Controversial city journalist Andrew Mwenda claims he has exposed the individuals behind famous social media activist Tom Voltaire Okwalinga (also known as TVO) and their connections to former presidential candidate Dr Kizza Besigye.
Mwenda went online and revealed that he knows the true identity of TVO who has been haunting him over his sexuality and double-dealing in the veteran journalist called ‘Unmasking Besigye extremist TVO’.
One of the three people Mwenda claims to be behind the TVO page is Mr Robert Shaka who is jailed and between 2011 and 2015, repeatedly posted criticism of the government on his Facebook account as Maverick Blutaski. However, the police suspect he is writing under the name Tom Voltaire Okwalinga, or TVO – a charge he denies. The other two are; Abbey Semuwemba, who lives in UK and Henry Lugasira who lives Canada.
For several years now, the person writing as TVO has been posting politically-charged information on his Facebook wall, and has many followers on social media. He has repeatedly accused President Yoweri Museveni and other senior leaders of corruption, nepotism and incompetence.
TVO is unabashedly pro-opposition. He writes in capitals, airs secret recordings, unveils political plots and posts mocking, home-made memes of the most powerful NRM and army officials.
The evidence against Shaka is yet to be presented in court, but many theories about TVO have been posed: that he is a government insider or a composite group of activists with high-profile sources rather than an individual, for one. This is the case with Baba Jukwa, a blogger well known in Zimbabwe, who is said to be the work of a group of defectors from Robert Mugabe’s ZANU-PF party. Individuals have been arrested in the hunt for Baba Jukwa but, like Tom Voltaire, the blog has continued.
From November 2015, TVO started posting on Facebook calling upon people to prepare for protest to reclaim “Uganda’s democracy from dictatorship” on December 15th, 2015.
When his Facebook followers challenged him to come out and reveal his identity as he was planning to lead a people to the journey to change, TVO responded saying that most Ugandans know him since he appears on TV and in newspapers.
“For long some people have called on TVO to come out in the open and lead the journey to change. These same people say at the same time that they don’t know who TVO is. Now what if TVO is well among you and lives and walks among you. It is possible that most Ugandans know who TVO is and have seen him on TV and newspapers and even on the streets. Come December 15th, the game will change,” he posted on Facebook on November 3oth 2014.
Famously last year, TVO accused city lawyer Fred Muwema of stage managing a raid at his law firm at the start of the presidential election petition in which former prime minister Amama Mbabazi challenged President Museveni’s election in the Supreme Court. TVO claimed in numerous posts on his Facebook page in March that Mr Muwema had bagged shs900m from government delivered by former information minister Jim Muhwezi to betray his longtime client Mr Mbabazi by trading off delicate evidence for a penny. He later claimed Muwema was protected by officers of the army’s Special Forces Command (SFC). Both Mr Muhwezi and Muwema denied the claims, while government distanced itself from the raid on the latter’s office and those of Mr Mohmed Mbabazi who led the Mbabazi legal team in the petition.
ALSO READ: Andrew Mwenda trying to free suspected killer Kanyamunyu, says TVO
The Question still stands, if Andrew Mwenda is mistaken, who is Tom Voltaire Okwalinga???
