the River Nile. Thousands of people passed that place every day. Time and again, you would find bodies floating down from the source of the Nile, through the dam, and piling up in the still waters on one side. There was a boat on full-time duty removing the bodies. You would find people physically lifting those rotten, bal-looned-out bodies from the river.

[Q] Playboy: Why do you think they were thrown into the river rather than into the lake?

[A] Kyemba: That was one of the stupid things that Amin's boys did. Obviously, they thought that by dumping them into the river they would be eaten quickly by the crocodiles. They did not realize that once they dumped the bodies in such numbers, the crocodiles could not eat them all. Nor did they think that the bodies would be floating, all puffed up, to the surface. I saw bodies that were left on the riverside for days, because people became hardened to the sight. Then Amin announced on the Ugandan radio that all those bodies must be removed by the police as soon as they appeared. He accused the police of being lazy because they were not removing them fast enough!

[Q] Playboy: Didn't he raise the question of why there were bodies there at all?

[A] Kyemba: No. Absolutely extraordinary. There were a number of commissioners of police at that time. They were fired, one after the other, for failure to make sure that the bodies were removed as quickly as they appeared. It became a serious political issue. Not a legal one, of course, just political. Tourists were passing through, and that made it hard for Amin to deny that the bodies actually existed. There were complaints that hydroelectric facilities at the dam were being clogged up. Can you believe it?

[The phone rings and Kyemba retires to a corner, laughing uproariously on occasion. After five minutes or so, he comes back.]

[A] Kyemba: This is amazing.

[Q] Playboy: What?

[A] Kyemba: That was a friend of mine, telling me of an interesting piece of information from contacts in Kampala. Amin has apparently heard that I am writing this book and being interviewed. He's just accused me on the radio, saying that I was responsible for the shortages of drugs in his hospitals, because I had embezzled 1,000,000 shillings [$125,000].

[Q] Playboy: Hasn't he made that accusation before?

[A] Kyemba: No, no. When I first left, before I even left Geneva, he accused me of taking 300,000 shillings. Later on, when he was trying to inveigle me back, he changed his mind and said, no--he had given me 30,000 shillings for medical treatment. Now he says it was 1,000,000! Still, I don't hold the record. When the ministers of finance and industry defected, he said they had taken 6,000,000 shillings each. Perhaps I should be flattered that he thinks me so honest! You think that's odd? Just listen to what else my friend told me---

[Q] Playboy: Just a minute. To set the record straight, did you take any money with you?

[A] Kyemba: Of course not. If I had been funneling any money out of the country or had even withdrawn my own savings, Amin would have known and I would never have left Uganda at all. I was careful to withdraw only my official allowance of $100 a day. When I came to England, all I had was $2000 in an English bank--which was, in fact, a personal gift Amin himself made on a foreign trip two years before. All I have to live on is the fees for the interview with the London Sunday Times and the income from my book. It won't last forever but long enough, I hope, for me to get back to Uganda under a different regime.

[Q] Playboy: All right, you were telling us what else your contact just told you.

[A] Kyemba: You remember Amin had four wives until March 1974, when he divorced three at once--Malyamu, Kay and Nora. It was announced they had commercial interests--that was the supposed reason he divorced them. Now I've just learned the truth. There is apparently no limit to the number of Amin's girlfriends. He has literally dozens, and that severely limited his ability to satisfy the women who were married to him. For months and months, he ignored his first three wives to live with wife number for, Medina. Naturally, the others were very unhappy.

[Q] Playboy: Frustrated?

[A] Kyemba: Very frustrated. They were all very good-looking women in the prime of life, who could have had any man they wanted. The three women, in their boredom and frustration, all took lovers. Then one night they threw a party for their men and other friends. Amin's bodyguards, afraid he would discover what was going on and blame them, told the president. He was furious and phoned his rebellious wives. They had the courage to tell him to go to hell! Literally! They were pretty drunk. He threatened to throw them out. They told him to do his worst, ordered the bodyguards to leave and barred the house. The next day, he announced the divorces. Amazing. I knew Malyamu well, but for some reason, she never told me about it all.

[Q] Playboy: Let's get back to where we were before that phone call. Aside from the mass murders, what has happened to Uganda since Amin took power?

