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President Yoweri Museveni has offered his condolences to the affected families and the entire nation, on the death of 37 kids at Nyabugaando Peter Hunter Secondary School that were killed by ADF terrorists.

The President said the terrorists may have collaborated with other criminals because the school had some wrangles.

This latest crime committed by ADF members is illegal, desperate, terroristic, and pointless. Since Operation Shujja began, the Congo Army and the UPDF Army have applied significant pressure to the ADF, who had claimed the region as their own for nearly 20 years.

To better comprehend the problem, President Museveni gave a crude sketch of Rwenzori (North to South). The Mountain is, in his estimation, 60 miles long from north to south and 30 miles wide.

Prior to Operation Shujja, the ADF had roughly control over the whole region west and south of the Rwenzori Mountain on the Congo side, despite the presence of certain camps for the Pro-Government Armies (Congo, UN, and SADDEC). They were mining the area, taking the cocoa from the locals and passing it off as their own, obtaining taxes, etc. They also believed, in their ignorance, that the forests in that area would protect them.

However, thanks to advanced technology, Government Armies can spot them from above day or night, no matter where they attempt to hide. With eyes in the sky day and night, the government army would hit the unsuspecting terrorists with long-range artillery fire or with high-speed fighter bombers from Entebbe.

Two things have occurred as a result of the aerial surveillance, long-range lethal fire, and on-the-ground infantry personnel. The terrorists can no longer gather in large groupings, and they have fled to areas outside the Beni-Eringeti-Komanda-Bunya Road, because they believe it is safer for them to split up into smaller groups that the army might not notice.

This is where their desperate, fruitless, criminal, and terrorist schemes enter the picture. They begin to believe that if they leave the Congo, return to Uganda, and murder unarmed individuals, we will be forced to send our army back to the Congo to protect the Ugandan villages, saving them from the losses they are currently experiencing. On December 13th, 2022, the terrorists attempted that when 51 of them entered Ntoroko with the same strategy as Nyabugaando the night before kill People.

Since the Army and the locals were on high alert, 26 of them were slain, 25 were taken prisoner, 2 light machine guns, 7 IEDs, and their leader, Ekyakute, a Musoga by tribe, were all taken.

Initially, the UPDF had focused on the larger groupings west of the Rwenzori. They recently began hunting the smaller group in the Mwalika Valley, near Biruunga National Park in Congo, across from Lake Edward, south of the Rwenzori Mountain and south of the Kasindi-Beni Road.

Mulaalo, the leader of that organization, was assassinated 1½ months ago. One of the troops’ quartermasters, Rubaanga, was also slain earlier in April. Therefore, the terrorist attack on a school was a desperate and cowardly act.

Their criminal and cowardly scheme would not, however, have succeeded if the People around Mpondwe were alert like the People of Ntoroko were when ADF came to that area last December 2022.

Especially now that the Congo Government allowed UPDF to operate on the Congo side also, the army has no excuse in not hunting down the ADF terrorists into extinction. By ensuring that the eyes in the sky and the other gadgets are working all the time, and ensuring nobody steals fuel on which they (the machines) depend and all the other linkages.

Uganda is now sending more troops into the area South of the Rwenzori Mountain to eliminate the obvious gaps. “Was an alarm sounded and by whom? How did the nearby Security People respond? Why didn’t our People on the Congo side have intelligence on this splinter group etc’’.?

Uganda’s army forces are not going to be pulled back from the Mwalika Valley where they are hunting the Arab, Abua-Kasi, who replaced the killed Mulaalo. The terrorist action was desperate, cowardly, and it will not save them. Uganda is bringing new forces to the Uganda side as we continue the hunting on the Congo side.