Kulayigye reappointed UPDF spokesman
Brig Gen Felix Kulaigye has been appointed as the substantive Defence Spokesperson.
The Chief of Defence Forces, Gen Wilson Mbandi, has reappointed Brig Gen Felix Kulayigye as the substantive Defence and army spokesperson.
“The appointment takes immediate effect,” reads a statement from the acting Defence spokesperson, Lt Col Ronald Kakurungu.
Brig Gen Kulayigye who once served as Defence and Army Spokesperson between 2005 and 2013, replaces Brig Gen Flavia Byekwaso who handed over office three weeks ago as she left for a one-year training course at the newly established National Defence College in Jinja.
Kulayigye also once served as the UPDF Chief Political Commissar. In 2016, he was elected to serve as a Member of Parliament representing the UPDF in the 10th Parliament (2016 to 2021).
In 2005, Kulayigye, whose name means “grow up and learn”, was appointed deputy spokesman, before taking over as UPDF/ Ministry of Defence Spokesman in November the same year.
“I had reservations, I actually feared it. It was a job I never wanted to do but in the military when you are deployed you have no choice,” he told this publcation in 2013 of how he felt leaving the jungles where he was hunting for Joseph Kony, to come and speak for the army.
Kulayigye joined the army in 1989 after graduating with a degree in education from Makerere University. He acquired his Masters in Economic Policy and Planning in the same university. He rose through the ranks from serving at the Presidential Press Unit from where he was transferred on President Museveni’s orders for pushing away women forcing their way to the president. He once served as Aide de camp to then Col. Kahinda Otafiire and at the rank of captain where he commanded a hunt for LRA rebels in the Acholi region before being posted to public relations.