[A] Kyemba: The whole country is devastated. Amin has no interest in bureaucracy. He has destroyed much of the economy by handing out the businesses of the 50,000 Asians who were thrown out of the country in 1972. That was, in effect, the whole of Uganda's middle class. Factories closed. Businesses were looted. Money was seized. Shortages grew. It's impossible these days to get bread, butter, sugar, tea--even the tea; Amin exports what little we grow to finance his luxuries. All the coffee we grow is exported. You can't buy it in the shops.

It is so tragic. We had a country that was fertile, well provided with industry. The whole nation is running down. Kampala--a beautifully laid out, spacious place, and what is it now? Windows are broken, paint is peeling. You can't get light bulbs, cars, bicycles, clothes. Anything you have is stolen. The place is rotten, diseased, by that cancer at its head.

[Q] Playboy: You must have seen all that coming. Did you keep notes, make a record?

[A] Kyemba: I am a historian by training, but it is very difficult to write anything down. I tried to write a book before I left Uganda, some years ago, and had to abandon it. Anything I put down could easily have been misunderstood if it were reported to Amin. In fact, I was later proved right, because Denis Hills was arrested for doing nothing else than preparing a manuscript for his book, The White Pumpkin. [Denis Hills is the English author who was condemned to death by Amin for calling him a "village tyrant" in a draft manuscript. He was saved after the intercession of the queen.]

[Q] Playboy: And the fact that you were writing something down would have made Amin suspicious?

[A] Kyemba: Absolutely. He doesn't believe that anyone can do anything innocent. Anything written is evidence and suspect. Partly, of course, it's a personal threat: He can't read at all well. So there are few government records. Amin administers the whole country by interview and radio announcement. So when the history of the past six years in Uganda comes to be written, it will be hearsay.

[Q] Playboy: That's the case with your own book, State of Blood. You've relied heavily on the experiences of other people and what they have told you.

[A] Kyemba: That's true. And that's why it is so important, as far as I am concerned, that I put down in writing what I know and do so with the maximum effect possible. Many of my brothers and sisters, friends, fellow Ugandans, really know little of what is happening in Uganda. Which means that information outside is pretty shaky, too. There is nothing objective that can be sent out. Amin himself approves every news bulletin. A few journalists are invited in, but if Amin finds that they are independent-minded, they never have a second visit. There are no foreign newspapers. No foreign correspondents--except a Tass man--none even from African countries. The whole country is a closed society; it exists for Amin alone.

[Q] Playboy: By 1973, you, as a Cabinet minister, knew the nature of his regime. How were you able to continue serving him?

[A] Kyemba: It was a most agonizing decision I had to make. I certainly had a fairly good idea of what Amin was doing in the country; I had known friends and relatives murdered; I had known many of the innocent who had died. I had no ambition to serve. In fact, on a number of occasions, I almost wondered why God had not given Amin the idea of firing me. I remember very clearly one day when I was driving between Kampala and Jinja; about ten miles out, a newscaster started reading out a list of officials who had been sacked. As soon as he started reading the list, I just burst into joyous laughter--I expected my name to be among those fired, 28 in all. Unfortunately, to my great disappointment, the list ended without my name being mentioned. I was thoroughly depressed. That would have been the only way for me to leave Amin's service. Resignation is impossible. Amin feels he is the one who knows when you are tired, when you are slow, when you should go into retirement; not the other way round.

[Q] Playboy: Your resignation would have implied criticism and therefore put you in danger?

[A] Kyemba: Absolutely. Even up to now, nobody can afford to resign and stay in the country. You post your resignation from abroad and remain where you are.

[Q] Playboy: Has anyone resigned and remained in Uganda?

[A] Kyemba: Only one that I know of--a Nubian--to whom Amin gave a big bakery. For anyone else, it would be suicide. Amin would accuse you of knowing that something was going to happen. "Why are you abandoning the boat?" he would say. "How do you know there is danger? Who have you been plotting with?" Exile is the only answer.

[Q] Playboy: Why did you decide not to go in to exile earlier?

[A] Kyemba: I could have done so, but living in exile is not an easy thing. Have you thought how difficult it is to leave the country you love? Uganda is a beautiful place. I never want to live permanently anywhere else. You remember Churchill called it the Pearl of Africa? More practically, though, if I left, I wanted to ensure that my departure would have maximum effect. And between 1972 and 1974, I was in a relatively minor ministry. My departure would not have made much impact on Amin. It wouldn't have made much difference. Several other senior ministers and officials left about that time and Amin pretended nothing had happened. But the strongest reason for staying was one that now seems wildly optimistic: I thought that because of my personal relationship with Amin, he might listen to what I had to say. I had to consider all those things. I thought I would serve my country better if I remained.

