Charles Mase Onyango-Obbo (born 1958) is a journalist, editor of The Monitor and leading political commentator in Uganda. He writes a popular column, Ear To The Ground in The Monitor , and a second column in the regional weekly, The East African . Onyango-Obbo specializes in security and democracy issues in East Africa and the African Great Lakes region. Born in the town of Mbale in eastern Uganda in 1958, he studied at Makerere University in Kampala, The American University in Cairo where he obtained his Masters degree in journalism, and in 1991 he was a Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University.

In May 1999, during the Second Congo War, Onyango-Obbo and other editors of The Monitor , Wafula Ogutu and David Ouma Balikowa were arrested and charged with sedition and publication of false news . This followed the publication of a photograph of a naked woman being sexually abused by men in military uniform. Officials insisted that the assailants might be Democratic Republic of the Congolese or Zimbabwean soldiers but could not possibly be Ugandan soldiers as the caption claimed. Onyango-Obbo and the other editors were were acquitted on 6 March 2001.[http://www.rsf.org/article.php3id_article=1821] [http://www.cpj.org/attacks99/africa99/Uganda.html]

= Publications =

*Uganda s Poorly Kept Secrets [Collection of short stories, Fountain Publishers, 1997] *Ear To The Ground *Made In Uganda: Inside The Soul Of A Nation And Its People

= External links =