In Uganda it's still the message, not the medium, that matters

While American journalists debate whether to blog, Twitter or become multimedia warriors, the journalism that really matters is still going on in the world:

In a two-pronged operation, police and operatives from the Chieftaincy of Military Intelligence (CMI), Joint Anti-Terrorism Taskforce (JATT) and the Black Mamba squad raided The Independent again, exactly a month after the first raid.

It is 9.30am on Saturday April 26 and The Independent’s Managing Editor Andrew Mwenda is driving from his home along Golf Course Road in Kololo for the Capital Gang programme on Capital FM radio. As he climbs up Coral Crescent Rise towards Lower Kololo Terrace, two suspicious cars come from in front of him, the front one towards him at breakneck speed. Thinking that perhaps the driver had lost control, he stops and tries to reverse when suddenly three other cars appear from behind, one knocking his rear bumper.

Then a swarm of security operatives surround the car, one young man tries to open the door but it is locked from inside. He pulls out a gun and points it at Mwenda asking him to get out of the car. When Mwenda opens the door, the security operatives pounce on him, forcefully pulling him out of the car, confiscating his phones, watch and car before dumping him into a waiting car and driving off in a heavily defended convoy at break-neck speed.

“There were not witnesses around,” Mwenda narrates his ordeal. “I realised the state wanted me to disappear without a trace. So I opened the car window and shouted at people along the road that I was Andrew Mwenda being kidnapped by CMI. At this point, the security operatives pulled me back and this time handcuffed me so that I do not cause more trouble.

[via TEDBlog]