[Q] Playboy: Still, six years is a long time to serve a tyrant whom you knew to be committing mass murders.

[A] Kyemba: Of course it is, too long. I will always have it on my conscience. My reasons for staying were largely selfish ones and so were my reasons for fleeing. On the other hand, don't you think that to parade such guilt is a form of self-indulgence? Lots of officials fled and, by fleeing, ensured that they lacked the knowledge to speak up effectively. For whatever reasons, I have that knowledge. The important thing is that my knowledge should become public, should be turned into an effective weapon against Amin. Should I have fled earlier and spared Amin my revelations? Should I have left that task to someone else? Would there have been someone else? And what would you have said to him? Or to anyone who remained long enough to tell the truth sufficiently strongly to help bring about Amin's downfall? How do you set my private guilt against the public service that I think, I hope, I believe I can now perform? If you've got the answers, you'd better tell me. I'm sure I won't have them for years--if ever.

[Q] Playboy: Did anything happen while you were his minister that justified your decision to serve him? Were you able, in fact, to exercise any moderating influence on him?

[A] Kyemba: Well, just after the coup, when I was his secretary, he consulted me on quite a number of senior appointments in the Cabinet. And it was a good, experienced Cabinet. It took him some time to reduce it to impotence. He also asked me, on a number of occasions, about appointments to various committees. On major issues, he would telephone me and ask me if I had anything to say. I assisted in the drafting of quite a number of communiqués from time to time. So I thought that I could exercise some restraining influence on him.

[Q] Playboy: And did you?

[A] Kyemba: Well, no, not in any significant way. I was wrong. But I am sure I did save a few lives, occasionally, when I knew he was being misinformed about the conduct of certain individuals. I remember once, on tour, one of my colleagues was arrested and accused of certain activities under Obote. I told Amin I didn't think it was true. When we got back, he ordered the police not to bother him any further.

[Q] Playboy: Before deciding to defect, were you ever in any personal danger?

[A] Kyemba: I don't think so. I knew Amin very well; I believed I could read his mind thoroughly and I was able to judge if he was likely to move against me. There was one time in 1975, after my return from China and North Korea, when I suspected that he might be about to move against me. I was held responsible for a shortage of drugs. Somebody told Amin my ministry had millions of shillings in foreign exchange for the importation of drugs, yet I had left the money on deposit in the bank. Fortunately, it was a foolish accusation. The ministry had to buy foreign currency with its local currency and we had none to spare. We were short of drugs because the crown agents in England [a semiofficial body that acts commercially for Commonwealth territories] had stopped handling Ugandan orders unless we paid cash, which we didn't have. I told Amin I would go if my going would save the situation. Within a few days, he started flattering me again, saying how well the ministry was being run again, and the danger receded.

[Q] Playboy: Yet all around you, officials were killed. You list 100 in the dedication to your book whom you knew personally. Why were you able to survive so long?

[A] Kyemba: Well, I possibly presented the least threat.

[Q] Playboy: What do you mean?

[A] Kyemba: I have never had any political ambition. In fact, the last thing I would have wanted was to be a minister under Amin. I was interested in pursuing a professional civil-service career in the old sense of the word. I found myself in a position of trust and I was determined to continue neutral. I gave my advice honestly. But I suppose I was also a natural survivor. When I knew Amin was violent and was not prepared to listen to any advice, I would just keep quiet, whatever my opinion. But if he gave me an opportunity, I was happy to say: I think that is not the way to do it. So he trusted me and I was never a threat.

[Q] Playboy: Through all the horrors you witnessed and heard about, you managed to react uncritically, is that it? Was that what enabled you to survive?

[A] Kyemba: That was absolutely vital with Amin. When Amin is talking, he is also looking at you, and he is terribly suspicious. He is always keen to read your reaction and he is frighteningly astute. If he turns to you and says someone has been shot, he will be watching for your reaction. If you remain impassive, he will suspect you of hiding something. He likes you to be a little shocked. You can say, "Oh, how terrible." But it must be only a personal reaction. You can't imply that he was wrong in his estimations.

