Longstanding rivalry between Rwanda and Uganda took a new twist on Monday after Ugandan security forces photographed and arrested a Rwandan diplomat naked in bed with the wife of a Ugandan businessman.
The incident, which was splashed across the front pages of all local papers, involves John Ngarambe, the first secretary at Rwanda’s embassy in Kampala, who was detained along with the woman late on Saturday at an upscale hotel near Lake Victoria.
Ugandan authorities declined to discuss the matter in detail but confirmed the arrests had been made and said Ngarambe had been released as soon as he identified himself and claimed diplomatic immunity.
”When they arrested him, he did not identify himself immediately and there was no way those who arrested him could have identified him as a diplomat,” Uganda’s junior Foreign Minister, Henry Okello Oryem, told Agence France-Presse.
”When he did so, he was left to go,” Oyem said.
He said that the entire matter was ”unfortunate” and that it was up to Kigali to decide whether to recall Ngarambe.
Under Ugandan law adultery is punishable with a fine equivalent to just 11 US cents but while Ngarambe cannot be charged, the diplomatic consequences of his arrest may do further damage to already strained ties between Uganda and Rwanda.
The two countries were once the closest of allies but relations took a dive when each sent troops into the neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in the 1990s during that vast nation’s long-running war.
Rwanda and Uganda pitted their armies against each other three times in 1998 in the eastern DRC town of Kisangani, after they disagreed on strategy. It was only intervention by Britain that prevented the hostilities from escalating into a full-scale military confrontation.
Since then, each has accused the other of planning to destabilise their respective governments and last month, the Ugandan press reported in great detail about the arrest of a university student accused of spying for Rwanda.
The Rwandan embassy declined on Monday to discuss the arrest of its first secretary. But it was was recounted in salacious detail by the Ugandan press and unnamed Rwandan diplomats were quoted as saying Ngarambe had been followed by Ugandan police for some time.
Oyem would say only that the woman’s husband had earlier complained to police that a Rwandan diplomat was ”sleeping with his wife” and suggested the pair could be charged with adultery, a criminal offence in Uganda.
Press reports suggested that police, some of whom posed as motorcycle taxi riders, closed in on the couple and broke down the door of the room, causing commotion that attracted staff and curious guests to the scene.
Ngarambe and the woman were reportedly filmed and photographed before they were allowed to get dressed and taken to the station, according to the independent Monitor newspaper.
The paper said police had confiscated the bedsheets and a variety of ”romantic accessories” from the lovers’ room at the upscale hotel in Entebbe.
Police spokesperson Patrick Onyango said the woman, a local employee of the Danish embassy in Kampala, was still being questioned and that ”exhibits” had been taken from the room. He declined to discuss what they were. – Sapa-AFP