Free French and Moland!

Tjostolv and Joshua lived in a tent in Kampala in a kind of a resort which belongs to an Australian named John Hunwick. They had a locked garage there with their equipment. This was all they could afford. They thought he was a friend. As it turned out, he wasn’t. When the boys were arrested in Congo, he broke in and stole everything they had. He sold most of it, among other things probably a pair of Zeiss binoculars that I had given Tjostolv. It was certainly not among the “evidences” in Congo.

A so called “sniper rifle” was apparently handed over to the “safety police”. Of course it wasn’t a sniper rifle but a hunting rifle called Kongsberg Lakelander, legally imported to Uganda of course. I bought it to Tjostolv for his confirmation. It was even a silver plate on the hilt. Earlier he kept it at a friend’s place in South Africa, legally imported. It is, as all hunters know, very possible to import a hunting rifle to Africa. 

I don’t know if the “scary” training videos were bought from Hunwick or from the “safety police”. But that Nilas got it without paying for it I’ll never believe. It was stolen, bought and published! It wasn’t all that scary either. Basically the same exercises are done voluntarily in “hell week” in officer training. Quite a scoop Nilas! 

I told Nilas over the phone that the rifle was a confirmation gift from me, and he wrote that in the article, I’ll give him that. Otherwise they found some wooden guns that they practiced with, and apparently some UN berets, scary stuff.

As far as I understand it, nothing that was found in Uganda can be called evidence of criminal activity. But I guess they sold newspapers. That the police in Uganda wanted to get their hands on them I can understand. They have witnessed that they’ve received hundreds of thousands in bribes from Norwegian journalists in Congo, so of course they want some of that.

So this wasn’t just acceptable actions from a journalist, but enough to get an award. Congratulations Nilas! I hope the award is of great joy to you!

Knut Moland, March 22^nd 2010