Take the case of Archbishop Luwuum, killed in February 1977. You remember he was accused, in the presence of 2000 soldiers and senior officials at that meeting in front of the Nile Hotel, of helping Obote's guerrillas. That was only a couple of hours before he was killed and it was announced that he had died in a motor accident. Well, if Amin had told me the archbishop had plotted against him, I couldn't possibly have said, "What nonsense!" I would have had to show personal shock at the death of the archbishop, but then sympathize with Amin that he had to take the decision, and even admire him for his audacity!

[Q] Playboy: What was your reaction in circumstances like that? You said that when you heard of the death of Mrs. Bloch, you reacted only by saying, "Oh, dear."

[A] Kyemba: That's right. But "Oh, dear," was hardly a reaction. It was a response that I had learned to give to Amin. The only people who witnessed my true feelings about Mrs. Bloch were my wife and a visitor. I took it out on them, shouting about how brutal and stupid Amin was.

[Q] Playboy: Since you lived through the Entebbe raid and had personal contact with Amin during that period, perhaps you can clear up some questions that remain. For instance, despite his claims that he was only mediating, is there any doubt that Amin was supporting the Palestinian hijackers?

[A] Kyemba: No. As his health minister, I was placed in charge of medical treatment for the hostages. Several times, Amin told me, "Well, Kyemba, now I've got these people where I want them. I've got the Israelis fixed up this time." And I remember that he was very enthusiastic when he first called to tell me the hijackers had landed at Entebbe.

[Q] Playboy: And you met the hijackers?

[A] Kyemba: Yes. When I was led to the airport that day, past the Ugandan soldiers, I remember seeing the hostages first. They were a miserable sight. Then I was introduced to the leader of the hijackers--a woman who I later realized was the German terrorist Gabriele. She was very good-looking, about 30. She nearly introduced herself to me by name but then said I should call her Miss Hijacker.

[Q] Playboy: What was the reaction in Kampala to the Israeli raid?

[A] Kyemba: From my own experience, I can tell you that a number of civilian casualties were admitted to my hospitals. They were victims of humiliated troops who had taken to the streets to prove their loyalty and strength. The soldiers had simply beaten up anyone who seemed to be mocking them. I can say also that the grave of Mrs. Bloch has become something of a legend for local villagers. It is located in a grass field not far from Kampala--where, I do not want to say--but the villagers are convinced that the Israelis will return for her remains. One reason I do not want to reveal the grave site is that I think Amin is secretly convinced the Israelis might, in fact, return, and he could have the body disinterred and removed.

[Q] Playboy: Right after you defected, you talked to a London newspaper and one of the things you said was widely quoted because it was so chilling. You said that Amin had told you he had eaten human flesh.

[A] Kyemba: Yes. He has said that to a number of people, including a doctor who nearly collapsed when she heard him say it. He told me on one occasion that the flesh he had consumed was more salty than other meats, something like leopard meat.

[Q] Playboy: You don't think he was saying it for dramatic effect?

[A] Kyemba: I don't believe so. He does lie and dramatize, of course; but he also likes to emphasize his bloodthirstiness and that is just the sort of thing he would boast about. Besides, his tribesmen, the Kakwa, are still very bloodthirsty themselves. There was a case I was told about involving a Kakwa official who shot some poachers in Murchison Falls Park. His driver told me he saw the official stick his knife into the bodies and taste the blood. It is done, I believe, to absorb the dead man's spirit.

[Q] Playboy: Have you personally witnessed any of those barbarisms?

[A] Kyemba: No, but it is common knowledge among Ugandan doctors that many of the bodies dumped into hospital mortuaries are terribly mutilated. Livers, noses, lips, eyes and genitals are often missing. These follow a definite pattern, and it can be safely assumed that the killers have performed these acts on specific instructions. After a foreign-service officer, Godfrey Kiggala, was shot in June 1974, his eyes were gouged out and his body was partially skinned before it was dumped into a wood outside Kampala. Medical reports on the deaths of Shabani Nkutu, the minister of works, and Lieutenant Colonel Ondoga, the minister of foreign affairs, who were killed in January 1973 and March 1974, respectively, stated that the bodies had been cut open and a number of internal organs had been tampered with.

As for the forms of death themselves, the reports of sadism and brutality have not been exaggerated, for the most part. At the prison of Naguru, there is a road that runs alongside the compound; my own bodyguard, Vincent Masiga, lives there. The cries of prisoners can often be heard by the residents nearby. Sometimes, in fact, crowds are permitted to watch executions.

