By Our Reporter
Like any Ugandan Minister, Friday started off as a normal day for Hon. James Mutende. He was in office to carry out his official ministerial duties and later returned home in the evening where he hosted the Bagisu Traditional Leader at his home in Makindye-Lukuli. His home was always open to the Bagisu most especially the cultural leader who always paid him courtesy visits whenever he was in town.
Later in the night, the entourage of the cultural leader and Mutende chose to go out for some Friday drink-up at Riders in Bugolobi. However, Mutende didn’t participate in the drinking and fun sprees. He later excused himself and headed back to his home to catch some sleep after what had been a long day. He had been jolly all day, in high spirits and looking forward to the 2016 elections where he was going to face off with FDC’s Jack Wamai Wamanga for the Mbale Municipality seat.
Calmly, he went to bed. At around 2-3am in the night, Mutende’s wife, Lydia Wanyoto notes that she began seeing him move from one side of bed to another as if he was having a nightmare. Mutende then woke up, and Wanyoto asked him whether everything was okay. Mutende told her that he was all fine, except for what he termed as “Ekikeeto” sometimes known as acid reflux in the throat. He then vomited and his concerned wife once again pestered him to know if everything was okay, to this, the Minister replied that all was fine and all he needed was to rest. “I just need to rest,” said Mutende to Wanyoto in the bedroom.
Little did they know that the words; “I just need to rest” would turn out to be his last words. In the morning, Wanyoto woke up very early since she had an appointment with her doctor at Nsambya hospital. She’d also planned to pass by the market and then head to Mbale in the evening to meet the members of the electorate.
When she woke up in the morning, Wanyoto saw her husband deep asleep and didn’t want to disturb his sleep since he’d struggled throughout the night. She went ahead to Nsambya hospital for her appointment with her doctor and then to the market. While at the market, she decided to call home and ask her husband to help her with his fuel card. She was surprised that he wasn’t picking his phone. She kept on calling but there was no reply.
Frustrated, she chose to head back home and request for the card. When she reached home, she was shocked to find that her husband was still in a deep slumber. She tried to lift his hand to wake him up, but the hand seemed lifeless and kept on going back to the former position. She tried to shake him but there wasn’t a real response.
It’s then that she decided to call her personal doctor at Nsambya and ask for an ambulance to be sent since this was now an emergency. Since Nsambya hospital is near their Lukuli home, the ambulance had arrived in no time. The nurse in the ambulance was to be seen checking for the pulse on Mutende’s body but with no hope. When they arrived at Nsambya hospital, Mutende was pronounced dead. According to the doctor, “Mutende had died about one hour back.”
With this shocking news, Mutende’s body was transferred to Mulago hospital for postmortem and embalming. According to the official programme, Mutende will be laid to rest on Saturday in Mbale. Since he’s been a Minister, government asked that his burial takes place after Independence Day.
May the family be comforted in these trying times.