With no one in his Oyima clan, his Lango ethnic group, or even his Uganda People's Congress (UPC) party ever boldly defending his 1966 assault on Mengo, President Apollo Milton Obote must be smiling in his simple grave in Abeibuti Village, Akokoro Sub-county.
He has, posthumously, found an unapologetic political heir in the most unexpected place—a Muganda lawyer and born-again Christian: Sam Mayanja.
A celebrated lawyer and now Lands Minister, Mayanja is also a pastor, which makes one wonder: could it be that defending Obote is part of God’s will for him?
Let me explain.
The 1966 attack on the Buganda Kingdom remains one of the most sensitive and painful episodes in Uganda’s post-independence history.
So contentious was the event that even Obote himself never dared mention it during his second stint in power (1980–85). To this day, many Baganda regard the attack as a grave insult to their seven-century-old cultural heritage.
Kabaka Mutesa II, the then-King of Buganda and first President of Uganda, immortalised the trauma in his autobiography The Desecration of My Kingdom, published in 1967. And yet, almost six decades later, Sam Mayanja continues to openly celebrate the events of 1966 as a triumph—a “successful revolution” that unified Uganda into a republic.
In his latest piece, published on Nile Post on May 13, 2025, and titled, 'This is why Mengo Establishment attempt using Buganda to capture power may explode', Mayanja wrote:
“The Mengo privileges ended with the 1966 successful revolution ushering in the 1967 Republican Constitution, ending Mengo’s 70-year rule of Uganda through Buganda.”
Echoing Obote’s justification that the attack on Mengo was preemptive, Mayanja went on to accuse Mengo of trying to “capture power” again—this time using groups like Nkoba za Mbogo and the elite class he calls Bakungu, who head Buganda’s commercial entities like CBS Radio, Buganda Land Board, Majestic Brands, and others. According to him, these groups push a hidden political agenda in the name of Buganda nationalism.
He ends his article with a chilling prediction:
“Mengo’s attempt to control the Buganda mob in order to take Uganda power shall meet the same 1966 attempt.”
This remark must have sent a shiver down the spines of many in Mengo and the wider Buganda region, which he generically refers to as the “Central region.”
Why?
Because the events of 1966 were not just political—they were deeply traumatic. That fateful attack forced Kabaka Mutesa II to flee by jumping over a wall, trekking through the jungle to Rwanda, before eventually seeking exile in London.
His ancestral palace, the Lubiri, was turned into a military barracks, and the Lukiiko (Buganda’s parliament) was renamed "Republic House" and converted into army headquarters.
The humiliation was complete. Mutesa died a pauper in a dilapidated flat—28 Orchard House, Rotherhithe, in London—on British welfare. To this day, the Baganda have not forgiven Obote. When he died on October 5, 2005, people danced in the streets.
Armed militia even threatened to seize and burn his body if it was brought via the Kampala–Gulu highway, forcing the family to reroute through Jinja, Mbale, Soroti, and Lira.
Against that historical pain, some in Obote’s Oyima clan might now view Mayanja’s vocal support as a vindication of their late kinsman's actions.
Some may even jokingly—or seriously—propose that Mayanja be inducted into the clan and renamed Sam Obote Mayanja, or perhaps Sam Akaki Iburahim Mayanja, after Obote’s beloved grandfather, Iburahim Akaki, who once fought alongside Kabaka Mwanga and Omukama Kabalega against colonial forces.
But let me be clear: I do not support Obote’s attack on Mengo, nor do I condone Mayanja’s glorification of it.
Even if Obote believed the kingdom posed a political threat, he could have preserved the Lubiri and Bulange as national monuments. Turning them into military outposts was a symbolic act of cultural desecration, not national unity.
And I must add this: Ugandans should be alarmed by my "cousin" Dr Mayanja’s prophecy of a repeat of 1966. That singular event was the genesis of the instability we still battle today—tribalism, corruption, inequality, and mass youth unemployment.
Our children and grandchildren deserve a better legacy.
The NRM government, the Buganda Kingdom, and all Ugandans have a shared duty to build a future defined not by recycled tribal conflicts, but by genuine unity, inclusion, and opportunity.
The coming general elections will be a watershed moment—to either silence, or escalate, the drums of yet another self-destructive tribal war.
Dr Sam Akaki is a Ugandan citizen