Ali Towelli, the head of the prison, has developed a particularly sadistic form of death. He forces prisoners, on the pretext of saving ammunition, to batter out the brains of another prisoner with a heavy hammer. He promises them they will be reprieved if they do so. The prisoner who has just killed is then killed by yet another prisoner in the same way, with the same promise.

[Q] Playboy: Amin is insane, isn't he? What about the rumors of syphilis, which is supposed to affect the mind in its terminal stages?

[A] Kyemba: Amin has suffered from syphilis; his medical records show it. And one of his girlfriends, a nurse, complained to me that she had been infected by him and rendered infertile. But I see no evidence that the disease is progressive. And even if it is true, it would not explain his behavior. It is not due to brain damage but to a long-term, consistent pattern of brutal behavior.

[Q] Playboy: What about those around him, his friends and family? Are they victims of his brutality as well?

[A] Kyemba: Indeed. I have interviewed all his wives. You remember that I said he had divorced three of his four wives. One of them, Kay, got pregnant shortly before the divorce. She went to her lover, who happened to be a doctor, for an abortion and died on the operating table. The doctor dismembered her, hoping to dispose of the body; then, in despair, he committed suicide. Kay's body was found and taken to the hospital, at which time I was told of the affair.

It was up to me to inform Amin, even before I identified the body. I was shaking. I got to him and said, "Your Excellency, your former wife is dead, and in terrible circumstances, I understand." There was no reaction. He just said, "What has happened?" I said, "The body is in pieces. It's dismembered in my mortuary." He said, "Have you been there?" I said, "No." He said, "You go there and tell me exactly what it is like." I went. It was appalling. The body was neatly severed along the limb joints--the arms and legs in one sack, the torso in another. I returned and told Amin. He was not concerned. He said only, "Oh, is that what has been done? You go home now." Then came that order that still fills me with horror when I think of it, when he called later to say, "Oh, could you arrange to sew back those legs and arms? We'll arrange for the children to see the body tomorrow." The staff did so and the children were brought in. As they witnessed the terrible spectacle, Amin shouted curses at the body and told his children that their mother deserved her fate. Then, after that, Kay was never mentioned. He had, I suppose, loved her. But it was as if she had never been.

[Q] Playboy: Is a man like that capable of human emotions? What did his wives say when you talked with them?

[A] Kyemba: Well, he had appealed to them as a man before they married him, but afterward, he disgusted them. His attitudes are so inhuman. For one thing, he looks on sex as a way of showing his manhood, his power. He talks about "mechanization" as far as sex is concerned. That is the word he normally uses.

[Q] Playboy: Mechanization?

[A] Kyemba: Mechanization. That is it. The sex act with a woman. He looks at it as a mechanical achievement. The machine works and something results--for him, a public display of his manhood. He'll say, "We need some mechanization round here," or, "She's good for mechanization." It is not something that has any emotional import for him. To have a woman means that the machine is working all right.

[Q] Playboy: Why is it, then, that his image as a man of humor and likability has persisted--along with the reports of his darker nature?

[A] Kyemba: I think that is the one point that has led to the greatest tragedy in Uganda and in the world at large. Amin has a talent for deception, where he hides behind his charm. He can sit with you at the table, enjoying a cup of tea or coffee, while next door a former friend is being slaughtered. He'll give someone anything if he believes he needs to make an impression, to win him over. I have seen him hand out fistfuls of dollars from his briefcase. He gives away cars, houses--anything. He will lavish hospitality on anyone he thinks might be useful. Yet he may kill the same people just as easily.

[Q] Playboy: Then why is he still considered a hero by some? Many African leaders refuse to condemn him.

[A] Kyemba: It is not true that African leaders have not condemned him. Amin has been condemned by a number of individual African leaders in no uncertain terms. President Nyerere of Tanzania condemned him forthrightly. President Kaunda of Zambia has condemned him. The president of Botswana, Sir Seretse Khama, has condemned him.

[Q] Playboy: What about the fact that he was given an ovation at the Organization of African Unity summit meeting in Gabon in July?

[A] Kyemba: It do not believe that that was an ovation in the real sense of the word. It was a misunderstanding by the Western press. It was pure irony, a way of jeering at him. He managed to turn up in a Western-built jet, in Western uniforms, with medals all over his body. He was huge and dramatic. It was like applauding a brutal version of King Kong. Here is this giant who comes out of the grave--you remember, there had just been an attempted coup and he had dropped out of sight--and even before the people of Uganda know that he has left, he is addressing the O.A.U. I have no doubt in my mind that not a single head of state or senior minister of government could have seriously participated in an ovation of a person who had just murdered an archbishop and two Cabinet ministers and was responsible for 150,000 murders. He sparked a sudden response--ironic applause.

