As the country continues to mourn the demise of the Speaker of parliament Rt. Hon Jacob Oulanyah, the Minister of Health, Dr. Jane Ruth Aceng has talked the nation through the unfortunate cause of his death.
While addressing the parliament on the life of the late speaker on 5th April, 2022, Dr Aceng read the doctors’ report in which cancer was revealed as the major cause of death.
According to Dr. Aceng, in 2019, the late developed a swelling in the neck, prompting him to seek medical attention in Germany where the swelling was removed and later diagnosed with cancer.
‘’The report I have here is the death summary report for the late Rt. Hon. Jacob Oulanyah and there are four issues. One, the immediate cause of death was multiple organ failure – the heart failed, the lung failed, the liver failed and the kidney failed. The liver started failing while he was still here in Uganda as well as the lungs that had started collecting fluid. The heart started failing while in Seattle as well as the kidney. He had multiple bacterial infection and viral infections that were discovered in Seattle,’’ she communicated.
“The Rt. Hon. speaker lost his spleen while he was in Makerere, he had a splenectomy following that riot. So he did not have a spleen which is also an organ which manufactures blood cells – white, red, and so on. He also had challenges with stem cells which had a poor immune response because of chemotherapy. He started having gastrointestinal bleeding or bleeding into the abdomen because of lack of platelets. He had multi-drug resistance bacteria which is usually hospital-acquired when you stay in a hospital for too long,” Aceng added.
What happened during the 1990 Makerere university students’ strike?
A Guild constitution enforced by the Ministry of Education was being rejected by students led by guild president Norbert Mao. The elimination of allowances was also at the heart of student dissatisfaction.
Thomas Okema and Tom Onyango, two Makerere University students, were found dead in the Freedom Square on December 10, 1990. Ugandan police had shot and killed them.
Students had staged a sit-in strike at Freedom Square moments before to protest the abolition of students’ allowances, affectionately known as boom. The police then used live bullets rather than tear gas to disperse the students.
Another student, Jacob Oulanyah, was writhing in great pain on the ground after being battered by the same forces. Oulanyah was the guild’s spokesperson in the student government led by Nobert Mao.
Oulanyah’s sight and spleen were both harmed as a result of the indiscriminate stomping. He was brought hospitalized in Mulago, treated and made a full recovery. However, he was expelled from the institution along with other students suspected of organizing the protest.
