Kwoyelo admits to having married girls and asks for forgiveness

GULU, UGANDA | THE INDEPENDENT | Former Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) fighter Thomas Kwoyelo, alias Latoni, has asked the court to forgive him for marrying minors to obtain “wives”. In Uganda it is a crime to have knowledge of the channel about minors. International conventions also protect women and girls from sexually violent crimes during armed conflict.

The LRA kidnapped thousands of children from Lango and Achol. Children were recruited for the brutal rebellion. Senior commanders would force young girls into sexual slavery or what they claimed to be marriage. Most enslaved girls ended up having children with high commanders, including Thomas Kwoyelo.

Kwoyelo, who is facing trial in Gulu court, did not deny the fact that some of the kidnapped children or women ended up being sexually enslaved by commanders, including himself.

He spoke in Luo and told the court that he did not force the girls but courted them to become his wives after Joseph Kony anointed them. Kwoyelo denied personally recruiting women and girls into sexual slavery.

“I don’t deny that I stayed with these girls because they were already women and had become my wives. I want to request this court that if it finds that I committed crimes against them, the court will forgive me,” Kwoyelo submitted to the court on Monday.

Kwoyelo was concluding his defense at the International Crimes Division of the High Court, where he faces charges of crimes against humanity.

The charges relate to rape, torture, outrages on personal dignity and violence to life allegedly committed between 1997 and 2004 in Kilak Hills, Olinga Village, Labala Parish, Pabbo Sub County in present-day Amuru District.

The former colonel in the ranks of the LRA especially defended himself against the testimonies of protected state witnesses called LW and NS on accusations of having committed crimes against humanity.

Court records indicate that the witnesses were kidnapped at the age of 11 in 1996 and 1997 respectively and then married off at age 13 by Kwoyelo.

However, Kwoyelo told the court that he did not know which of the LRA leaders in the ‘convoy’ kidnapped the girls, although he acknowledged that after their abduction, they were distributed and remained in the homes of senior LRA commanders.

According to Kwoyelo, the girls had been helping the wives of LRA commanders until 1999, when LRA leader Joseph Kony ordered him to move to Sudan with women and girls who lost their “husbands” during the battles.

He told the court that after arriving in Sudan, he handed over all the widows to Joseph Kony, who then initiated an anointing by immersing them in the river and shaving all their hair.

Kwoyelo said Kony gave the order that women should not be courted into a relationship until nine months had elapsed when they were ready to marry, adding that he then got his “wives” after the nine months.

“After the girls were anointed, I also got mine among the widows, courted them and married them in the year 2000. Among those I married, God blessed me and they had children with me,” he said.

He, however, asked the court for forgiveness, in any case committing the crime of marrying the young women arguing that they were kidnapped and taken into captivity when they were children.

Kwoyelo also told the court that he is seeking forgiveness from the girls’ parents and President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni.

“My request to the court is that if this matter ends, I ask this court to send my word to the President that I would like to meet him and talk face to face with him because there are other issues that we have to talk about. about. He has been a soldier, not a civilian, and there are things I would like to advise him about the military,” Kwoyelo stated in court.

Kwoyelo began presenting an unsworn defense against the 78 charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity on April 15 this year, months after the court ruled in December last year that it had a case to answer.

His defense lawyers had earlier told the court that they would present 13 defense witnesses in court immediately after Kwoyelo concluded defending himself.

However, Caleb Alaka, Kwoyelo’s defense lawyer, told the court today that some of the witnesses they had called have not responded to their calls. He also noted that the defense lawyers re-evaluated the testimony of one of the Luzira Maximum Prison witnesses but deemed it non-essential, adding that he will not be presented further in court.

Caleb told the court that the defense has already assembled two witnesses, an expert and a cultural leader who are ready to testify, but he prayed for a brief adjournment for the defense to seek other witnesses who are long distances away.

Charles Richard Kamuli, Deputy Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), however, pointed out that the two defense witnesses are not ordinary witnesses and argued that the state needs time to read their statement.

Robert Mackay, the victim’s lawyer, also observed that the two witnesses are not ordinary people, arguing that they can change the course of the case and, therefore, it is necessary for the defense to reveal their statements.

In a ruling by the panel of ICD judges read by Justice Michael Elubu, the court refused to grant the defense for adjournment arguing that it is a tradition of the court that disclosure is made in a timely manner. Consequently, he adjourned the trial hearing until Tuesday morning.

Kwoyelo is the first LRA commander to face trial in a national court for war crimes and crimes against humanity following years of LRA campaigns in northern Uganda. However, he has denied all charges in his defense arguing that they were trumped up against him.

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