Uganda’s powerful army chief, General Muhoozi Kainerugaba, issued an unexpected apology to the United States on Friday, retracting incendiary claims that the U.S. Embassy had been assisting fugitive opposition leader Bobi Wine and disrupting bilateral military cooperation.
Muhoozi, who doubles as Commander of the Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) and is the son of long-serving President Yoweri Museveni, posted the apology on X after initially deleting earlier tweets in which he had announced a complete suspension of cooperation with the U.S. diplomatic mission in Kampala.
“I want to apologise to our great friends, the United States, for my earlier tweets that I have now deleted,” Muhoozi wrote. “I was being fed with wrong information. I have spoken with the US Ambassador to our country, and everything is okay.”
Therefore, his reversal came barely an hour after the original posts, in which he accused the U.S. Embassy of coordinating with Wine, who has been missing after rejecting the results of last month’s disputed presidential election. In those now-deleted messages, Muhoozi said Uganda was suspending “ALL cooperation with the current administration at the US Embassy in Kampala,” including joint military work in Somalia, where Ugandan troops play a leading role in regional security efforts.
Observers say the episode highlights the heightened tensions surrounding Uganda’s January 15 election, in which President Museveni, 81, secured a seventh term, and the fraught relationship between Kampala and Western partners over human rights and democratic governance. Opposition leader Robert Kyagulanyi Ssentamu, popularly known as Bobi Wine, has rejected the election result as “blatant theft” and called for protests, even as a government crackdown intensifies.
Furthermore, wine’s disappearance into hiding and his subsequent accusations that security forces raided his home prompted international concern. His wife, Barbara Kyagulanyi, has said soldiers roughed her up and forced her to attempt to unlock her husband’s phone during the raid, claims the military has denied.
In the days leading up to Muhoozi’s apology, he had garnered criticism abroad for the tone and content of his social media posts. Rights groups and foreign governments have expressed alarm over the arrests of thousands of opposition supporters, allegations of killings during post-election unrest, and muzzling of dissent.
Though his apology appears to have calmed what could have been a serious diplomatic rift, analysts warn that underlying strains between Uganda’s leadership and Western partners, especially the United States, over governance and military cooperation may persist if the broader political crisis deepens.
