By Salmah Namwanje
Edith Byanyima the sister to Oxfam Executive director Winnie Byanyima has distanced herself from the people power movement as reported by the media after the search at her home where police allegedly recovered red napkins.
She said the material that police took were napkins that are made by disadvantaged youths who are trained from her home to do carpentry, tailoring among others skills.
On Wednesday, police raided Byanyima’s home in Muyenga and after several hours of searching, emerged with 24 pieces of red cloth. Byanyima says police searched her house including the workshop where she keeps the material that are made by the youths who converge at her home to learn skills to improve their livelihood.
’’We are more than six ladies, we do this voluntarily, we see people who are struggling especially in the slums and give them the designs, buy materials, help them produce products and we help them market the products.’
She said police told her they were looking for weapons, ammunition and other prohibited materials. After the search, police took with them red cloths, which they suspect, were made for wrong reasons.
Police said they got intelligence information that there were dubious activities being organised from her home, which she objects to.
’’I was surprised, when the police got to the workshop and started tearing apart my products and picking red napkins, I asked them where they were taking them, why they were selecting red, there were several other colors, green, blue, yellow but they were particularly interested in the red napkins.’’
‘’We want police to bring back our napkins because our customers had placed their orders and they want us to deliver on time.’
She displayed several of them to the media and refuted allegations that she has any connections to the people power movement. She addressed the media flanked by some of the youths she says are part of the group trained at her home.
However, some youth were donning shirts written on; Free Bobi Wine, People Power.
