SUMMARY
UFM (Uganda Freedom Movement) was a Ugandan rebel group that was involved in the conflict against the regime of Milton Obote in the early 1980s. The origin of the group was tied to in-fighting in the ruling coalition government; after having overthrown former president Idi Amin in 1979, the victorious UNLF had taken over power in the country, but its unity soon fell apart. In the subsequent struggle for power, a string of governments replaced each other. Directly after the toppling of Amin, the leader of UNLF, Yusef Lule had become provisional president of the country. When he was dislodged from power in June the same year, one of his ministers, Andrew K. Kayiira, left the UNLF and went on to create UFM. In February 1981, the group announced an armed struggle aimed at toppling the newly installed Obote regime, which it claimed had rigged the 1980 elections. UFM, with its armed wing UFA (Ugandan Freedom Army), aimed to reach its goal through quick, coup d’état-like attacks in urban areas.
While it was Andrew K. Kayiira that founded the group, Balaki Kirya was elected chairman. Another prominent member was Arnold Bisase, and most sources talk of a joint leadership between these three. With the exception of Kayiira, who spent part of his time in Uganda, the executive was based in Nairobi. The group was fractious from the start, and this was largely due to the fact that each member of the executive in Nairobi had his own fighters in Uganda, and would order attacks without first clearing it with the rest of the leadership, thus fragmenting the group.
Well-informed sources set the rough size of UFM at a few thousand fighters, some of which had a background as soldiers in the colonial, Amin and UNLF government armies. In general, UFM drew much of its support from Western- and business oriented groups. Ethnically, it was especially strong amongst the Baganda, the largest ethnic group in the country. Relations between the Baganda and Obote had been tense since 1966, when the latter during his first stint in power abolished the group’s semi-autonomous kingdom and subsequently sent troops to quell a secession attempt. Thus, geographically, UFM was strong in zones with large Baganda populations in southern and eastern Uganda, where its fighters could even move freely in some areas. Operationally, the group focused mainly on attacking urban areas, and it had fighters based in the capital Kampala, as well as in Mukono just east of the capital, and Mpigi southwest of Kampala.
At the time of the birth of UFM, Uganda as a whole was going through a very turbulent period, and the group co-existed with numerous other armed challengers to the government. Despite this, and probably due to the disparate nature of the organizations, there was very little coordination between them. However, UFM was involved in one attempt at coordinating the armed struggle. In 1981, the leadership of the group met with fellow rebel groups NRA and UNRF) under the sponsorship and Chairmanship of the Libyan leader Col. Gaddafi. The talks led to the signing of the Tripoli Agreement, under which the Ugandan Popular Front was formed as an umbrella organization that intended to unite the three movements. However, Ugandan Popular Front failed to materialize on the ground, and UFM, NRA and UNRF subsequently simply opted to maintain good relations. Aside from this attempt at collaboration with other rebel groups, UFM received support from Libya in the form of military training, funds and possibly also arms. Furthermore, the group received support from the government of Kenya, which permitted low-key political activity by the UFM’s exiled leaders in Nairobi.
The beginning of the end for the group came with a large-scale attack against the Malire Barracks in the capital. Due to a lack of training and bad planning, the group ended up losing large quantities of arms and ammunition. Furthermore, the spectacular attack shook the government, which subsequently had its agents infiltrate UFM. This resulted in the storming of the group’s camps in August, and to the capture of several hundreds of fighters in September; after this, UFM disintegrated and failed to have any more impact militarily. However, when Obote was overthrown in a coup in late July 1985, UFM reorganized and joined the Military Council that ruled Uganda between August 1985 and January 1986. When the Military Council was ousted by NRA in January 1986, the group joined the victorious forces and was integrated in the 35th Battalion of NRA, as the latter became the government army. With these events, the groups seized to exist as an independent entity in UCDP data.
