ADF commanders killed since 2015

Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) second-in-command Meddie Nkalubo is believed to have been killed in an airstrike carried out by the Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) on a compound in eastern DR Congo 10 days ago.

President Museveni said their intelligence indicates that Nkalubo is dead.

“According to subsequent intelligence, it seems that a lot of terrorists were killed, including the notorious Meddie Nkalubo,” President Museveni said on Saturday. 

The army has been analysing the targets, which are deep in forested areas of the Congo since they carried out the strike. 

The airstrike was a hunt of ADF rebels under Operation Shujaa in Eastern DR Congo. The operations started in November 2021. Since the operation started more than eight top commanders of the ADF have been killed.

Elias Sseguya, alias Fezza, Seka Wankaba, Mzee Mubindo, Fazal, Lubangakene, Abu Aden and Muhammad Kayiira are among the top leaders of the group that have been killed during operation Shujaa.

Ssegujja was ranked number three in the ADF command in 2015, according to the United Nations report on Eastern DRC armed groups. 

The UN Security Council in 2015 named Mzee Mubindo, a Congolese, as one of the pathfinders of the ADF and plays “an important role in navigating the terrain.”

In 2020, he appeared in an ADF propaganda video where he called on people in Kasese to join the group or be killed.

Since 2015, many of the top commanders of the group have either been killed or captured.

The group’s leader Jamil Mukulu was captured in Tanzania where he was hiding. He was replaced by Sheikh Musa Baluku and deputised by Hood Lukwago.

Lukwago was also killed by the Congolese forces in 2016. The group’s top doctor Dr Kasadha Kalume was also killed by the Congolese forces in April 2015. 

Nkalubo took charge of the second position of the rebel group. 

President Museveni said Nkalubo was a key plotter of the bombs that were used in Kampala City including; those near the Kampala Central Police Station, near Parliament and the ones that were discovered recently near Kayanja’s Church and in the Bunamwaya area.

“These uninformed people have been playing with deadly fire for a long time. They will now discover that killing Ugandans is not a good hobby,” he said.

Early this month, President Museveni said ADF rebels will be considered for amnesty even if they surrender on grounds that they had committed grave crimes that aren’t worth forgiving. 

The ADF rebels are accused of killing 35 people and abducting others when they raided a Lhubiriha Secondary School, in Mpondwe, Kasese District in July this year.

However, the Amnesty Commission is still calling on the ADF rebels to surrender and get amnesty. Under the amnesty provision, a rebel that hands himself or herself don’t face prosecution, but they are rehabilitated and even given a package to start a new life.

The army is still hunting the whereabouts of several other top ADF leaders, including: Baluku, the group leader; SImba Amigo alias Mzee Amigo, an army commander;  Sheikh Kabila Katende is a military commander and one of the high ranking Islamic clerics in ADF; Canada Kibuye is a military commander, who had previously been the commander of Camp Canada aka JNBG camp; Rafiki; and Jamil Muzzanganda alias Armorer Man, is in charge of ADF’s weaponry, and was one of its primary bomb-makers.