The Uganda Peoples Defence Forces (UPDF) have clarified on claims by a one Marinos Alexandria aka Esther a woman being presented by the National Unity Platform leadership as a victim of torture by the state security operatives.
Marinos claims she was punished for supporting Bobi Wine and defiantly playing his music even after she had been allegedly warned.
Army and defense spokesperson Maj Gen Felix Kulayigye in a statement this afternoon clarified that Alexandria is not known to Uganda – Chieftaincy Military Intelligence (CMI) and has never been held in their detention at any point in time.
Gen Kulayigye emphasized that the two individuals she mentions as the ones who tortured her, Ali Hassan and Elias Ssengoba are people she has known for some time and even Elias is a civilian and has been a neighbor to Marinos Alexandria for some time.
Ali Hassan was involved in interrogating her at Kinawataka Police Station in 2020 when she was suspected of possession of military stores.
This was because her lover at the time was an LDU and deserted. It was suspected that he might had left some military equipment in her possession.
Nothing incriminating from that interrogation was found and she was subsequently released.
Who is Alexandria Marinos?
According to close friends, Marinos is a Congolese by nationality who relocated from the Democratic Republic of Congo and settled in Uganda some years back as a young girl.
In Uganda, Marinos grew up in Musaja Alumbwa cell in Kisenyi II parish, Mengo, Rubaga division.
Currently, she is renting along Rubaga road near Red Cross where she stays her sister.
She speaks several languages including French, Luganda, Runyankore, Lingala among others.
At Hannys pub she is a karaoke dancer under her group known as VIP dancers.
Hussein Kasumba a fiend from Kisenyi narrated to us that Alexandria has a man in Sweden and has tried 3 times to get a visa to Sweden being denied.
“She became very frustrated after 3 visa denials until of recent when a new option was suggested to her by friends for her to quickly get a visa”.
Kasumba adds that “the option was to get self-inflicted torture marks and appear in the media as a victim of political oppression and later on go to the Sweden embassy for political asylum”.
Many opposition members have used this option before and have successfully been given Visas to Europe claiming political persecution.
At the time Alexandria claims she was under detention, phone print outs indicate that she was at her place of residence making numerous telephone conversations like any other person enjoying her freedom.
It is a new norm of seeking asylum or refugee status in Europe and North America by claiming persecution at home as one of the quickest ways to achieve it, is the source of motivation for Marinos Alexandria claims.(C1P).