How America has funded UPDF

Uganda remains one of the largest recipients of US military aid in Africa, 22 years after the deadly terror attacks that toppled the World Trade Centre towers in New York, an event that installed the East African nation as one of the Western powers’ major proxies in the fight against terror.

According to recently de-classified data from the US State Department, from 2019 to 2021, Uganda received military training assistance from the US worth $8.5 million (Shs31.5 billion). 

Between 2012 and 2016, Uganda received grants from the US for equipment worth $21.9 million (Shs81.3 billion). This placed it as the fifth largest recipient. It trailed Nigeria and Chad afflicted by the Boko-Haram insurgency and political instability; Kenya, which faces the threat of al-Shabaab insurgents from neighbouring Somalia; and Niger convulsed by terror activities in the Sahel and a recent coup that ousted its leader, Mohamed Bazoum.

In aggregate dollar terms, the top five recipients of military training assistance from the US to Africa between 2019 and 2021 were Nigeria, which received $13,590,004 (Shs50.5b); Kenya got $12,996,084 (Shs48.2b); Chad got $9,344,876 (Shs34.7b); and Uganda got $8,488,247 (Shs31.5b). 

Key ally
Though Uganda’s halo may have slipped in the eyes of the West recently as a result of its stained human rights record and democratic credentials, it appears that President Museveni remains a key ally of the United States and its point-man in the volatile Great Lakes region.

For instance, on the eve of 2021 General Election one of the most violent elections in Uganda’s post-independence era, Uganda received $5,307,476 (Shs19.7b) in military training assistance from the US. This was the highest among the 46 African nations that received such assistance that fiscal year. 

In comparison, Nigeria received $5,165,515 (Shs19.1b) and Kenya $5,173,733 (Shs19.2b) during this time. This assistance went towards training 5,021 personnel in military professionalisation, adherence to human rights, peacekeeping, border security and transnational threats. 

Brig Felix Kulayigye, the Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) and Defence ministry spokesperson, revealed in detail the nature of the training assistance Uganda received from the US. 

“The biggest deployment of that 5,000 has been the peacekeeping operations in Somalia […] two, the Civil Affairs offices did support civil military relations training,” he told Sunday Monitor.

Sizeable kitty
According to data from the Defence Security Cooperation Agency, between 2012 and 2016, Uganda received grants for defence equipment worth $21,975,492 (Shs81.6b). Whereas this is dwarfed by the $192,873,190 (Shs716.7b) Nigeria received over the same time period, it is significantly more than the $17,661,021 (Shs65.6b) Djibouti—a major US ally in the Horn of Africa enclave—received during that time. 

The equipment received included mine resistant ambush protected vehicles. Critics of the regime argue that this military support has entrenched the government and led to the clampdown of civil liberties and egregious human rights abuses, especially of Opposition politicians. 

At a recent rally in Mbale, National Unity Platform (NUP) party leader, Robert Kyagulanyi, alias Bobi Wine, called on the US to halt providing the Ugandan government with military assistance.

“This is a message to the EU and the Americans. We are asking you to stop sponsoring the dictator,” he said.

Kulayigye rejects this view. He opines, “Our government has not been entrenched by Western allies. It has been entrenched by the electorate. So, to undermine the power of the vote is a product of a neo-colonised mind who thinks you must endear yourself to the West in order to govern your country.”

Boon for Uganda
According to the author Helen Epstein in her book titled Another Fine Mess: America, Uganda and the War on Terror, shortly after the September 11 attacks, Museveni hired Ms Rosa Whitaker, “a shrewd Bible-quoting African-American lobbyist and former assistant trade representative in the Clinton and George W Bush administrations” to promote his image in Washington as an expert on the Somalia situation. 

In 2003, Whitaker arranged Museveni’s White House visit and sent letters reminding State Department officials that Museveni was “strongly supporting the US in the global war against terrorism.” Soon, presidents Bush and Museveni were speaking frequently by telephone. 

Critics proffer that this war on terror has turned into a boon for Uganda to pursue a game of brinkmanship in its military adventures across the Great Lakes and Horn of Africa. 

For instance, in 2019, a year in which Uganda received Shs9.2 billion in military training assistance, there was public outcry regarding the conduct of military personnel during interventions in civil matters.

These concerns were reflected in a motion passed by the 10th Parliament in December 2019, to inquire into the conduct of the UPDF during deployment in civil matters following allegations of gross human rights violations.

During the House sitting on December 11, 2019, then Speaker Rebecca Kadaga revealed that she had received threats for her criticism of the army. The inquiry subsequently came to naught.

Two years earlier, security operatives had raided Parliament in September 2017 during a debate on the Constitutional Amendment to lift the age restrictions that barred President Museveni from running for president. 

Kulayigye says the UPDF’s record of upholding human rights compares favourably with that of its allies in the West.

“Which army observes human rights more than the UPDF […] Because even if individuals among us misbehave, we take them to task. We are the only army that has executed its own—126,” he revealed, adding, “Name me just one soldier from the US who was executed for violating human rights.”

Uganda has benefitted from its close ties with the US military in the last two decades of the war on terror, however this has come at a great cost domestically, with curtailed freedoms and a democratic deficit in the face of unchecked militarisation, critics opine.

Issue
Uganda has benefitted from its close ties with the US military in the last two decades of the war on terror, however this has come at a great cost domestically, with curtailed freedoms and a democratic deficit in the face of unchecked militarisation, critics opine.