[Q] Playboy: But even an ironic ovation is an ovation, and Amin must have gone away satisfied. Surely, it's an inadequate response to a murderer. Don't you think that the African leaders themselves need to consider more carefully ways of bringing international pressure to bear on Amin?

[A] Kyemba: It is inadequate and the O.A.U. has no formal organized condemnation. It is terrible that Amin can still take them by surprise and get a reception like that. Of course, the O.A.U. leaders are worried about meddling in the affairs of member states. Perhaps the same thing could happen to them someday. But there comes a time when self-interest no longer justifies that support. Amin should not be allowed to get away with those appearances on the world stage. We have seen delegates walk out of conferences as soon as the South African foreign minister starts to speak. It is worse when Amin appears--or should be. He shou'd speak to empty chairs. I hope and pray we shall see some firm words from the O.A.U.

[Q] Playboy: What are the chances of a more immediate solution, such as assassination?

[A] Kyemba: Well, there have been several attempts on his life. There was one just recently, in June, just before the last O.A.U. summit in Gabon. I had left by then, so I don't know the details. But there was one attempt in which I was almost involved.

The occasion was a police review. After the review, the VIPs, Amin included, all went to a reception in a nearby hall. After about half an hour, Amin decided to leave. We crowded out of the building with him to say goodbye. Outside, in the compound, were a mass of cars and people all waiting to see him. He had an open jeep waiting for him, its windshield removed--a flamboyant form of transport in which he often liked to show himself off as a man of action. Seeing the crowds, he decided to dramatize his departure. He ordered his driver into the passenger seat, took the wheel himself and spun the jeep out of the compound gates. I was standing watching him go, with the others, when we heard an explosion. I learned later, a grenade had exploded just beside the front wheel on the passenger side. Another grenade went off just behind the jeep. The first one blasted a splinter of metal into the forehead of Amin's driver, who slumped down in his seat. Amin accelerated away and, as he went, seized a grenade from his briefcase--he always carries grenades in his car--and held it up to his teeth. He thought he was going to be chased and wanted to be ready to toss the grenade over his shoulder. The driver died later. It was an extraordinarily lucky escape--Amin should have been in that seat.

[Q] Playboy: Would you advocate assassination?

[A] Kyemba: Well, I'm not a violent man. I would never advocate a solution I could not perform myself. But the suffering of the Ugandans is so intense, I would certainly welcome it if he were assassinated. It is the quickest answer--there can never be a popular uprising, because Amin's grip on the country is so strong and international action does, as you say, take time to work.

[Q] Playboy: Could the army take over?

[A] Kyemba: Well, it might. But Amin's own policemen--and there are almost 20,000 of them--are so scattered through the armed forces and the police that it would be difficult for dissident army officers to organize a coup without being discovered. That's why a lone assassin might be the only answer.

[Q] Playboy: And what happens when Amin goes?

[A] Kyemba: It could be very nasty. The southern Sudanese know the game they are playing. They have nothing to hold them to the country except Amin and his luxury goods. If he goes, they will flee north toward the border. But, of course, they have a long way to go and they have to go through the very tribes who have borne the brunt of Amin's attacks. If those areas hear of Amin's fall before the southern Sudanese get through, there could be the most frightful massacres.

[Q] Playboy: What then?

[A] Kyemba: It's very hard. There is virtually no authority that can take over except the army. And the army is terribly discredited, deeply involved as it is in Amin's reign of terror. But it will, I'm afraid, be the only possible force for peace, and it will be helped by the disappearance of the southern Sudanese. To regain the confidence of the people, it will promise the earth, disassociate itself from the excesses of Amin. But those are the very techniques Amin used. They will have to go beyond that--to suggest a rigid timetable for a rapid return to civilian rule. If that works out, then the tremendous numbers of trained personnel--the thousands now in exile--will return and Uganda will revive.

[Q] Playboy: If Amin himself has a chance to flee, what will he do?

