Afande Muhammad Kirumira was in September 2018 shot as he approached his home in Bulenga. He died an hour later at Rubaga hospital. The motive behind his murder is yet to be established.
While details of who shot him are scanty, over the years, the controversial former Buyende DPC has cut the image of a controversial police officer, never afraid to speak his mind.
In March 2018, Kirumira said that his life was in danger after he discovered that some people were trailing him.
The Witness brings you some of the remarkable statements made by Kirumira.
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In March 2018 after he fell out with senior people in the police force, Kirumira wrote:“Unknown people are trailing me from one place to another, with no clear motive. I am trying to fix a solution. Inform one another. I have now connected dots on this surveillance on my movements, these are associates of some officers facing various charges in military court and possibly some friends of Kitatta camp.”
When he faced the police disciplinary court at Naguru this year, the maverick police officer said:“They have done a lot to stop me. They thought taking me to Nalufenya would scare me. I won’t backtrack from the truth.”
In January 2018, after he announced that he intended to leave the police force, he wrote on his facebook page:“I want to leave the police since it’s clean and am branded dirty. I will not accept to hold office meanwhile am being tried. I would love to keep my reputation as a freedom fighter. This is my decision which I shall not change permanently.”
When General Kale Kayihura was sacked as police chief in March 2018, Kirumira wrote:“I prayed from Nalufenya detention facility, for 23 days, and 6 hours per night. Thank you God for answering my prayers right away, the way you answered me when the late thugs Kato Pius and Majwega Henry were fooling about. You gave them their due pay.”
The Fearless Kirumira
At the pinnacle Gen Kayihura’s time leadership in Uganda police force, and amidst subjugation of civil rights, Kirumira criticised brutality, corruption and abuse of power. According to the Ugandan paper the Observer, Kirumira confronted his rogue colleagues head-on, and never minced his words.
Knowing that he was risking his life Kirumira once said:”I am Muhammad Mwoyo Gwa Gwanga. Mwoyo Gwa Gwanga simply means patriot. I am around. I am still around. Until God says don’t be around. I am still around and my virtues and values haven’t changed,” the Observer quotes him as saying.
While he basked in cheers, warmth and public support, including by the media, Kirumira was often criticised by his colleagues for hypocrisy.This would be much more pronounced when he was whisked to court and charged with bribery and colluding with criminals during his stint as the head of Nansana Police Station in 2013 and 2014. He confidently pleaded not guilty but swore to bite back with a suit if charges were not proven to be true.
But what made him quite distinct from his colleagues was apart from the court battle, people in the street often hugged him and encouraged him for his zeal.
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