For the first time since her husband’s death nearly two years ago, Molly Katanga stood in a courtroom and told her side of the story. Appearing in person before the High court last Thursday, after months of following proceedings via video link from Luzira Prison, the widow of businessman Henry Katanga spoke at length about the final hours inside their Mbuya home, where a gunshot ended his life in November 2023. Calm but firm, she rejected the prosecution’s case that she had pulled the trigger. “I do not know how to operate a gun,” she told Justice Rosette Comfort Kania, dismissing allegations built on forensic evidence that places her at the centre of the shooting. Her testimony comes at a critical stage. Weeks earlier, the court had ruled that she and four co-accused, her daughters Patricia Kankwanza and Martha Katanga, medical officer Charles Otai, and the family’s shamba boy George Amanyire – had a case to answer in connection with Henry Katanga’s death. The prosecution, led by Jonathan Muwaganya, has pointed to a series of elements it says form a coherent narrative: DNA evidence linking Katanga to a pistol registered in her husband’s name, traces of gunshot residue found on her hands, and allegations that the crime scene was interfered with, blood cleaned, items moved, and timelines obscured. Yet as Katanga began to speak, the courtroom was presented with a very different story. She did not begin with the morning of the shooting. Instead, she went back into the rhythms of a marriage that had spanned more than three decades. She described her husband as “quiet and well-mannered,” an introvert, a man whose temperament had long been steady. Together, they had raised four children: Patricia, Martha, Arthur, and Siima. But in the months leading up to his death, she said, something had shifted. Henry Katanga had been under increasing strain from his money-lending business. He had withdrawn Shs 210 million to extend loans, but many borrowers had failed to repay. The losses mounted. The frustration deepened. Eventually, she said, he began to talk about leaving the business altogether. One loss, in particular, seemed to weigh heavily on him. Apollo Nyegamehe, better known as Aponye, had been both a friend and a client. His death in a road accident in July 2023 left behind not only grief, but a substantial unpaid debt. “I remember the day Aponye died,” Katanga told the court. “Henry came and told me, ‘It is like I have lost everything, my heart, and everything I have worked for.” The debt was formally recorded at Shs 1.5 billion, she said, though informal arrangements may have pushed the figure higher. By the time she turned to the night before the shooting, the picture she painted was one of quiet tension. She described a routine evening. A walk in the neighbourhood. A shower. Helping her son with homework. Dinner. When Henry arrived home, he seemed unsettled. “I am done with this business; it is stressing me. I am depressed,” she recalled him saying. After speaking briefly, she left him seated in the upper dining area and went to pray in another room. When she returned about an hour later, he was still there. Eventually, she went to bed. He joined her later, she said, but remained restless. There had been signs, she added, in the weeks before. Complaints of headaches. A reluctance to consult their family doctor, Dr. Karuhanga. He insisted, she said, that stress, not illness, was the root of his condition. Then came the morning. What she described next was sudden, disorienting, and violent. She told the court she was in the bathroom when Henry attacked her. “He came and started hitting my head. I only saw it was him because of the mirror,” she said. She described being struck repeatedly with a baton, dragged from the bathroom toward the bedroom, and slammed against a door handle. Her voice, at times, seemed to carry the weight of the moment as she recounted pleading with him. “Wabota? What has happened? What is it?” she said she asked, trying to understand what had triggered the attack. The violence, she said, did not stop. She tried to shield herself, to duck, to resist. But she was overpowered. In court, she raised her hands, visibly deformed, to show the extent of her injuries. One finger missing. Scars on her scalp. Swelling that, she said, had not fully subsided even after reconstructive surgery. She spoke of lingering headaches, dizziness, and a persistent struggle with balance. At some point, she said, Henry told her three times, in Runyankore, “Yimuka”— stand up. She could not. Then, she testified, came the words that now sit at the centre of the case. “I am going to kill myself now.” A gunshot followed. Then silence. What happened next, she said, was a fight to stay alive. Injured and disoriented, she crawled in search of water. Eventually, she was taken for medical care, first to a clinic on Kampala Road, then to a facility in Bugolobi, and finally to International Hospital Kampala, where she underwent surgery on her head, arms, and hands. But the prosecution’s case does not accept this version of events. In an earlier ruling, Justice Kania pointed to what she described as sufficient circumstantial evidence to suggest malice aforethought. Central to that reasoning was the “last seen” doctrine: that the deceased and his wife were alone in the bedroom when the fatal shot was fired. The court also cited forensic findings, gunshot residue on Katanga’s hands, DNA evidence linking her to the weapon, and raised concerns about her conduct after the incident, including delayed cooperation and possible interference with the scene.The post Molly Katanga reveals husband’s final dark battles appeared first on The Observer.