To be a soldier, Rupert Everett once said, “one needs that special gene, that extra something, that enables a person to jump into one on one combat, something, after all, that is unimaginable to most of us, as we are simply not brave enough.” Not many soldiers’ exploits have attracted immense interest as that of Fred Rwigyema. In part four of our series, ‘Fred Rwigyema: In Memoriam’ we explore how Ugandans remember Rwigyema.
BY FAUSTIN MUGABE
This year marks 30 years since Maj. Gen. Fred Rwigyema died.
On October 1, 1990, Maj. Gen. Fred Gisa Rwigyema led a force of about 2,500 Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF) fighters who had deserted the Uganda army to wage war against the Rwanda government.
Tragically, on the second day of the war, October 2, 1990, Rwigyema was killed in action on the frontline, a few kilometres inside Rwanda at Mirama Hills on the Uganda-Rwanda border.
News of his death shocked Ugandans as they could not believe that the Luweero Bush War veteran had breathed his last.
To friends and fellow combatants of the Luweero war, it was tragic that the first bullet ever to hit Rwigyema also killed him. A Ugandan, who was a friend of Rwigyema, told this reporter on condition of anonymity that during the Luweero Bush War, Rwigyema was never shot and that the only heavy scars on his body were on the belly – which he sustained in 1983 as he crawled on his belly under heavy fire from the Uganda National Liberation Army (UNLA) led by fierce UNLA commander Maj. Gen. David Oyite Ojok. For a long distance, the fighters crawled to avoid being shot by the enemy.
But when Ugandans finally accepted the reality that the Luweero Bush War hero was no more, those who could not personally deliver their condolences to the bereaved family, used the Ugandan media, including the defunct Weekly Topic newspaper, to deliver their eulogies.
Faustin Mugabe picked some of the poems published in memory of Rwigyema. Below, some are reproduced verbatim.
Eulogy for Rwigyema
By Philip R. Winyi
[Winyi is the elder brother of late Brigadier Noble Mayombo and Major Okwiri Rwaboni.
When in the west I first fell upon you, my Lord
Your tall elegance, like the Rwenzoris
Stunned, dwarfed and atomized me!
Your physique, strength and sheer enormous
Like the Ruwenzori’s, midgeted and shrunk me
Your light-footed swiftness, flashy eyedness
Your ramrod-like the Nyamwamba River
Engulfed, entranced and swallowed me whole
I fell for you, adored you and swore to follow you
To our own Jerusalem, Judea and to the ends of the earth…
And now you neither smile nor feel my Lord!
Your gracious, cherubic voice still haunts my inside
Your modest: “How are you sir?”
Your respectful: “Mukama wange kiki?”
Wrenches hot tears and reddens my eye
Sets a quiver upon my lip
Hoarsens and roughens my throat
Wobbles my feet…
And now the earth must shake with terror!
Every inch of the earth, my Lord!
The sons and daughters of envy, greed and villainy
Must burn in the furnace of our anguish
And the next of kin to tyranny and treachery
Must perish in the abyss of their creation till none be there
The cause for which you lived and died, my Lord
Must live
Must bear radiant light for mortal man…
Whenever you wrote and signed, my Lord
You ended thus: ALUTA CONTINUA…
Published, Weekly Topic, November 23, 1990.
In memory of Major General Fred Rwigyema
[Anonymous]
Fred has died for his country
At the age of thirty-three
He gave his life for all Rwandese
In quest of freedom, unity and peace
He left behind a loving widow,
A three-year of junior Kiddo
And a cute little baby girlie
To claim their abode in Kigali
Fred loved his adopted home
And fought his best for its freedom;
But as all logic would dictate
He kept in mind Rwanda’s fate
Strong in his patriotic stand
Fred could never understand
How a frail factionalist band
Dared confiscate the motherland
That was Fred’s creed,
His dream to end the greed of
Few fascist brothers
Wearing factional blinkers
Let us honour his martyrdom
With dedication to freedom
In anti-sectarian catharsis
For a God-ordained symbiosis
Published, Weekly Topic, December 14, 1990
Who is who?
That split the milk that caused disunity
That did not see, that wasted the bullet
A curse to him
Fred! You can hear, dear
But you fought many, 79 you faced them;
You saved lives, from Mountains of the moon,
And mountain of Elgon
Many would help to honour you,
Though gone the foe stands
Time had come to have identity
But, the cause has caused destiny;
Deprived the rights and rites
Deserved a curse to him
Like Abel you are slain; slain in cold blood
Your love still vivid and ever
The undying desire to free man
But surely who? That is uncouth,
That sold you down the river; a curse to him
I demand to know don’t you…? Who did it?
It will always haunt us
Sankara wounds still fresh, fresh and dripping-unnursed
You followed suit; ha, a curse to him
You’re gone – it is finished: as he said
I suppose you too said, a curse to
He who pulled the trigger, to spoil the milk, he who…ha…
Let’s us pray; Lord…
May Fred’s soul rest in eternity?
May the struggle…and mission be accomplished
Amen
- Published, Weekly Topic, December 14, 1990