[A] Kyemba: He's got it worked out very well. He has a ranch in his home area right in the corner where the borders of Uganda, Zaire and Sudan meet. His tribe, the Kakwa, are far more numerous in both countries than in Uganda. He's got thousands of acres, with goods, cattle, arms--you name it--stored away. I've been up there. He's got cash by the millions of dollars out of the country. He could hole up there with a hard core of his army--say 5000 men--and it would be practically impossible to get hold of him. He could shift over either border with ease. In the southern Sudan, especially, he could carve himself out a little robber kingdom, until his ammunition and cash ran out. What a prospect! It would take a coordinated military action by three countries to catch him. And even if it looked as though they might, he has a plane and a house in Libya. He could always flee to Qaddafi. I'm telling you, he shouldn't be underrated. He's very smart in this sort of operation.

[Q] Playboy: What do you think the U.S. should do?

[A] Kyemba: The actual removal of Amin will have to be done by Ugandans themselves. But the U. S. has a very important role to play. Amin's regime is not selfsufficient. It depends tremendously on supplies from outside--in particular, on luxury imports and planes from the U. S., from the U.K., from France and from other countries. Those are the only things that allow Amin to survive. He has Boeings, Gulfstreams and C130s from the U. S. They are all serviced by Americans, either in Entebbe or in the U. S. Surely, the U. S. can act to cut off commercial contacts. In your country, you're in the forefront of a world-wide debate on human rights. President Carter has said it time and again. Amin has not the slightest regard for human rights. There are organizations for the international protection of wildlife everywhere; is it too much to expect that the international community should protect human life everywhere?

[Q] Playboy: Aside from its political and industrial power, do you think the U. S. has a particular role to play because of its large black community?

[A] Kyemba: Absolutely. It has amazed me to see the extent to which Amin has successfully exploited his color with the American blacks to excuse his excesses. Blacks are right to be suspicious of white criticism because of past oppression. But in this case, that attitude has masked the truth. It is now not a question of black or white but a question of humanity. It is outrageous that some of the black community have ignored the deaths of tens of thousands of Ugandans, merely because the Ugandans happen to have a black leader; if that is the price of having a black leader, one wonders if it is right to have one. Amin is an international criminal who should be got rid of. Anyone who associates with him is an accomplice. I know. I was an accomplice for a time. Eventually, you must act or bring discredit on yourself and on your government.

[Q] Playboy: UN Ambassador Andrew Young, in his Playboy Interview and elsewhere, severely condemned Amin. What effect did that have?

[A] Kyemba: Amin has to be condemned outright by black communities wherever they are. Amin has tarnished the image of black men. It is up to blacks to oppose him. I must regard the statements of Andy Young, therefore, as of considerable importance to the world at large. He has shown that there need not be a double standard by which the civilized world judges atrocities--one for the white nations and one for the black. You remember former UN Ambassador Daniel Moynihan had tried to lead condemnation when he called Amin a "racist murderer"? Well, that's what he is. Andy Young has agreed in so many words. Let the black community show its concern and back him up. We have sanctions imposed against Rhodesia, quite rightly. It is terrible, isn't it, that Amin continues to enjoy the apparent support of the U. S. Government, while a person who is committing fewer, lesser crimes in Rhodesia gets a worse condemnation? The U. S. is the greatest purchaser of Ugandan coffee. Amin's planes are serviced in the States. The more I think about it, the less justification I see for the United States not to act. Does that make sense?

[Q] Playboy: Perhaps, but the British have argued that to cut off trade would be to harm the Ugandan population. What's your reply to that?

[A] Kyemba: That is just nonsense. Isn't the Ugandan population suffering already? All the luxury supplies from Britain--the "whiskey run"--two flights a week worth $70,000 each, are meant solely for Amin's army and his thugs who are terrorizing the population. The people in the villages don't have the essential commodities--sugar, salt, soap. They are slipping back a century, economically. They make soap substitute from the leaves of pawpaws. Nothing from Britain or from the U. S. goes beyond Entebbe or the immediate supporters of Amin. All the items supplied from the flights to London are directed to the army shops, which supply each army unit. Officers can get anything from radio cassettes to golf clubs, toys to car accessories, clothes to furniture. The only way that a few of those things filter through to civilians is for the army officials themselves to sell them at exorbitant prices to traders, who then sell them to the few people who can afford them at ten times their ordinary cost. It is not fair to expect that by supporting Amin's army and keeping it contented the ordinary people in Uganda will ever get anything. Can anyone really think it right to support Amin's planes so that he can send his family to Libya for medical treatment or to New York to do some shopping, while the ordinary man in the village has not got a bicycle to take him from his village to the hospital for treatment?

