I was shot in the arm and the leg. I said to my mum at the time that if I was to live, and if I was to lose a part of me, I would like it to be the leg, because I would like to write my story one day. She was very encouraging.

I was a writer at university, as much as one can be. I had written a few oneact plays. I was a much more accomplished actor. I think I partly acquired notoriety because it was easier for me to influence opinions because I was known to a wider body of students. It was easy to use the acting to my advantage, to use my popularity to my advantage as a political tool.

I was a student of literature and some of the literature that we were studying was about heroic people doing heroic things, and it was impossible for me to reconcile that with doing nothing, when all around us the national fabric was stained.

When the moment of my arrest and torture came, at least I was able to stand up to them and to go with my principles intact. I may have underestimated the risk I was taking by being politically active but I didn't compromise. I can look back on that with a kind of pride.

I feel that I never hesitated to stand up for something.

When I realised the soldiers had decided to kill me, I asked them to grant me three things. I wanted to look at the moon and the stars. I asked them if I could say my prayers, and I asked them not to hit me any more. Later, I asked them to have the courage not to shoot me in the back.

Nine years after I left Uganda, my exile was over, and I was free to go back. My mum and I went to thank the people in the village who had helped me when I was wounded. One of them said to me, how come you have never told your story? That very night I considered myself commissioned.

The play was easy to write technically, but hard to write emotionally. But I knew that it had to be done and that I was ready to do it, and I would do it without going insane. It was important to do it because it was a promise I had made to myself, but also because it was a way to bear witness to a lot of other people who never lived to see a different Uganda. In a small way, I also thought that something like this might help to alert people more to these sorts of events. I had had an appointment with that story.

Writing the play was a healing journey for me.

Perhaps even more the performance. When I started performing it I felt emotionally lighter. It was sort of getting rid of my demons.

Since I started to do the play, I have had no nightmares. I used to have them before.

'Come Good Rain', written and performed by George Seremba, is at the Samuel Beckett Theatre, Trinity College, from May 17 to 28.