[Q] Playboy: Do you think there is enough evidence to show that a firm international response will have an effect on Uganda's internal affairs?

[A] Kyemba: Certainly. On a number of significant occasions, Amin has been humiliated by foreign powers. When the two Americans, Nicholas Stroh and Robert Siedle, were killed in 1971, the U. S. demanded an investigation--which pointed the finger of suspicion at a senior officer and thus to Amin. He was utterly humiliated by the Israeli raid. He backpedaled fast when Carter threatened military action in support of U. S. citizens in Uganda. Yes, any firm international response has an effect. His image is tarnished so thoroughly in Uganda itself that even the army is likely to move against him--even his own tribesmen.

[Q] Playboy: All right. You're now in exile, and we've worked together intensely for a month. Have you told everything you know?

[A] Kyemba: No. I keep remembering new details as we get things into perspective. Last night, I remembered the case of Mrs. Augustina Kyewalyanga. It's too late for the book, isn't it? Her husband, a doctor, had a serious illness and was admitted to a hospital. His first wife had died and he had recently married a young girl. Dr. Kyewalyanga was thought to be suffering from terminal cancer. There was clearly intense feeling in his family that his new wife might possibly inherit all her husband's wealth and that she should not do so. The family therefore arranged to use Amin's system for its own advantage. The patient was to be transferred to a hospital in Germany and Mrs. Kyewalyanga was to get some funds out of the bank for the journey. A female relative of the doctor's went to the hospital while she was visiting her husband and told her she could drive her to the bank. She drove her instead to a prearranged spot where some army chaps, hired for the killing, were waiting for her. They snatched the woman and took her to the outskirts of Kampala, cut her throat and burned the body. In normal circumstances, that would have been murder and an easy matter for the police to act against. But nobody took any notice. The president happened to be in the hospital the very next day. I took him to see the doctor before he was transferred and told Amin what had happened. He took no notice. A head of state! He never bothered about it. The doctor was horribly shocked and distraught, as you can imagine. But nothing was ever done.

[Q] Playboy: What happened to Kyewalyanga?

[A] Kyemba: Oh--extraordinary. He went to Germany and survived. He's still there, I think.

[Q] Playboy: Do you feel at all worried about the publicity to which you will be subjected as your story becomes known?

[A] Kyemba: Well, I believe I have a very special role to play in ending the Ugandan tragedy. Naturally, I am bound to come in for some publicity, which was never my cup of tea. I always detested the camera and television. But I have made my choice. I'll do whatever seems necessary to publicize what I have to say.

[Q] Playboy: What impact do you think your story will have in Uganda itself?

[A] Kyemba: Of course, neither the book nor this interview will be available in Uganda. But people will undoubtedly smuggle the book in and hide it under mattresses. It is vitally important to find some way to make this story available to my countrymen. Ugandans are as starved of the truth as are foreigners and they will be determined to read it.

[Q] Playboy: Is there one particular example--a single brutality--that stands out in your mind as an overriding indictment of Amin's regime?

[A] Kyemba: As I have said, I have been aware of a great number of brutalities committed on Amin's orders. Despite my knowledge of them, despite my association with Amin, it was not possible for me to prevent those murders. He was careful to always present them as faits accomplis. The old lady, Dora Bloch, was taken from my own hospital and murdered. The Anglican archbishop and two Cabinet ministers were murdered and thrown into my own hospital mortuary. I've been expected to tell lies to the world. So, no: not one single brutality--many. And it is something that will be on my conscience until I die, too.

[Q] Playboy: Are you afraid of dying--perhaps at the hands of someone connected with Amin?

[A] Kyemba: There is a remote possibility that Amin would pay one or two people to assassinate me. There is also the possibility that some of the things I have been saying are unpalatable to certain exiled aspirants to Ugandan leadership. But, no, I don't fear for my life. I think I've done my bit. I would have felt very bitter and unhappy if I had not spoken out. But having done so, I do not fear to die.

"If Amin isn't responsible, no one is. His killers don't owe their loyalty to anyone else. They are armed by him and carry out those things on his orders."

"We have seen delegates walk out of conferences as soon as the South African foreign minister starts to speak. It is worse when Amin appears--or should be. He should speak to empty chairs."